Saturday’s 6-2 victory over the Minnesota Twins gave the Texas Rangers a positive penultimate afternoon. Sunday supplied the final result: Minnesota won 6-4 at Target Field on September 27, and the Rangers finished 80-82 and missed the postseason.
The final week was worse than the month containing it. Texas did not spend all of September falling apart. It went 12-12, scoring 111 runs and allowing 113. The sharper failure was concentrated in the final six games, when the Rangers went 2-4 and were outscored 32-20.
That closing stretch cannot bear responsibility for every opportunity Texas missed earlier in the season. But it does explain why a reasonably competitive September ended with so little satisfaction. Two consecutive series offered chances to add wins at the finish. Texas took only one game from each.
The three-game set against the New York Mets began with a 6-3 Texas loss on September 22 and a 7-2 defeat on September 23. The Rangers salvaged the finale, 3-1, on September 24. That made the Mets series a 1-2 result for Texas, with Texas outscored in both of the first two games before finally limiting New York to one run.
Minnesota then won 10-2 on September 25. Texas answered with a 6-2 victory on September 26, but the Twins took Sunday’s finale 6-4. Across the Minnesota series, the Twins outscored Texas 18-12. The Rangers produced a convincing response Saturday and then lacked enough complete-game execution to produce another one the next afternoon.
Sunday showed why the final score cannot be pinned on one late swing. Minnesota scored in the first after Luke Keaschall walked, moved to third on Kaelen Culpepper’s single and scored on Josh Bell’s sacrifice fly. Texas tied the game in the third when Danny Jansen hit a solo home run.
The Twins regained the lead later in the inning: Keaschall was hit by a pitch, Culpepper struck out, and Bell then hit a two-run homer.
That sequence captures the game’s traffic problem. Minnesota repeatedly put a runner aboard before its biggest hit or productive out. Texas’s first run, by contrast, arrived with the bases empty. Home runs are hardly a flaw; three of them produced all four Rangers runs. They were simply isolated events rather than parts of longer innings.
The fifth inning created the decisive cushion. Walker Jenkins singled, Keaschall walked and Culpepper struck out. Bell then walked, followed by Ryan Jeffers’ walk that forced in Jenkins.
After a pitching change, Kody Clemens singled home Keaschall to make it 5-1. Texas used three pitchers in the inning, and one inherited runner scored against Jordan Montgomery, who otherwise worked 2 2/3 scoreless innings. The relief effort stopped further damage, but Minnesota had already increased its lead from two runs to four.
