ARLINGTON, Texas — Everything was going so perfectly for the Texas Rangers.
And then, in a flash, it wasn’t.
Rangers veteran left-hander Martin Perez flirted with perfection Thursday afternoon at Globe Life Field.
Perez, 31, stifled the Houston Astros through six innings, not allowing a hit or walk, but ended up taking a no decision in a 3-2 Rangers loss.
Astros outfielder Chas McCormick broke up Perez’s string of perfection with a hard-hit double to the right-center gap to lead off the seventh inning.
The Astros took a 1-0 lead on Yordan Alvarez’s two-out single later in the seventh before the Rangers tied it in the bottom of the inning.
Kyle Tucker’s two-run, pinch-hit home run to right field against reliever Matt Bush gave the Astros a 3-1 lead. Corey Seager’s solo homer in the ninth pulled the Rangers to within 3-2 but Rafael Montero forced Adolis Garcia to groundout on the first pitch he saw with Nathaniel Lowe on first base to end the game.
Perez is the second pitcher this season to start a game with at least six perfect innings. The Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw threw seven perfect innings before leaving the game because of a high pitch count.
It’s the best start for a Texas pitcher since Mike Minor threw 6 1/3 perfect innings in June 2018.
“That’s as good as I’ve seen a guy throw,” Rangers manager Chris Woodward said. “He just kept executing. I thought he was going to throw a perfect game.”
There have been 23 perfect games thrown in MLB history.
No-hitters are much more frequent. The league recognizes 314 no-hitters since 1876, including nine in 2021. The Rangers were the victims of two of those last season.
Perez had to be near perfect against Astros ace Justin Verlander, who has three career no-hitters. Verlander held the Rangers to one hit through six innings with seven strikeouts and no walks.
But the Rangers got to him in the seventh. Corey Seager, Mitch Garver and Nathaniel Lowe rallied for consecutive one-out singles, the first trouble the former Cy Young winner faced. Adolis Garcia tied the game at 1-1 with a sacrifice fly to center that scored Seager.
“Today was amazing,” Perez said. “They were a little bit better than us, but we just need to turn the page and come back tomorrow.”
Perez (0-2) allowed a run on two hits with four strikeouts and no walks in seven innings. It’s Perez’s second consecutive impressive outing. He held Oakland scoreless on two hits over six innings on Saturday but didn’t figure in the decision.
Verlander held the Rangers to a run on four hits and no walks with eight strikeouts in seven innings and earned the win.
“Obviously, the guy on the other side is pretty good, has a pretty good track record,” Woodward said of Verlander. “Well-pitched game. It came down, basically, to one pitch, one mistake I wish we could get back.”
Bush said he hung a breaking ball to Tucker and wanted it to go “anywhere but where I went with it.”
“It was a good pitch for someone to hit a home run,” he said. “Other than that, it was a hanger. I was just trying to bury it. This game is tough. I thought Martin had an amazing game and of course I want to pick him up right there. It just didn’t work out for us right there.”
Perez said he was just trying to match Verlander’s scoreless innings.
“I know he’s got a lot of years at a high level, but we’re both pitchers. He’s no different than me,” Perez said. “He’s got more experience than me … he had a great game, too. I was just trying to do what he was doing. If he throws zeroes, I’m going to throw zeroes, too. I had a lot of fun today. It was good.”
Woodward said the plan was to have Perez, who had thrown only 76 pitchers, return to the mound in the eighth but after a long seventh inning they decided against it. Perez was hoping to go back out.
“His pitch count was low, but at the same time he sat for a long time after that seventh inning. That’s when pitchers tend to have bad things happen,” Woodward said. “It’s hard on a pitcher to sit there and wait. If you’ve been up seven times, it’s hard on your body, especially if that last one is a long wait. He had done his job.”
The Astros took the past three games of the series after the Rangers won Monday’s opener.
The Rangers start a three-game series against the Atlanta Braves on Friday at Globe Life Field.
Perez, who spent the first seven seasons with the Rangers, has been what the club was hoping for when they signed him in the off-season, a guiding veteran presence for the team’s young pitching staff.
“I can’t say enough about him. There’s been a ton of growth in his life. He talks openly about the struggles he had early on that kind of prevented him from becoming a superstar,” Woodward said. “He’s had a hell of a career.
“Just having dialogue with our pitchers about the ups and downs of a starting pitcher and how to work through those things, how to grow. In the clubhouse, he’s been a really good presence, especially for our young pitchers.”
