Thursday, July 10, 2008

Texas Rangers 5, LA Angels 4

By Pegasus News wire

ARLINGTON — The Texas Rangers played a storybook game Wednesday night in Arlington, defeating the LA Angels 5-4 with a walk-off home run in the bottom of the ninth at Rangers Ballpark. The win improves the Rangers to 48-44, the first time they've been four games above .500 since 2006 and within 6 1/2 games of the division-leading Angels.

Photo not provided by the LA Angels

K-Rod? More like K-Rud.

The Rangers were down 4-2 heading into the bottom of the ninth, and were facing the major league's best closer in Francisco "K-Rod" Rodríguez. Rodriguez, who has 36 saves before the All-Star break, walked pinch hitter Ramón Vázquez before striking out Ian Kinsler. Michael Young then singled in Vázquez to make it 4-3, before Josh Hamilton knocked one out of the park for a dramatic two-run, two-out walk-off homerun.

According to Hamilton, it was the first walk-off home run of his career. The shot gave him two more RBI to add to his league-leading total of 89. It was also Hamilton's first home run in 70 at-bats and 19 games.

Rangers 'starter' Warner Madrigal --a converted outfielder who spent seven years in the Angels' organization-- lasted just three innings, but gave up relatively little over that span: just one run and four hits, while walking none and striking out one. Madrigal was relieved by Josh Rupe, who gave up one run over the next three innings, and Frank Francisco, who gave up a two-run home run to put the Rangers down 4-2.

Jamey Wright pitched a scoreless eighth and ninth innings for his fifth win of the season.

Ian Kinsler went 1-for-5 to extend his career-best hitting streak to 21 games, but struck out three times. Michael Young went 3-for-5 with an RBI and a run scored, while David Murphy went 2-for-3 with a walk and a run scored.

Posted by Todd M.

Related stories

• Pegasus News Week in View: m.pegnews.com edition (July 10, 2008)

See more stories in:

• Baseball > MLB > Rangers