Turn of calendar brings no respite for slumping Rangers in another loss to Twins

ARLINGTON — The calendar now reads September. A decisive month of meaningful baseball now lies ahead for the Texas Rangers.

They’ll have to address the issues from the month prior if they want to capitalize. A 5-1 loss to the Minnesota Twins on Friday night at Globe Life Field showed that might be harder to do so than it looks.

The Rangers’ bullpen was rocked and coughed up a lead. The Rangers’ offense sputtered out just three hits and couldn’t catch up to fastballs. Corey Seager, though, put some hurt into a baseball.

In other words: It looked a lot like the second half of August, in which the Rangers struggled to execute in each phase of baseball and coughed up their lead in the American League West. The lone piece of good news is that the other two contenders in the division — the Houston Astros and Seattle Mariners — also lost on Friday night. The Rangers remain in third place, one game back of first.

The bad news is that Texas can’t rely on that scenario to follow suit for much longer. The Rangers have four games vs. Houston waiting next week, then seven against the Mariners to end the month. If there’s a time to turn things around, it’s now. Or two weeks ago, for honesty’s sake.

Regardless, things unraveled on Friday when the Twins broke into the Rangers’ bullpen. Because it’s always the bullpen. Brock Burke gave up two long balls — a two-run home run from Jordan Luplow and a solo shot from Christian Vazquez — in the seventh inning. Ryan Jeffers hit a leadoff double off of Josh Sborz in the eighth, then Jorge Polanco smacked a two-run home run to give the Twins a 5-1 lead.

That was that.

Again.

“We’ve just got to make better pitches, as simple as that,” said Bochy. “It’s not just giving up hits, we’re giving up slug from that bullpen.”

No kidding. Texas relief pitchers allowed 17 home runs in 93 and 2/3 innings in August, the eighth-most in baseball.

“We’ve got to execute the pitches better, because they’re going to get used,” Bochy said. “The starters aren’t going to go nine.”

Not on Friday night, at least. Rangers starter Max Scherzer pitched six one-hit innings, struck out seven Minnesota batters and walked two. He lowered his ERA with the Rangers to 2.21 in 36 and 2/3 innings pitched. He’s struck out 47 batters in a Texas uniform.

Everything looked good. But after six innings and 88 pitches — the fewest he’d thrown in a start since May 21 — Scherzer was lifted for Burke. Bochy said that Scherzer had gone far enough and that with two left-handed hitters due up in the seventh for Minnesota, the matchup favored Burke.

Scherzer went a bit further in his explanation of the early night. He struggled to locate his pitches in his sixth and final inning and admitted that he’s dealing with a bit of forearm tightness — not enough that he’d classify himself as “injured,” but enough to raise a flag. He communicated with pitching coach Mike Maddux after the sixth inning and gave way to the bullpen soon thereafter.

“I’m not going to let [forearm tightness] turn into a strain or a Tommy John situation,” Scherzer said. “When you’re in this spot, for me, throughout my career, I always tell managers where I’m at. This is not the time where you get to be a hero and take the ball ... you have to be smart of that, you have to be in communication with your coaches.”

It’s a prudent call from the three-time Cy Young award winner, one who knows that he’s scheduled to start vs. the Astros on Wednesday. The long game outweighs the short game, especially when forearm tightness can quickly snowball into a season-ending injury. See: deGrom, Jacob.

Texas’ corrosive bullpen — which combined for five blown saves on the recent nine-game road trip — just can’t be relied upon to hold up its end of the bargain. The same can currently be said of the offense.

The Rangers struck out seven times vs. Minnesota starter Joe Ryan — five times on the fastball, a pitch that’s flummoxed Texas over the last month. Left fielder Robbie Grossman had the Rangers’ first hit of the game with a leadoff double in the third inning, but Ezequiel Duran and Leody Taveras each struck out on fastballs and Marcus Semien flew out to left field to strand him at second base.

“Those empty at-bats are what hurts,” Bochy said.

There were plenty to go around.

Seager, who was named the club’s player of the month on Friday, gave the Rangers a 1-0 lead in the fourth inning with a solo home run to right field. With an exit velocity of 114.4 miles per hour, it was the hardest-hit ball of Seager’s career and his 11th home run since returning from the injured list on Aug. 2.

It’s for the best if Seager maintains his August form.

The other eight hitters in Texas’ lineup? Maybe not.

Nathaniel Lowe followed Seager with a single. It was Texas’ last hit of the game. The Rangers went 0 for 17 in their final 18 plate appearances, the lone base runner being a Marcus Semien hit by pitch to lead off the sixth. Seager wiped the opportunity away by grounding into a double play.

“It’s going to come down to us finding a way to score those runs we used to get to take a little pressure off of this bullpen,” Bochy said.

If there’s any time to find that way, it’s now.

On Twitter: @McFarland_Shawn

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