The night in Detroit for Texas featured seven scoreless innings from starting pitcher Jon Gray, and four different Rangers batters collecting multiple hits on their way to a 7-0 win as the team flirts with .500 with a 31-33 record this season.
The win elevates Gray’s record to 2-3 in his first season with the ballclub.
“Any time you can get on the board like that, especially when you’ve got a good pitcher like Jon Gray, it kind of settles him down, and he can go out and throw some zeros up on the board,” Ranger’s skipper Chris Woodward told MLB.com.
Brett Martin tossed a scoreless eight, Garett Richard followed suit in the ninth, and the Rangers now lead the series with Detroit, 2-0, ensuring the Rangers a split in the four-game set.
Texas led the game with a walk by Marcus Semien, a single by Corey Seager, and a double by Adolis Garcia to score Semien. Ranger catcher Jonah Hiem was next to the dish prompting a mound visit from the Tigers coaches for a chat with hurler Tarik Skubal.
The talk did not work.
Heim slapped a 0-2, 78.3 MPH Knuckle-curve down the first baseline to plate Seager and Garcia to give Texas the early 3-0 lead.
That was all the run support Gray would need for the victory as the 30-year-old righty allowed just five hits, no walks, and fanned six.
The Rangers would tack on five more runs in the win, including a solo-homer from Heim (number eight on the year), and Garcia tallied two more RBI to his season stat-line, giving him a total of 43, good for the fifth-most in the American League (Jose Ramirez of Cleveland leads the category with 62.) Heim’s home run total is second in the American League only to 2020 American League Comeback Player of the Year Salvador Perez.
“The way we play the game, the way we go about our business, I know, is going to pay dividends long-term, especially as the season becomes a real grind for most teams,” Woodward said. “We’re going to lean on one another, and their commitment to [that] has been phenomenal.”
The Rangers will look to pick up their third straight against the Tigers on June 18, starting at 4:10 p.m. EDT when Taylor Hearn takes the hill for Texas and Rony Garcia gets the start for Detroit.
