Rangers Fall to Royals in First Spring Training Game
The Texas Rangers began their 2023 spring training schedule with a 6-5 loss to the Kansas City Royals at the teams’ shared complex in Surprise, Ariz. Below is a wrap-up of the game.
Kansas City Royals 6, Texas Rangers 5 (Box Score)
How the Royals won: Kansas City’s Tucker Bradley hit a walk-off home run off of the Texas Rangers’ Marc Church in the bottom of the ninth inning.
Records: Kansas City, 1-0; Texas, 0-1.
Winning pitcher: Ryan Weiss (KC, 1-0).
Losing pitcher: Marc Church (TEX, 0-1).
Rangers at the plate: Texas scored three runs in the top of the second, and one each in the top of the seventh and top of the eighth. Robbie Grossman’s two-run home run in the top of the second was one of two home runs for the Rangers. Justin Foscue hit a solo home run in the top of the seventh.
Catcher Sandy Leon was the only Rangers player that had two hits in the game. He went 2-for-2 with an RBI. Third baseman Josh Jung and catcher Sam Huff were the only Rangers hitters with a double.
The Rangers used 19 different position players in the game.
Rangers on the mound: Starter Glenn Otto threw two innings in his spring debut, giving up one hit and two runs while striking out five and walking one. The one hit he allowed was a two-run home run to Kansas City’s Vinnie Pasquantino in the top of the first inning.
José Leclerc, John King, Jake Latz, Chase Lee and Cody Bradford all scored a scoreless inning for the Rangers.
Owen White, in his spring debut for the Rangers, gave up three hits, two runs and two walks in 2/3 innings before he was relieved. But it wasn’t all on White.
Church gave up the walk-off home run facing his first hitter.
On the rules
Plenty of rules changes. Here are a few tweets from the game to reinforce what happened with the rules changes.
How the pitch clock can impact the speed of the game:
How a pitcher can be impacted if they exceed the pitch clock:
How the shift ban is impacting hitters and fielders:
Here’s an inning in less than three minutes:
You can find Matthew Postins on Twitter @PostinsPostcard
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