Bullpen can't close out Mets as Rangers fall to 3rd place

NEW YORK -- The Rangers took this week’s three-game set against the Mets and it looked like they had seemingly fixed one big issue: They started scoring in the late innings. But another issue remained -- the bullpen -- and it reared its head as Texas was unable to complete the sweep with a 6-5, 10-inning loss on Wednesday night at Citi Field.

The Rangers fell to third place in the American League West for the first time this season, one game behind the Astros and the Mariners, who both won Wednesday. With head-to-head record determining tiebreakers in the standings, Texas has the edge over Seattle, 5-1, with seven games remaining between the clubs. The Rangers are 4-6 vs. Houston and would need to sweep the final series between the teams from Sept. 4-6 to hold the tiebreaker.

Despite falling behind, 3-0, in the second inning against the Mets -- as Texas starter Dane Dunning gave up back-to-back homers to Daniel Vogelbach and DJ Stewart and an RBI double to Brandon Nimmo -- the Rangers’ offense stormed back to take the lead with three runs in the top of the eighth.

Instead of riding the offensive outburst to victory, the Rangers logged their fourth blown lead in the eighth inning or later during this nine-game, three-city road trip.

Every blown lead on the road trip has come from a different Texas relief pitcher. Wednesday, it was José Leclerc, who was on the hottest stretch of his season with a 0.00 ERA in 8 2/3 August innings entering the day. He surrendered a game-tying two-run homer to Stewart in the eighth inning. Meanwhile, Aroldis Chapman handed the Mets the game-winner on a bases-loaded hit-by-pitch from Stewart, who terrorized the Rangers all game.

The struggles of Leclerc and Chapman overshadowed the work of Martín Pérez and Will Smith, who combined for 4 2/3 innings of scoreless ball to keep the game within striking distance.

“José’s been throwing the ball well, it’s just a misplaced fastball,” said manager Bruce Bochy. “[The bullpen] has actually been doing some pretty good things. I'm not gonna dwell on what didn't go well as much as what they are doing well, and I’m encouraged at some things that are happening. Yeah, you're gonna look at this game and say, ‘Well, it got away from us,’ but that was really one pitch and one hard-hit ball off José. Like I said, he has been throwing the ball well.”

The obvious bullpen struggles aside, Bochy said it was just as disappointing to not cash in on a few opportunities on the offensive end, especially in the 10th inning when Texas had the bases loaded with no outs but didn’t get a run across.

The Rangers were 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position while stranding nine runners on base.

“It would have been nice to cash in a little bit more, no question,” Bochy said. “Obviously, you're hoping to put a game away and we couldn't quite do it tonight, even though we had some good at-bats mixed in. We also had a couple of at-bats that didn't go too well.”

The loss to the Mets concluded the road stretch for the Rangers, as they went 3-6 between Arizona, Minnesota and New York. Of those losses, three came in extra innings (one in each city).

“Everything didn’t go well,” Bochy said. “Yeah, we've let some games slip away, and we have to get better at that. There's no getting around it. I think it has been getting better, but this is what you deal with. We'll put this behind us and go on the day off tomorrow. We’ll regroup. I think some fellas need a break. We're home for a while. Hopefully, we'll get clicking.”

As far as the bullpen is concerned, help isn’t exactly on the way. The Rangers acquired Chapman and Chris Stratton at the Trade Deadline. The options at Triple-A Round Rock like Jonathan Hernández and Alex Speas didn’t seize their opportunities earlier this season and there’s not many others behind them ready.

The waiver deadline is Thursday, but Texas has played so well to this point that it’s hard to see any of those options falling so low in the claim order.

“With internal additions, guys have to play their way into that,” general manager Chris Young said on Tuesday. “Obviously, there's some external things that you can always keep an eye on, but that's not within our control completely either. Kind of a tough thing to answer, but I stand by -- all season long, we've done our best to try to give this team every chance to win. We'll continue to do that.”