The Texas Rangers finished a four game series with the New York Yankees last night with a 3-0 loss, to split the series 2-2. About a month ago the Rangers beat the Yankees by winning two out of three games in New York. The Yankees were in a mini slump at the time and have played much better since then. So when the Yanks came to Arlington to play a four game series, I took the series to be a precursor of how far along the Rangers have played so far and what to expect the rest of the way. If they played New York well I thought they'd have a shot at making the playoffs via the Wild Card.
To me this series would show me how good or bad Texas really is. They won the first two games of the series with bats-a-blazing, but New York's pitching extinguished the Rangers' hot scoring to hold them to 2 runs in two games with the 4th game being a shut-out. So what they showed me is that they can beat a good team if the opponents' pitching is mediocre and they can hold their own against an equally offensive minded team when faced with a top shelf pitcher. For example in game 4, the Rangers' starting pitcher gave up 2 runs in 7 innings. Not bad for a pitching staff that's not known for keeping opponents from scoring.
With all this said, I think Texas has an outside chance of making the playoffs this year. After the Yankees' series, they're heading out east to play Baltimore in a 3 game set and then Boston for 3 more before they host the East leading Tampa Bay Rays (still want to call them DevilRays) for the first 3 games of a 9 game homestand. Even if they don't come back from out East 3 out of 6 this time around, they will have laid the groundwork for next season. This team has shown that it can come back from 5 or 6 runs deficits to win games, and for all these young guys to experience these comebacks shows what they have the skills to be successful.
