Rangers find a way to win 10th straight game

A 10th consecutive victory wasn’t going to come easily Friday night for the Texas Rangers, and it didn’t.

First, they had to solve a left-handed starter, something that has given them problems this season.

They gave away a run in the fourth. Their starter lasted only five innings. The first reliever quickly found trouble. The closer did, too.

But all the things that foiled them as recently as two weeks ago didn’t bite them in a 5-3 win against the Detroit Tigers. A team is capable of just about anything when it can’t seem to lose, and the Rangers haven’t lost since May 8.

Mike Napoli and Joey Gallo hit home runs as the Rangers scored five times against lefty Daniel Norris, and Nick Martinez and the bullpen relied three times on the bend-but-don’t-break philosophy when the Tigers mounted their biggest threat.

Momentum? It’s real.

“Obviously,” Napoli said. “We had a lot of guys trying to figure out what was going on with their swings, and I think that got away from the team thing. Once we talked about it and got back to what’s important in winning, you have to win as a group and do the right thing. We definitely have momentum.”

The winning streak is the fourth-longest in club history, and the Rangers can match the 2010 team for the third-longest Saturday. They will have their road ace, A.J. Griffin, on the mound against the Tigers’ ace, Justin Verlander.

“We knew the streak would come. It always does,” Gallo said. “We’re playing pretty good right now.”

Martinez allowed only an unearned run in five innings, but wasn’t allowed to pitch a sixth with his pitch count at 92 after too many foul balls and a 25-pitch fourth inning in which the Tigers scored their run against him.

But he left with a 5-1 lead thanks to two runs in the third that came on a bases-loaded walk and a fielder’s choice. Napoli started the third with a drive to left field, his ninth homer of the season, and Gallo connected with two outs in the sixth for his team-leading 13th home run.

It was only the second hit in six games for the left-handed-slugger, but it came off a lefty and after he had struck out in his first two at-bats. The two-run blast came off the bat at 115 mph and traveled 439 feet.

The Rangers entered batting only .225 against lefty starters.

“It ended up being pretty big,” Gallo said. “That’s what’s great about my skill set and what’s tough about it. There are going to be a lot of ups and downs. It’s something that I’ve learned to try to deal with.

“I’d never faced that guy before, like most of these guys. It’s really tough to never face somebody and go up there. I think I started to get a little more comfortable. He’s got a quick arm, and I was trying to get ready a little earlier and see the ball a little deeper.”

Detroit quickly scored a run against Tony Barnette in the sixth, but didn’t do anything against Keone Kela. The right-hander breezed threw a perfect seventh but had to pitch around a leadoff walk in the eight.

Matt Bush entered for the ninth and found trouble. An error on Elvis Andrus, his second of the game, allowed the Tigers to push a run across and bring the go-ahead run to the plate.

Bush, though, struck out Alex Avila, who entered batting .377, on his 33rd pitch. He and Kela might not be available again this weekend, which will make keeping the winning streak alive difficult.

But a team is capable of just about anything when it can’t seem to lose, which the Rangers haven’t done in nearly two weeks.

“We’ve been playing good baseball,” Napoli said. “We’re playing as a team. We’re going the right things. We’re getting good pitching, timely hitting, good defense. That’s how you want to be playing as a group.

“We’re just going to keep going. We show up every day. We don’t talk about a streak. We play as a team.”

This story was originally published May 19, 2017 at 11:01 PM with the headline "Rangers find a way to win 10th straight game."