Rangers falter in clutch, stumble in extra innings

ARLINGTON -- Game after game, the 2023 Texas Rangers have seemed to hit all the right buttons, win all the close games and get all the clutch hits.

On Monday night at Globe Life Field, the opposite happened. The Rangers suffered one of their worst losses of the season, falling to the Angels, 9-6 in 12 innings, behind a two-homer game from two-way star Shohei Ohtani.

Early on, it seemed like business as usual for Texas.

The Rangers hopped out to a 5-0 lead after three innings, thanks to a three-run homer from Ezequiel Duran and a pair of RBI hits from Josh Jung and Mitch Garver.

But then the offense went silent in the following frames as the Angels stormed back into the game, capped off with a game-tying solo homer from Ohtani in the seventh inning off Texas rookie Grant Anderson that would send it to extra innings.

“It was a hard-fought game on both sides,” said Rangers manager Bruce Bochy. “Starting with [starting pitcher] Dane Dunning, he wasn't quite on top of his game. It was a battle for him to go five innings, and we got hurt with the Ohtani homer.

"You looked at that game and a lot of good things did happen, especially the job that some of those guys did in the bullpen. ... But the only thing you can do when you have runners in scoring position is hit the ball hard. We did that and they made some nice plays, and we just couldn't get one to fall in for us.”

One of the best offenses in the Majors was silenced for more than half of the game, going 4-for-21 with runners in scoring position and stranding 16 baserunners in 12 innings.

The top four batters in the Rangers’ order -- Marcus Semien, Corey Seager, Nathaniel Lowe and Adolis García -- scuffled the entire night, combining to go 2-for-21 with four walks, three of which came from Seager.

For what felt like the first time this season, it was the bullpen that kept Texas in the game.

Relievers Josh Sborz, Will Smith and Cole Ragans combined for 4 1/3 scoreless innings behind Anderson to keep the game tied for as long as possible until Ohtani’s second homer -- in Ragans' second inning of work -- gave the Angels the lead in the top of the 12th.

“I have to execute my pitches,” Ragans said. “I didn't execute and they made me pay for the pitches that I didn't execute.”

“Those guys are unbelievable,” Ragans said about the rest of the bullpen. “They're back-of-the-bullpen guys for a reason. They throw those high-leverage innings for a reason. They went out there and did what they've done all year, I felt like.”

Even so, the Rangers had numerous chances to win the game, especially in extra innings. They had two runners in scoring position in the ninth inning, and the automatic runner reached third base in the 10th and 12th innings. But the Angels made play after play, keeping the game tight through all 12 innings.

After the Halos put up a four-spot in the top of the 12th to take the lead, Texas scratched one across in the bottom half, but it wasn’t nearly enough, even as the tying run came to the plate.

But like much of the night, the Rangers just couldn’t come through with a big hit.

“We had our chances,” Bochy said. “[Leody] Taveras smoked one to second base and they made a nice play. Marcus hits a bullet to the shortstop. It hit off his chest and he recovered to make a nice play. Josh Jung, line drive, those balls just couldn’t find holes.

“That's tough luck, it is a tough loss. But like I said, you can't do any more than hit the ball hard. You look at the fight in this club, we're down and we get the tying run up there with a good hitter, and it just didn't happen that way. These are tough ones, but these are games you have to bounce back from.”