The Rangers’ position in the standings hasn’t drastically worsened after their 3-2 loss to the Twins on Thursday night, but the defending World Series champions now face a troubling situation. They’ve dropped to 10 games below .500 and are 10 games behind in the American League West, highlighting the “tougher climb” to playoff contention, as manager Bruce Bochy put it.
“You never know in this game — that’s why you keep going hard, and that’s what we will do,” Bochy said. “Of course, it’s more challenging being 10 games back. A lot needs to happen. The first thing that has to happen is, we’ve got to win ballgames.”
The Rangers were close to securing a win on Thursday at Globe Life Field, thanks to a determined performance by starter Cody Bradford, who allowed just two earned runs over six innings. However, closer Kirby Yates faltered in the ninth inning of a tied game, walking two Minnesota batters with one out and surrendering the game-winning run on Carlos Santana’s sacrifice fly.
Yates’ misstep proved crucial, as the Rangers’ offense, which had largely disappeared after the early innings, went down in order in the ninth. The Texas lineup struggled to generate any offense after their initial burst, where Marcus Semien led off with an infield single, Josh Smith walked, and Adolis García delivered an RBI single followed by Josh Jung’s sacrifice fly to score their only runs of the night.
“We just couldn’t get much going after the first inning,” Bochy said. “We had a couple chances there … it’s a tough one.”
The Rangers found some solace Thursday night in Cody Bradford’s performance, as the young pitcher pushed deeper into the game than he had in any of his previous 13 career starts. Bradford threw a total of 104 pitches, including a taxing 29-pitch sixth inning.
In that inning, Bradford walked the leadoff batter and then needed nine pitches to strike out Willi Castro, who fouled off four two-strike pitches before Bradford finally got him swinging on a high fastball. After Kyle Farmer singled, manager Bruce Bochy opted to stick with Bradford. Bochy’s decision paid off, though it wasn’t easy—Bradford had to labor through 12 more pitches to secure the final two outs on fly balls.
Bochy, visibly tense on the top step of the dugout, had reliever José Leclerc warmed up and ready, but he chose to trust the 26-year-old from nearby Aledo to finish the inning.
