Athletics @ Rangers: August 6th-8th

[Molina00]

Game 1 Recap
Yesterday's series opener against Oakland almost turned out to be a big game for Texas. The fell way behind early, battled back to tie the game and force extra innings, but couldn't pull out a win. Had they scored in extras instead of the A's it would have ended a 4 game losing skid.

John Rheinecker made the start for Texas and got off to a shaky start, to say the least. Oakland bombed him for 6 runs in the 1st inning, including a Marco Scutaro grand slam. The A's added 1 more run in the 3rd to take a 7-0 lead and that would be the end of their scoring until the 13th inning.

The Rangers got the rally going in the bottom of the 3rd scoring 3 runs off Oakland starter Dallas Braden. Texas put 3 more runs on the board in the 8th, 2 of which came courtesy of Jason Botts first homerun of the season, to make it a 7-6 game. Michael Young slammed his 5th homerun of the season in the 9th inning to tie the game at 7 and force extra innings.

Both team's bullpens held each other scoreless for the 10th through 12th innings before Oakland broke through against Willie Eyre in the 13th. The A's put 2 runs on the board to take the lead and the Rangers failed to get anything going against Kiko Calero in the bottom of the inning. Oakland went on to win 9-7 and deal the Rangers their 5th straight loss, despite a 15-hit attack.

[metsguy]

This is the first year in a while that Oakland realy isn't in the hunt for the playoffs