One Runner Left on Base Was No Compliment to Texas

One runner left on base usually sounds like a tidy afternoon. For the Texas Rangers on Sunday, it was closer to an inventory shortage. Texas collected six hits, drew no walks and lost 6-4 to the Minnesota Twins at Target Field, ending the season at 80-82.

Three of those six hits left the ballpark. Danny Jansen and Elias Díaz homered with the bases empty; Corey Seager hit his with Brandon Nimmo aboard. The lineup converted its biggest swings into four runs, then ran out of ways to make the Minnesota pitchers deal with anyone else.

Jansen’s homer in the third inning tied the game at 1-1, but it was a solo shot. Díaz’s pinch-hit homer opened the eighth and trimmed Minnesota’s advantage from 5-1 to 5-2, but it also came with empty bases. Seager’s blast produced an extra run because Nimmo had singled earlier in the inning, before Wyatt Langford popped out.

One swing produced two runs and changed the shape of the final inning.

Then came Jake Burger’s strikeout swinging, followed by Ezequiel Duran’s flyout to left. Seager’s homer supplied a late jolt; the Rangers never put another runner on base.

The larger problem was the traffic before the ninth. Texas finished with six hits, no walks and one runner left on base. The low stranded-runner total did not reflect a stream of scoring opportunities expertly converted. Home runs clear their own baserunners, and Texas was putting few other men aboard. The offense had supplied its own cleanup crew without generating much work for it.

Dean Kremer made that shortage especially costly. The Minnesota starter worked seven innings, allowed three hits and one run, struck out four and issued no walks. Texas’ only runner against him in the sixth came when Nicky Lopez singled.

Evan Carter then sacrificed Lopez to second, Brandon Nimmo grounded out with Lopez moving to third, and Wyatt Langford grounded out to finish the inning. Lopez advanced, but the sequence ended without a run and without a new baserunner. Kremer reached the late innings after throwing only 74 pitches to 23 batters.

The Rangers did not suddenly discover a full rally after he departed. Díaz led off the eighth with his homer, then Jansen flew out, Justin Foscue popped out and Cody Freeman flew out. Minnesota answered in the bottom half: Royce Lewis homered against Cody Bradford, restoring the four-run margin before the ninth began.

The contrast with Minnesota’s Luke Keaschall was more instructive than his 0-for-2 batting line. Keaschall walked in the first inning, was hit by a pitch in the third and walked again in the fifth. He scored three times without recording a hit.

Josh Bell’s sacrifice fly brought him home in the first; Bell’s two-run homer brought him in again in the third; Kody Clemens’ single scored him in the fifth.

Keaschall’s contribution was repeated access to first base, followed by teammates doing enough with those opportunities. Minnesota also received five walks and a hit-by-pitch overall. Its six runs came through a sacrifice fly, Bell’s two-run homer, Ryan Jeffers’ bases-loaded walk, Clemens’ RBI single and Lewis’ solo homer.

That sequence required different kinds of offensive execution, with runners repeatedly present when Minnesota found a productive swing or drew a useful walk.

There is no reason to downgrade the home runs themselves. Jansen’s tied the game, Díaz’s reduced a substantial deficit and Seager’s brought Texas within two. Without them, the afternoon would have been much worse. The missing ingredient was ordinary access to first base: a walk before one of those homers, or another hit that let an inning continue after the celebration.

Nicky Lopez, stranded at third in the sixth, was the lone Ranger left on base. That makes his afternoon a useful last image: a runner who advanced on two outs, then watched a third end the inning. Texas could clear the fences. It needed to fill a few more bases before doing so.

Sources

Official game data

Official game box score

Official game data

Official game data

Official game data