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ARLINGTON, Texas — The Texas Rangers executed one of the weirdest third outs of any inning you’ll ever see in Saturday's 16-6 demolition of the Seattle Mariners at Globe Life Field.

In the top of the fourth inning with the Rangers up 6-3, reliever Josh Sborz had runners at the corners with two out and facing the Mariners’ Teoscar Hernández. One swing of Hernández’s bat could have tied the game.

Instead the Rangers ended it with a tag-out at home plate.

How?

Mariners center fielder Julio Rodríguez tried to steal second. More importantly, Rangers catcher Jonah Heim tried to throw him out, in spite of the runner at third base. But Heim didn’t make a clean throw. Instead it slipped out of his hand and rolled toward Rangers shortstop Corey Seager.

With that, the runner at third, second baseman José Caballero, decided to take a shot at taking home plate.

Seager, instead, made a heads-up play, ran up on the ball and made a bare-handed grab of the ball, threw a sidearm shot to Heim, who had a chance to make up for his mistake and tag Caballero out to end the inning.

With that, the Rangers remained ahead, 6-3. They went on to score a run in the fourth and three more in the fifth to give themselves some insurance.

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You can find Matthew Postins on Twitter @PostinsPostcard

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