Rangers recap: With plenty of chances, Texas offense fails to come through

The Texas Rangers offense kept setting itself up for success Sunday, but each time Toronto Blue Jays pitching turned it away in failure. Toronto took the series finale 3-2 Sunday at Rogers Centre after holding off the big hit late against Texas. The Rangers dropped back to .500 with the loss. Texas’ offense left 12 runners on and were 2 for 15 with runners in scoring position. The Rangers open a four-game series against the Orioles in Baltimore on Monday.

Pitching: Chi Chi Gonzalez breezed through the Blue Jays lineup ten up, ten down before Jeff Donaldson broke the string with a one-out solo homer to left in the fourth. His command began to suffer after the homer. He walked two in the fourth before getting a fly out to center to end the inning. He walked the lead-off hitter in the fifth and Toronto increased its lead to 3-0 with three consecutive hits, including a Devon Travis double to the track in left. Gonzalez responded with a 1-2-3 sixth. Spencer Patton and Tanner Scheppers each pitched perfect innings of relief. Scheppers had two strikeouts.

Hitting: Prince Fielder singled with one out in the sixth and later scored on Elvis Andrus’ single. After Joey Gallo walked to load the bases with two outs, Leonys Martin struck out to keep the score at 3-1. The Rangers loaded the bases again in the seventh after singles by Shin-Soo Choo, Rougned Odor and Fielder before right-hander Bo Schultz replaced lefty Aaron Loup to face Adrian Beltre. Beltre bounced into a force out at second to score Choo to make it 3-2 and give Texas runners on the corners with two outs for Mitch Moreland. Moreland grounded out to first to end the inning. In the eighth, Andrus led off with a hustle double on a bloop single to shallow left. He moved to third on Gallo’s tapper back to the mound, but Martin struck out on three pitches. After Robinson Chirinos walked, Choo struck out on three pitches to end the inning. Again in the ninth, Texas seemed poised to at least tie after Odor led off with a double to right-center. He moved to third with two outs on Beltre’s fly out to center. Moreland struck out on three pitches, swinging on a high fastball to end it.

Notable: Fielder increased his major league-leading multi-hit games to 33 ... Fielder has multiple hits in five consecutive games, tying his career-high ... Texas outfielders (Choo, Martin, Gallo and Rua) combined to hit .108 (4 for 37) in the three-game series against Toronto.

This story was originally published June 28, 2015 at 4:41 PM with the headline "Rangers recap: With plenty of chances, Texas offense fails to come through."