Wyatt Langford did not drive in a run Tuesday. He scored two of Texas' eight, including the fifth-inning trip that stretched a one-run lead into a four-run cushion.
Langford went 2-for-5 with a double as the Rangers beat the Athletics 8-5 at Globe Life Field and moved within one game of the Astros in the American League West. ESPN's box and CBS Sports agree on the line: two hits, two runs, no RBIs, one double (his 17th), one strikeout, average .254.
The Associated Press framed the night around Brandon Nimmo's four hits and five RBIs and Corey Seager's three runs; Langford's traffic was the connective tissue in the fifth and sixth.
Fifth inning: single, then home on a groundout
With Texas ahead 2-1 in the fifth, Joc Pederson pinch-hit a single and Seager walked. Langford singled to shallow left-center, loading the bases. Nimmo's single to right scored Pederson and Seager and sent Langford to third.
Ezequiel Durán grounded out to second, scoring Langford for a 5-1 lead. That sequence - Langford's single creating the third baserunner, then scoring on the next out - turned a tense game into a multi-run margin before MacKenzie Gore left the mound.
Gore (8-10) worked 5 1/3 innings with five hits, one earned run, four walks, and four strikeouts. He had already navigated an Athletics lineup that finished with 11 hits and seven walks but stranded 14 runners on the night, the AP noted.
Sixth inning: double, then home on Nimmo again
In the sixth, after Logan O'Hoppe and Seager had already pushed across two more on sacrifice flies, Langford doubled to shallow right off Jose Suarez. Nimmo singled him home for an 8-1 lead. ESPN measured Suarez's night at two-thirds of an inning with four hits and three earned runs; CBS lists his ERA at 5.82 and ESPN at 5.87 after the same outing.
Langford also flied out with Seager on third in the first and struck out after Seager's second double in the third. He popped out in the eighth. The two productive trips - the fifth-inning single and sixth-inning double - were the ones that showed up on the scoreboard.
