New park, new offense: Solak fuels Rangers

ARLINGTON -- The Rangers' starter lasted only four innings, and their offense did not hit a home run.

That's often caused problems for Texas in the past, but that was not the case Tuesday night. Mike Minor was better, an overpowering bullpen made up for his short outing and the lineup, led by Nick Solak, put together enough winning offense.

Put it all together, and this is how the Rangers will need to win more often than not in their new ballpark, and with an offense not nearly as powerful as in the past. Texas took a four-run lead early and held on for a 4-2 victory over Seattle at Globe Life Field, its fourth win in five games this homestand.

• Box score

“Overall, it was great,” manager Chris Woodward said. “Honestly, we needed that. Just a solid win. We got hits when we needed to, we scored runs and held it the whole time. We’ve got to find a way to win any game we can, honestly. We needed that one today.”

The Rangers had All-Star left-hander Mike Minor on a pitch restriction after he went 0-3 with a 6.89 ERA over his first three starts. The goal was to keep Minor around 75 pitches in an effort to start rebuilding his stamina, and the results were encouraging.

Minor went four scoreless innings, allowing a hit and three walks while striking out four. He threw 67 pitches through three innings, then set down the Mariners’ order on nine pitches in the fourth. That put him at 76, and that was the end of his night.

“I felt better,” Minor said. “I wasn’t happy with Woody not letting me go out for the fifth, but the ball was coming out better tonight. I felt I made better pitches. We stuck with the fastball more than usual. It is something to build on.”

The Rangers had been concerned about Minor’s velocity over his first three starts, and he averaged 90.9 mph with his fastball in this outing, the highest of his four starts. He also had five swing-and-misses with the pitch, equalling the number he had over his first three starts.

“I thought Mike was really good,” Woodward said. “I actually let him go further than I anticipated. He was begging me to go back out for the fifth, because he felt good. That was a good sign. His velocity was still hovering around 90-91 [mph]. He came out feeling really good about it, which was awesome.”

Solak, who has started six straight games in center field, tied a career high with three hits while driving in three runs. He is hitting .400 (10-for-25) in his past seven games, going 6-for-13 in the past three.

Solak put the Rangers ahead with a bases-loaded, two-run single in the first. In the third, Isiah Kiner-Falefa led off with a double and Joey Gallo was hit by a pitch with one out. Solak and Willie Calhoun followed with back-to-back RBI singles to give the Rangers a 4-0 lead.

Kiner-Falefa’s double was Texas' only extra-base hit, and it is now 4-3 in games in which it did not hit a home run. The Rangers were 34-89 in such games in the last three seasons at Globe Life Park.

“The more ways you can win a game, the more games you are going to win,” Solak said. “We are not always going to hit home runs, but we can string together good at-bats, get guys on base and get timely hitting. An offense clicks when you are putting together good at-bats and not necessarily relying on home runs.”

The Rangers were 23-38 over the past three seasons when their starter went four or fewer innings. The Mariners scored two runs off Nick Goody in the fifth, but the back-end bullpen combination of Edinson Vólquez, Joely Rodríguez, Jonathan Hernández and Rafael Montero combined to retire 13 straight batters to close out the win.

“It went better than anticipated,” Woodward said. “From the fifth on, it was pretty important as a ballclub to show if we get the ball to these guys at the back end, we are going to win a lot of games.”