ARLINGTON, Texas — Texas Rangers president of baseball operations Chris Young said Monday that Thursday’s 4-3 loss to the Seattle Mariners, in which Jacob deGrom struck out 12 in 6 scoreless innings, was the most painful loss of the season for him. Young made the comments during his weekly segment on 105.3 The Fan’s G-Bag Nation, on the club’s off day before a nine-game homestand.
deGrom retired the first 15 batters he faced at T-Mobile Park and allowed 1 hit over 6 innings with no walks and 12 strikeouts. He left with a 3-0 lead after 92 pitches, with groin tightness that began in the fourth inning. In the seventh, Jakob Junis faced 4 batters without recording an out, and Julio Rodríguez hit a three-run homer off him for the go-ahead runs.
The 12 strikeouts were deGrom’s most since Sept. 18, 2022, with the New York Mets.
“I think it was. It was for me, certainly,” Young said. “You hate to assign any more misery to a loss than another loss because they’re all equally important or impactful. But I think from a morale standpoint, that one, I just felt dejected given how good Jacob was and just really kind of the bad breaks that we had.”
“The day before, I felt like we got a little bit of a tough break with the ball hitting the second base, which led to two runs in that game and maybe cost us that game,” Young continued. “But we had opportunities in that game.”
Seattle won that Wednesday game 3-2. Texas went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position.
Chris Young Points To Two Wild Pitches In Jacob deGrom Loss
In the top of the seventh Thursday, a pitch from Seattle starter Logan Gilbert bounced away from catcher Cal Raleigh, and Gilbert made a sliding tag on Wyatt Langford at the plate off Raleigh’s throw. Gilbert struck out 11 over 7 innings.
“Being up 3-0 and then all of a sudden, before you can really snap your fingers, they’re up 4-3,” Young added. “And then two wild pitches that just really, they made one of them a really good play, and on the other got a break where the ball bounced right back to the catcher. And if we score on either one of those, chances are we go on and win the game. So it was just a really, really tough way to lose when Jacob was throwing so well.”
The Mariners took two of three in the series after Texas won the opener 10-5 on Tuesday.
Texas Rangers Took Two Of Three In Arizona After Friday Blowout
The next night, the Rangers lost 9-1 to the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field and went 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position. Rangers manager Skip Schumaker had told his team after the Seattle loss that it would have to flush it by the time it landed in Arizona.
“I think that carried over to Friday night in Arizona,” Young detailed. “I mean, it was obviously a lopsided game, and it did not go well. And then by Saturday our guys flushed it. They came back, played great. And then Sunday, obviously yesterday, went out and found another way to win.”
“So it was a really, really good bounce back from a team that arguably could have really gone in the tank after that Jacob loss,” Young noted. “And fortunately, they did not.”
Texas won 6-2 on Saturday behind a six-run fifth inning and 7-6 on Sunday, when Corey Seager homered and drove in 3 runs. It was the Rangers’ first road series win since July 1, after eight straight road series losses. The six-game trip ended 3-3.
deGrom is 10-9 through 28 starts. He was 12-8 with a 2.97 ERA last season and was voted American League Comeback Player of the Year.
At 74-76, Texas is one game behind the Houston Astros in the American League West and two games behind the Cleveland Guardians for the third American League wild card. The Rangers open a three-game series against the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday at Globe Life Field, with first pitch at 7:05 p.m. CT on Rangers Sports Network.
