Rangers run wild, set a record

By Roch Kubatko

Aug. 23, 2007 12 AM PT

Baltimore Sun

BALTIMORE -- As much as Dave Trembley is honored and excited to be returning as Orioles manager next season, there will be nights when he would prefer a 14-hour bus ride in the minors -- broken air conditioning and all.

In Game 1 of Wednesday’s doubleheader, the Orioles were battered by a team that kept batting around. They surrendered six home runs, two of them grand slams, and a club-record 29 hits. They also gave up the most runs scored in the majors since 1900, historic indiscretions that punctuated a 30-3 loss to the Texas Rangers before a sparse but wildly entertained gathering at Camden Yards.

Through it all, Trembley sat in the dugout with his lips pressed tightly together and an icy glare in his eyes -- when he wasn’t walking to the mound to make another pitching change.

“You need to have a real short memory,” Trembley said, “and you let it go.”

Then you play a second game, with fresh wounds.

Catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia, the prized acquisition in the Mark Teixeira trade with the Atlanta Braves, homered twice, singled twice and drove in seven runs. No. 9 hitter Ramon Vazquez, batting .229 when the day began, had two three-run homers and a run-scoring single. Marlon Byrd and Travis Metcalf hit grand slams. David Murphy had five hits, two of them in the eighth inning.

Two of Vazquez’s singles came in the sixth inning. Saltalamacchia homered and singled in the sixth, and walked and homered in the eighth.

The Rangers did all their scoring in four innings, sending nine batters to the plate in the fourth, 14 in the sixth, 13 in the eighth and 10 in the ninth.

Daniel Cabrera (9-13) gave up six runs and nine hits in five-plus innings. Brian Burres was charged with eight runs and eight hits in two-thirds of an inning. Rob Bell gave up seven runs and five hits with three walks in 1 1/3 innings. Paul Shuey surrendered nine runs and seven hits with three walks in two innings.

There’s no exaggerating how long it had been since baseball had seen this kind of offensive display. The 30 runs scored are the fourth-most in major league history. The Chicago Colts (now the Cubs) defeated the Louisville Royals, 36-7, in 1897.

No American League team has matched the Rangers’ output, with the Boston Red Sox and Chicago White Sox totaling 29 in 1950 and 1955, respectively.

The Rangers became only the second team in the last 50 years to have four players total four or more runs batted in in the same game.

Texas’ Wes Littleton, who entered the game in the seventh with a 14-3 lead, picked up a save by pitching three scoreless innings.

The Rangers won the second game, 9-7, to set a modern record for runs in a doubleheader.

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Scoreboard buster

Teams that have scored 26 or more runs in a game since 1900:

AMERICAN LEAGUE

* 30 -- Texas at Baltimore, Aug. 22, 2007.

* 29 -- Boston vs. St. Louis, June 8, 1950.

* 29 -- Chicago vs. Kansas City, April 23, 1955.

* 27 -- Cleveland vs. Boston, July 7, 1923.