Early not an issue, Rangers again stumble late

ARLINGTON -- Starter Cole Hamels looked as sharp as he has so far this season, but it still wasn't good enough to get the Rangers turned around in their own ballpark.
Instead, the Rangers lost another one in the late innings as the Athletics pulled away to a 3-2 victory on Tuesday night at Globe Life Park. The loss was Texas' 12th in 15 home games. The Rangers are 1-4 on the current homestand, and all four losses have come with the go-ahead run in the seventh.
The Rangers also may have lost third baseman Adrián Beltré for a significant period of time as he had to exit the game in the eighth inning with a left hamstring strain.

"It's a tough blow," Hamels said. "He is a big part of our offense. Big part of our defense, just who he is and what he brings to the team, especially in the lineup. You don't want to see that."
Hamels has three losses at home and is 0-5 with a 7.32 ERA in his last five starts at Globe Life. Prior to that, he had won eight consecutive decisions at home. The Rangers' Opening Day starter is now 1-4 with 4.41 ERA after six starts.
"I thought he did a good job with the offspeed stuff," Rangers manager Jeff Banister said. "Pretty gutsy performance by him to be able to maneuver through the innings and the [baserunners]. Great use of the curve, slider and changeup, and enough fastballs to keep them off the offspeed stuff. He really battled through all that."
Hamels allowed just two runs on five hits and two walks through 6 1/3 innings, but three hit batters also caused some more trouble.
"Having so many baserunners is not something you prefer," Hamels said. "It was a tough situation, hitting as many guys as I did. They definitely have some power and I'm just trying to minimize the damage. They ran up my pitch count and made it difficult to go deep in the game. You have to battle through it and just try to put up as many zeros as you can."
Hamels and Athletics counterpart Andrew Triggs pitched five scoreless innings. The Athletics finally scored in the top of the sixth on Mark Canha's home run. The Rangers tied it in the bottom of the inning when Beltre hit a sacrifice fly with the bases loaded and one out.

Hamels' outing came to an end with one out in the seventh when he gave up a double to Marcus Semien. Matt Bush took over and walked Matt Joyce after getting ahead 0-2 in the count. Jed Lowrie followed with a double to center to drive home the go-ahead run. Joyce stopped at third on the play and then, with Khris Davis up, got picked off by catcher Robinson Chirinos.

Matt Olson had an RBI double in the top of the eighth that made it 3-1. Beltre drove home Shin-Soo Choo with what should have been an RBI double in the bottom of the eighth, but he had to stop at first because of the leg injury.
MOMENTS THAT MATTERED
Rangers right fielder Nomar Mazara just missed taking away a home run from Canha in the sixth. Mazara got his glove over the wall and had the ball, only to let it slip out from what would have been a terrific catch.

SOUND SMART
Hamels hit three batters in the game. He got Olson on the hand in the second and Stephen Piscotty on the foot later that inning. He also plunked Chad Pinder in the third on the foot. This was only the second time in 368 career starts that Hamels hit three batters in a game. The other was on April 20, 2016, against the Astros. Those outings are tied for the most hit batters by a Rangers pitcher in one game.
YOU GOTTA SEE THIS
Delino DeShields made a tremendous catch to take away extra bases from Jonathan Lucroy in the eighth. According to Statcast™, DeShields needed to cover 109 ft to get to the ball and actually ran 111 ft, so a great route. He had 5.6 seconds to get there and had 29.5 ft/sec sprint speed (close to the 30 ft/sec elite level). DeShields also got a bonus for the knock being a "wall ball" and all of that adds up to a 4 percent catch probability. Call it a five-star play.

UP NEXT
Right-handed pitcher Doug Fister is scheduled to come off the disabled list and start against the Athletics at 7:05 p.m. CT Wednesday. This will be his first start since April 9 and Banister said he should be on a normal 95-100 pitch count. Right-hander Kendall Graveman will pitch for the Athletics.