ARLINGTON, Texas — With Houston arriving to play in front of a crowd in Arlington for the first time in the 18 months since their sign-stealing scandal broke, Rangers fans finally got their long-awaited chance to boo the opposing hitters Friday.
They also got a chance to cheer their own.
The waits only seemed equal.
Within earshot of the franchise record for consecutive scoreless innings, the Rangers offense, already no-hit once this week, awoke from its slumber in a 7-5 ,10-inning walk-off win over the Astros in front of 30,445 fans. Dak Prescott, in a Nick Solak jersey, was among them.
The crowd certainly exercised its right to free speech, starting with the first time Houston leadoff hitter Jose Altuve’s name was announced. The booing of those who were regulars from the 2017 World Series winners, tainted by a trash can-banging sign-stealing system, only stopped long enough for the crowd to finally exhale on the Rangers’ struggling offense. Then it resumed again, even more throaty than it had been. Until the Astros silenced them with a three-run eighth-inning rally against Joely Rodriguez and closer Ian Kennedy. And then scored the go-ahead run in the 10th.
It only set up the ultimate cheer: A three-run homer, the official calling card of Adolis García, with two outs in the 10th. It was the Rangers’ first walk-off homer at Globe Life Field. García’s homer came on a 1-0 fastball and followed a walk by Joey Gallo. It was García’s fourth three-run homer of the season and fourth homer in the ninth inning or later.
Game. Blouses.
The crowd turned its attention to the Rangers when just-activated Brock Holt’s opposite-field homer in the third snapped a 24-inning scoreless streak for the Rangers, four shy of the club record for futility that had existed since the middle of its first season in Texas.
Holt’s homer also served as a beacon for the Rangers offense, Tyler Ivey in his major league debut. Somebody had to do it. Against Ivey’s heavy dose of breaking balls, it required patience and a willingness to use the larger portions of the field, rather than trying to pull the ball. A veritable avalanche of hits the opposite way and up the middle followed.
While the Rangers broke one streak, Kyle Gibson extended another: Though he had a lot of high-stress innings, he allowed just one run in six innings. It was his ninth consecutive quality start, tying the club record for such a streak. He got a late assist from catcher Jose Trevino. After Gibson fell down 3-0 to Carlos Correa and was already past 100 pitches, Trevino yanked a pair of low change-ups back into the zone to get an eventual inning-ending called third strike.
Trevino was also endemic of a Rangers offense that seemed to hear manager Chris Woodward’s caution against getting too “tentative,” even as they were struggling. Trevino moved up from first to second on a fly ball to left in the fifth, then scored the Rangers’ fourth run on a two-out single up the middle by Nate Lowe.
The other two runs had scored on García’s double up the alley in right center — another opposite field hit — in a two-strike count in the fourth. García had stayed back on a slider. Ivey attacked the Rangers the same way as has become the style of the day: Lots of secondary stuff.
He threw 40 fastballs (50.6%) and 39 other pitches: A slider, curve and change. As teams have noted the Rangers lead the league in batting average against fastballs, they’ve gone to a heavier and heavier rotation of secondary pitches. Going into Friday, the Rangers had seen the lowest percentage of fastballs of any team in the majors in May: 50.9%. They hit .196 against all that other stuff.
“Hitting breaking balls and changeups is a skill, not a talent,” hitting coach Luis Ortiz said before the game. “And the stuff they are seeing is different than anything they saw in the minors. So, it’s just learning. Their database is growing. They are going to solve some of those problems eventually. We went through a period where we were doing well and the league has adjusted. Now we have to adjust back. It’s a difficult cat and mouse game. I don’t like to lose. But I enjoy seeing them attack this. They are getting better. The results might not be showing right away. But they are getting better day by day.”
On Friday, the results showed.
And it gave the crowd something to cheer about.
