Texas Rangers

Happy Friday, everybody... Drew Davison has a story on Justin Grimm, and how he's gone from disappointment at University of Georgia to major league starting pitcher (who also rooms with Robbie Ross). Master Tesfatsion has a story at the Rangers' website about Leonys Martin, who the team is pushing to play more fundamental ball and less "Latin style." Evan Grant has a story on how the Rangers' farm system is paying dividends in terms of providing pitching depth that is helping the Rangers thrive in the early months of this season, despite missing key pitchers. Davison has a story on Jose Canseco, who is going to be a player/coach for the Fort Worth Cats on their current eight game homestand. Anthony Andro also has a story on Canseco and his return to the Metroplex. The S-T's notes talk about Nick Tepesch's blister, Colby Lewis's bullpen session, Derek Lowe's release, and Mark Teahen being signed.

Lazy Lester (born Leslie Johnson,[2] June 20, 1933, Torras, Louisiana, United States)[1][3] is an American blues musician, who sings, and plays the harmonica and guitar. His career spans the 1950s to the 2010s. Best known for regional hits recorded with Ernie Young's Nashville, Tennessee based Excello label, Lester also contributed to songs recorded by Excello label-mates including Slim Harpo, Lightnin' Slim, and Katie Webster. His songs have been covered by (among others) The Kinks, Freddy Fender, Dwight Yoakam, Dave Edmunds, Raful Neal, Anson Funderburgh, and The Fabulous Thunderbirds. In the comeback stage of his career (since the late 1980s) he has recorded new albums backed by Mike Buck, Sue Foley, Gene Taylor, Kenny Neal, Lucky Peterson, and Jimmie Vaughan. Lazy Lester (born Leslie Johnson,[2] June 20, 1933, Torras, Louisiana, United States)[1][3] is an American blues musician, who sings, and plays the harmonica and guitar. His career spans the 1950s to the 2010s. Best known for regional hits recorded with Ernie Young's Nashville, Tennessee based Excello label, Lester also contributed to songs recorded by Excello label-mates including Slim Harpo, Lightnin' Slim, and Katie Webster. His songs have been covered by (among others) The Kinks, Freddy Fender, Dwight Yoakam, Dave Edmunds, Raful Neal, Anson Funderburgh, and The Fabulous Thunderbirds. In the comeback stage of his career (since the late 1980s) he has recorded new albums backed by Mike Buck, Sue Foley, Gene Taylor, Kenny Neal, Lucky Peterson, and Jimmie Vaughan.

The Rangers make their second trip to the Pacific Northwest to face the Seattle Mariners. The teams each won two games in the first series in April. This time around the Rangers will see Mariners ace Felix Hernandez after missing him in the first series. Here's what else to watch for: Mariners' offense scuffling: Seattle has been shut out twice in the last four games, and also lost 7-1 to the Los Angeles Angels on Wednesday night. The Mariners have been shut out four times, second most in the American League behind Houston and Toronto with five.

SURPRISE, Ariz. – Some of the top young talent in the Texas Rangers' system was on display at extended spring training on Thursday, as outfielder Jairo Beras and Ronald Guzman put on impressive batting practice displays. Lone Star Dugout has video of the 18-year-old prospects' BP rounds from the workout.

SCOUTING THE STARTERS NEXT at Seattle, 9:10 today (FSSW) Rangers RHP Justin Grimm (3-3, 4.02 ERA): recorded his most impressive win of the season in his last start by battling through 6 2/3 innings to beat the AL’s best offensive team, Detroit. It broke a three-game losing streak to start May. His May performance reinforces that because he does not have a dominant out pitch, Grimm doesn’t have much room for error. When he commands his … [visit site to read more]

The Rangers will avoid any further strife with their starting rotation, at least for now. Before the club left for Seattle, right-hander Nick Tepesch threw a bullpen session and experienced no issues with the blister on his right middle finger. Tepesch will start on Sunday. Also, right-hander Colby Lewis had no issues with a bullpen session Thursday and will start for Triple-A Round Rock on Saturday at Memphis. Lewis is expected to throw about 60 pitches. Right-hander Alexi Ogando … [visit site to read more]

SEATTLE — In the last three days, the Rangers’ offense reached a low not even seen during the nadir of last year’s late-season collapse. They went an entire series hitless with men in scoring position. In losing two of three to Oakland, the Rangers went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position. Over the final two games of the series, the Rangers had just one at-bat with a runner in scoring position. The Rangers are hitting .252 with runners in scoring … [visit site to read more]

The Texas Rangers released pitcher Derek Lowe on Thursday, and signed infielder Mark Teahen to a minor-league contract. View full post on Yahoo! Sports – MLB – Texas Rangers News

via upload.wikimedia.org Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, released as Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles in Europe, and Gekikame Ninja Den (激亀忍者伝?, "Fierce Turtle Ninja Legend") in Japan, is a 1989 platform game for the Nintendo Entertainment System. The game was developed by Konami and originally released in Japan through Konami themselves, then in North America through Konami's Ultra Games imprint, followed by a release through the European equivalent, Palcom Software, in PAL regions. This was the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles video game, and is based on the 1987 TV series, which was in its third season at the time of the game's original release, although the art style more resembles the original comic series. The game was ported to various home computer platforms in 1990; the original NES version was ported to Nintendo's PlayChoice-10 arcade system in 1991, and the Wii's Virtual Console service in 2007. It was taken off theWii Shop Channel on January 26, 2012. via upload.wikimedia.org Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, released as Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles in Europe, and Gekikame Ninja Den (激亀忍者伝?, "Fierce Turtle Ninja Legend") in Japan, is a 1989 platform game for the Nintendo Entertainment System. The game was developed by Konami and originally released in Japan through Konami themselves, then in North America through Konami's Ultra Games imprint, followed by a release through the European equivalent, Palcom Software, in PAL regions. This was the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles video game, and is based on the 1987 TV series, which was in its third season at the time of the game's original release, although the art style more resembles the original comic series. The game was ported to various home computer platforms in 1990; the original NES version was ported to Nintendo's PlayChoice-10 arcade system in 1991, and the Wii's Virtual Console service in 2007. It was taken off theWii Shop Channel on January 26, 2012.

This is not a slide puzzle, or part of Mike Olt’s latest battery of vision testing. Those, on top, are the 24 Rangers pitchers who reported to big league camp in February as members of the 40-man roster.  Among them were Jeff Beliveau and Roman Mendez and Justin Miller and Matt West and Rule 5 pick Coty Woods. On bottom are the 14 pitchers who were invited to big league camp even though not on the roster. That group included big leaguers who couldn’t find roster jobs but were given a chance by Texas to win a job (Derek Lowe, Neal Cotts, Kyle McClellan, Yoshinori Tateyama, Randy Wells, Evan Meek, Collin Balester), longshot journeymen (Nate Robertson, Yonata Ortega), minor leaguers off the roster that the club wanted to see against big league hitters (Nick Tepesch, Cody Buckel, Jake Brigham, Johan Yan), and Ben Rowen, a minor leaguer who started camp on the back fields but forced his own look late in March. Texas ran 38 pitchers through big league camp, looking not only for the 12 to go to battle with out of the gate but also another five or 10, or maybe 15, it would likely take to get through the season. Ross Wolf: Not in the picture. Now, to be fair, the 30-year-old, though not in big league camp, was one of the 43 pitchers who appeared in a spring training game for the Rangers.  Teams bring “just in case” arms to every exhibition game so that when a scheduled pitcher can’t get out of a prescribed inning it doesn’t disrupt the plans for when the other scheduled pitchers will pitch. Sometimes those are prospects a year or two or more away rewarded with the opportunity (Jerad Eickhoff, Jimmy Reyes, Victor Payano). Sometimes they’re Ross Wolf, and even the hardest-core of you might decide when Ross Wolf takes the ball against the Padres in an ugly seventh inning in early March that it’s a decent time to go buy some Dippin’ Dots, or a Rangers hoodie. Wolf did get into four spring training games, and completed 2.1 total innings that Texas didn’t have to stretch someone else out to take care of.  In those 2.1 innings, opposing hitters, some of whom were late-inning journeymen, if not just-in-case players themselves, hit .417, with five base hits and two walks.  Two of the hits cleared a fence, in fair ground. If you asked 100 diligent Rangers fans in late March which was more likely – that Wolf would be released before camp broke, or that he would start a game in Arlington in May – the percentage choosing the latter would surely have been lower than the percentage of empty boxes in the graphic above. I wrote the other day about Texas officials squinting their eyes and seeing a starting pitcher this spring in Josh Lindblom, in spite of the fact that he hadn’t started so much as a minor league game since May 2010. Wolf’s last start was in 2005.  He made one start that year, in mid-May, in Class AA for the Marlins, and lasted three innings. Before that, Wolf’s last start came in 2002, the summer in which Florida drafted him in the 18th round out of Wabash Valley College. The Marlins were still called “Florida” then.  The year before that, the Nationals were still the Montreal Expos, who drafted Wolf in the 47th round out of Newton High School in Wheeler, Illinois, but didn’t sign him. After his 11 starts (4.66 ERA) in that 2002 season, in the following decade Wolf made the one May 2005 start and 483 relief appearances. Fourteen of those 483 games pitched in relief were out of Florida’s big league bullpen in August and September of 2007 (11.68 ERA). Another 11 came in the second half of the 2010 season, when he posted a 4.26 ERA for Oakland.  Texas saw him three times, putting five runs on his ledger over 3.1 innings – and that doesn’t count the three of four inherited baserunners who also scored. Wolf’s stint with the A’s came after seven years with the Marlins and a year and a half with the Orioles.  The Oakland experiment lasted a few months, after which Wolf signed with the Astros and spent the 2011 season in Oklahoma City.  Baltimo