The Texas Rangers are still under .500, and they are still in the American League wild-card picture. A 6-2 win at Arizona on Saturday improved Texas to 73-76 and left the club two games behind the final wild-card spot, the Associated Press reported via NBC 5, on a night both Josh Jung and Nathan Eovaldi returned from the injured list.
Sports Illustrated's Matt Postins underscored the calendar math: the same Saturday Jung and Eovaldi contributed, the Houston Astros and Cleveland Guardians both lost, trimming Texas' deficits in the AL West and wild-card races to two games.
That is a narrow path in September, but it is a path that did not exist if Texas had dropped the middle game of the Chase Field series after Friday's 9-1 loss.
What two games back means in mid-September
A sub-.500 club two games out does not control its destiny. It does force every remaining series - starting with Sunday's finale in Phoenix and a nine-game homestand that opens Tuesday against Boston - to carry playoff weight.
The AP listed Arizona at 79-70 after Saturday, 1 1/2 games behind San Diego for the final National League wild card, a reminder that both dugouts were playing for October while the Rangers were trying to climb back into it.
Jung's activation from a left calf strain put a .294/.361/.441 bat (nine homers, 35 RBI in 92 games before the injury) back in the three-hole, Sports Illustrated reported. He went 2-for-5 with an RBI and a run. Eovaldi, back from right posterior elbow inflammation, threw 2 2/3 relief innings with one run allowed in his first outing since Aug. 7.
Those are not ornamental returns; they are the roster's attempt to add production and innings while the standings remain reachable.
The win that moved the needle one night
Saturday's offense clustered in the fifth. Wyatt Langford led off with his 17th home run, the AP wrote. A review that upheld Corey Seager safe at first - pitcher Brandon Pfaadt ruled off the bag, challenge inconclusive - kept the inning going with the score tied, and Texas scored five more runs after that call.
