The 2012 Texas Rangers: A Shutdown Ending

By Shutdown Inning

The writers from shutdowninning.com have collaborated to provide a complete recap of the 2012 Texas Rangers season. From Spring Training to the Wild Card Playoff game, the early season highs to the late season lows, every important moment is highlighted in this one-of-a-kind production.

As George Santayana said, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shutdown Inning
• Release date: Dec 13, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301006922

Shutdown Inning

ShutdownInning.com exists to educate and inform its readers about the Texas Rangers, and baseball in general. The writings you'll find from SDI authors range from passionate to analytical to entertaining in nature.

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The 2012 Texas Rangers: A Shutdown Ending

From the writers at Shutdown Inning

Published by Shutdown Inning at Smashwords

Copyright 2012 Shutdown Inning

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Foreword

Preface

Spring Training

April

May

June

July

August

September and October

The Wild Card Game

Closing

About the Authors

Acknowledgments

To Jon Daniels for building a winning club and making baseball fun in North Texas, and to Nolan Ryan, Ray Davis, and Bob Simpson for supporting that.

To Eric Nadel and Chuck Morgan.

To my family and closest friends for all of their support. To Alexander Cartwright for inventing the game of baseball. – James Holland

To my Mom, Dad, brother, all the people that support SDI, and especially the writers. – Patrick Despain

To Patrick and Peter for giving me the opportunity to write for SDI, and to all of our readers who make what we do possible. – Ben Wertz

Dedicated to my father who taught me the game of baseball. Gone, but not forgotten. – Eddie Middlebrook

To Kristen, for learning to love baseball, encouraging me to get into writing about it, and for reading every single thing I produce. – Peter Ellwood

To the folks that have read my stuff and offered comments. The feedback you provide (positive, negative, or indifferent) is what a new writer craves the most. To Patrick and Danny: I'm so glad you guys allowed me to get in on this thing, and I thank all the rest of the SDI Mafia for not voting me off the island. Special thanks go out to Michael Grubes Gruber and Mike Rhyner. Finally, I'd like to thank all of the new folks I've met on Twitter that make watching a game without an internet connection feel like a lonely experience. – Chris Kautz

To my friends and family who always thought this was special, because it is and so are you. And to the guys I write with who took me seriously and allowed me to be a part of this. And Ian Kinsler, too. – Emily Cates

To my wife and children for being supportive of me and my obsession with the great game. – Jeff Johnson

To my family for all of their love and support. And a special thank you to Patrick Despain and Todd Kaufmann for giving me a shot. – Mike McGehee

To Danny Fowler for his role in the creation of Shutdown Inning.

To Dan Allsup for having the first inspiration for putting together this book.

To Kazuto Yamazaki joining us in the baseball journey and translating Shutdown Inning articles into Japanese.

To Scott Fitzgerald and 1340 The Fan in Lubbock for partnering with us to make the SDI Mafia a part of the Sports Shack on a weekly basis.

To Jamey Newberg for his tireless efforts that pre-date the word blog, and that enhance our knowledge and passion for the team that we love.

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Foreword

By Sean Bass

In the spring of 2004 I fell in love with a girl while at college at The University of North Texas. Her name was Katie. As a twenty two year old kid, I wasn’t quite sure just what that meant at the time. Hell, I still might not be able to wrap my head around the whole notion. Life was brimming with excitement of digging my teeth in what turns out to be an incredible career in radio by starting to cover the Texas Rangers for KTCK and doing more and more on air work. There was still a year or so of school left, so the impending train at the end of the tunnel known as responsibility wasn’t quite on the radar just yet.

Partying with my roommates at our four bedroom house in Denton still took a high priority. Moments of youth infused decisions that could have led to worse consequences were luckily avoided. But at the time the possible results of my actions weren’t top of mind. I figured as long as I studied and wrote good papers and kept the GPA at a reasonable level (not to mention go to Rangers games for free as a media member) nothing could really bring me down from the natural high that was spending wonderful moments with Katie. This blonde girl of mostly German descent was all that really mattered. I was in love and believed it. This is all we can ask for during our time here.

Then it happened. The spring semester ended, and Katie left me. Not in the heartbreaking way she did four days before my graduation a year and a half later, but she left for the summer to work in Denali National Park in Alaska. She was an outdoorsy hippie chick. Even more reason as to why I fell for her so hard. I was facing not seeing my girlfriend for three and a half months. Looking back it seems pretty silly, but I was incredibly bummed out by an idea of a summer minus my new best friend. Luckily the true constants in my life were there to console me and dry up the tears of loneliness - a summer of friends and baseball.

Texas, under Buck Showalter and free of