Rangers’ problems at home continue with loss to Yankees

Perhaps some sort of sacrifice needs to take place at Globe Life Park.

Something to maybe appease the baseball gods and lift the hex that has now loomed over the Texas Rangers for over a month.

The Rangers lost for the 11th time in their past 12 home games Monday night as the New York Yankees powered their way to a 6-2 victory.

No team in the majors has fewer wins at home than Texas, which dropped to 16-27 in the series opener against New York. Only one other team has fewer than 20 home wins (Cleveland with 19).

It has been a talking point for manager Jeff Banister and his players, who have dutifully tried to answer the same question since the team went 4-1 on a homestand June 12-16. But since returning from a 2-3 road trip on June 23 with a 37-33 record, Texas has struggled to get back to .500. They’ve gone 10-18 since, including 1-11 at home.

“These are professional players. I’m not going to sit here and say this is a mental thing,” Banister said. “I’ve never seen it before but I don’t believe it’s a mental thing, it won’t be a mental thing. They’re going to show up in their own ballpark at their own lockers in their own uniforms in front of their home fans and come out here and play.

“It’s not anything other than that. We need to continue to grind it out and find a way to push through and get some Ws here at home but it’s not a mental thing.”

Rangers pitcher Matt Harrison took a step back in his third start since returning from spinal fusion surgery. He was charged with six runs on six hits, including home runs by Didi Gregorius and Alex Rodriguez.

After the Rangers took a 2-0 lead on a run-scoring double by Elvis Andrus and a run-scoring single by Leonys Martin in the second, the Yankees scored three in the third, including Gregorius’ two-run homer to right.

Rodriguez made it 4-2 with an opposite-field line drive homer to right in the sixth. Harrison, who threw six scoreless innings in his last start at Colorado, walked the leadoff hitter in the seventh and left after Chase Headley’s double gave the Yankees runers on second and third and no outs.

Gregorius blooped the first pitch from reliever Sam Freeman into shallow right to score both runners to make it 6-2.

“After us scoring the two runs I gave it right back to them and gave the momentum back to them,” said Harrison, who was at a loss to explain the struggles at home. “It’s just one of those things that’s going on right now. We have to play better baseball and I didn’t do my job tonight, so that starts with me.”

It could have been worse, too.

Center fielder Leonys Martin made two sterling plays, including a catch at the top of the wall on a fly ball from Mark Teixeira in the second and later throwing Teixeira out at home to end the eighth.

The offense continues to struggles at home with runners in scoring position. Texas was 1 for 12 with runners in scoring position and left 9 runners on base. Adrian Beltre and Robinson Chirinos each left four of the 9.

“I don’t know,” said Shin-Soo Choo, who has 18 RBIs at home and 27 on the road. “We have the support of the fans, we’re used to this field. It just happens. I can’t explain it, but that’s baseball.”

This story was originally published July 27, 2015 at 11:15 PM with the headline "Rangers’ problems at home continue with loss to Yankees."