Thoughts on Game 3

During the off day, I thought of a bunch of thoughts I wanted to add. Not only did I not have time to add those that day, but I've pretty much forgotten them. That was a Friday, and I spent from 9:30 a.m. until 11 p.m. at Wilkerson-Sanders Memorial Stadium preparing for and directing The Scoreboard Show. I'd like to say that was a rousing success, but ...

Anyway, for me Game 3 was a mishmash of checking progress on my phone and then listening to the game in the car on the way home and on the radio here. I spent Saturday afternoon at my second and third high school football games in a 24-hour period.

As a result, I don't have a huge handle on the play by play and its intracacies, so even these thoughts will be short.

Because the radio broadcast was a few seconds behind the telecast, I could get a pretty good idea of what was going to happen by hearing Margaret's reactions from the living room. For instance, I heard "Catch it!" followed by a grown and realized that a Giant had reached base on a long fly ball. Turns out it was a home run. Another team, an "Oh, no!" indicated to me that Bengie Molina probably had grounded into a double play.

And I guess that double play was kind of indicative of the Cowboys' game, and something I consider a warning sign.

By that time, the Rangers had a 4-0 lead, built on two home runs. After that, they put runners on base but couldn't bring them home. The danger is that they might have gone into their mode of "All we have to do is hit enough home runs and we'll win."

That mode leads to a lot of frustrating fly balls to the warning track and popups with runners on second and third with one out.

On the pre-game show* as well as my observations at the two afternoon football games, I knew that there was a relatively strong wind. At Rangers Ballpark, that wind usually is collected behind home plate, then blows out toward right-center field with greater force. Because it was a south wind, it also would have helped fly balls to left.

Despite that wind advantage, the Rangers still managed just two homers, and none after starter Jonathan Sanchez left the game. If they continue to go for homers today, might they have less success?

Just checked tonight's weather forecast for Arlington. Weather.com says the wind will be 9 mph from the south, so the conditions should be similar.

*-The Rangers' pre-game show on 103.3 ESPN wa an unprecedented four hours, giving way to another hour on the ESPN network. Four hours is about half of what the Cowboys get for their pre-game shows any regular-season week when their game starts after 1 p.m. Eastern.

Colby Lewis' continued strong pitching reminded me of a conversation I had with someone from the Cowboys' minor league staff during the regular season. The question was whether Lewis or Tommy Hunter would be a better choice as Texas' third postseason starter behind Cliff Lee and C.J. Wilson.

His side of the conversation was that Lewis had been pitching well but had been the victim of poor run support.

My contention was that at some point, he had to take charge and win a game. That was while he was on a streak of nine games without a win, granted with poor run support. All but his final two starts during that span went six innings or more. Five were "quality starts."

Well, Lewis' last four starts all fit the lame quality criteria, and he was 3-1 during that stretch. That earned him a spot in Texas' playoff rotation and made our disagreement moot.

Meanwhile, "Big-Game" Hunter made five more starts -- with only one win, and none of which went more than six innings. He hasn't made it past four innings in either postseason start.

Two factors have to improve for the Rangers to win Game 4.

1. The offense has to manufacture runs, take more pitches and forget about home run trots until the ball clears a fence.

2. Hunter has to make it through six or more innings to help avoid a bullpen meltdown similar to the one in Game 2.

I'm more confident that Hunter could succeed than that the offense could go atainst its nature. That has happened off and on this season. Rangers fans had better hope that switch is on tonight.