ARLINGTON – They came to see Nathan Eovaldi and Shohei Ohtani on Thursday. They got that. And they got a show from Rámon De Jésus, too.
Who is Rámon De Jésus, you might ask?
Usually, just a mild-mannered umpire. On Thursday, though, he threatened to become the center of attention in a close game in front of a crowd of 35,092. Then, Ohtani did what he does and stole the attention back with second-deck, opposite-field game-changing homer in Los Angeles’ 5-3 win over the Rangers.
The crowd, which braved weather issues, was the largest weeknight crowd (excluding Aaron Judge’s home run record pursuit) since Globe Life Field in Arlington opened in 2020.
It gave the Angels three wins in the four-game series. It’s not surprising Ohtani, who did double duty as a pitcher and hitter on Thursday, had a larger-than-life impact on the series. He homered four times in four games, three of them leaving the bat at 109 mph or higher and traveling at least 440 feet. He drove in eight runs. He reached base 13 times in 20 plate appearances. His homer off a first pitch cutter away from Brock Burke left the bat at 109 mph and landed somewhere in Erath County or, well, at least past the visiting bullpen.
“I don’t really have a lot more to say about him,” Rangers manager Bruce Bochy said of Ohtani. “He killed us. He’s a great hitter and he’s not missing many mistakes right now.”
De Jésus had an outsized impact on the series, too. Four ejections in four games has to be some kind of record, too. Three of those came ahead of the pivotal eighth inning Thursday when De Jésus tossed a trifecta of Rangers: Marcus Semien, Mike Maddux and Bruce Bochy. First Semien went for complaining about a checked swing third strike call made by De Jésus on appeal. Maddux and Bochy went in rapid succession for airing their grievances about the ejection.
It came with the tying run on third and one out in the seventh. Semien pointed at his eyes as he left home plate, then stopped to talk to De Jésus on his way out to his position. While Semien appeared to calmly state his position, he twice appeared to say it was “Ball Four.” After the second, De Jésus tossed him.
It quickly became a wider confrontation. Maddux, at the far end of the Rangers’ dugout at that moment, sprinted out to try to save Semien. But he also had a few words to say. De Jésus cocked his head momentarily, then thumbed him. And then Bochy, too.
“I was really mad at myself for even offering at that pitch, but I didn’t think I did anything to strike out,” Semien said.
“I made some gestures as I was walking back to the dugout and then calmly told him the game is on the line, we all want to be on the field and give it our best. I wanted to get some answers about why [the call was made]. I didn’t I just got thrown out.”
“It’s a tough call at that moment,” Bochy said. “We had the situation where we wanted it/ It might have been a spot to turn the game around.”
As the home plate umpire on Monday, De Jésus had also tossed Los Angeles’ Brandon Drury after Drury made contact with the umpire while protesting his own strikeout. And, yes, it had an impact on Thursday’s game. Drury was suspended for a game, decide to serve it Thursday and the Angels were left short-handed.
It kind of became important when Gio Urshela went down with an ankle injury and Anthony Rendon was left basically unable to swing after being hit by a first-inning pitch. The Angels had no choice but to keep Rendon in the game and watch him strike out without taking a full swing in three successive at-bats.
It left Ohtani.
It was enough.
As the starting pitcher, he navigated through the Rangers’ patient approach at the plate. They did not chase and forced him to work. He threw 30 pitches in the first inning and 20 in the third when the Rangers scored a pair of runs on three straight two-out hits to take a momentary 2-1 lead.
He struck out only three and recorded only five swings and misses all game. It was the fewest swings and misses he’s ever had in a start of at least 80 pitches. But he still managed to get through six innings on the mound.
“He’s a good pitcher, too,” Bochy said. “He reset out there and did a good job.”
Eovaldi gave the Rangers their first quality start in a week, but Mickey Moniak hit the first pitch of the seventh, a four-seamer at the bottom of the zone, over the center field wall to give the Angels the lead.
In the bottom of the inning, Travis Jankowski walked, stole second and went to third on a fly ball. It put them in perfect position to tie the game with a fly ball or base hit from Semien. He worked the count against Chris Devenski to 3-1, fouled off a couple of sliders in the hitting zone and then tried to stop his swing on a changeup in the dirt. On appeal, De Jésus ruled he had swung.
It changed the inning. Turns out it might have changed the game, too. It gave Shohei Ohtani another chance to steal the show.
On Twitter: @Evan_P_Grant
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