A chilly Sunday didn’t affect Chicago White Sox. But Texas Rangers never warmed up.
The temperature at first pitch Sunday at Guaranteed Rate Field was 43 degrees, but it felt like 34 degrees thanks to a steady breeze blowing in from left field.
It certainly wasn’t baseball weather, and the Texas Rangers appeared to agree.
They played the series finale against the Chicago White Sox, but everything seemed as off as the thermostat.
Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Joey Gallo, 2020 Gold Glove winners, both committed errors.
Pitchers’ velocities were down. The bats, true to the temps, were cold.
Add it all up, and the Rangers had their worst, most non-competitive game of the 2021 season.
Kohei Arihara allowed five runs in only two innings, and the Rangers struck out 10 times in five innings against rookie right-hander Michael Kopech en route to an 8-4 loss that resulted in a three-game sweep.
Arihara didn’t use the cold as an excuse, because Kopech did so well in the same conditions, but it was clear it affected him in his worst start so far since coming to MLB from Japan.
Arihara wasn’t alone.
“As a whole team it affected us,” manager Chris Woodward said. “These guys have been playing in it for a month. Our hitters were stiff and could, and the pitchers ... you’re going to have to deal with the elements at times. Unfortunately, I think that’s something that affected us today.”
Arihara needed 40 pitches to complete the first inning, even though he had two outs and the bases empty after two hitters. But he walked Yoan Moncada and allowed a two-run homer reigning American League MVP Jose Abreu.
Arihara walked two more hitters and allowed an infield hit before getting out of the inning.
The second inning wasn’t any better. The White Sox opened single, double, triple for two runs, and Abreu made it a three-run inning with a sacrifice fly.
Chicago forced Arihara to throw 30 pitches in the second, and he was finished after two innings.
Woodward has some suspicions that Arihara might have been tipping his split-fingered fastball, which to this point has been his out pitch. Arihara, though, didn’t see any issues there, just an inability to adjust to the cold.
“I just wasn’t able to control my body, and even until the end of my outing I wasn’t able to fix it,” he said. “My fingertips were cold, but in general just my whole entire body was cold and I wasn’t able to move my body the way I wanted to.”
The Rangers were down 8-1 after three innings, with the only run coming on a second-inning homer by David Dahl. Their bats warmed up some in the sixth, a three-run frame that started with singles by Willie Calhoun, Kiner-Falefa, Gallo and Nate Lowe.
Kiner-Falefa collected three hits on the day and is riding a five-game hitting streak after snapping an 0-for-19 skid. Nick Solak beat out two infield singles, including one in the sixth that scored a run.
The Rangers were short on bullpen arms and were hoping for more than the one inning Brett de Geus gave them in a three-run third. But Brett Martin and Josh Sborz, added to the roster before the game, tossed two scoreless innings apiece, and Taylor Hearn worked a scoreless eighth.
The Rangers open a seven-game homestand Monday with the first of three games against the Los Angeles Angels. The Rangers are in the midst of playing on 19 consecutive days, and the pitching staff could get worn down.
At least it will be warm at Globe Life Field.
It was a cool one Sunday in the Windy City, and the Rangers never warmed up.
