Major League Baseball

Lost weekend

Published Oct. 11, 2010 10:10 p.m. ET

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ARLINGTON - Over the course of the Rangers' 39 not-so-historic seasons, they've been overmatched, underfunded and occasionally downright awful, but they've never committed this sin before:

Choke.

In order to qualify for such a despicable description, you must first occupy a position of superiority. You can't choke if you can't win, which left most Rangers teams ineligible. Even when they were good, making the playoffs three seasons in the late '90s, no one really expected them to overcome the dynastic Yankees.

But that was then, and this is now. This is a good Rangers team, the best-equipped ever for the postseason. This is a team that was up, 2-0, in Florida and coming home.

This is a team that was six outs away from the ALCS on Saturday and four wins from the World Series.

And after Sunday's 5-2 loss? It's a team looking more and more like the '06 Mavericks and any team of the Wade Phillips era.

For the record: Choking is a serious accusation, and it's not how I might describe the last couple of days. For the most part, the Rangers have simply been outplayed by the team with the best record in the league. No one allowed a ball to roll between his legs. No one walked in the winning run.

But try to tell that to a fan base that has endured 38 years of hard times, not to mention the fact that the sports calendar doesn't begin and end with April and October.

This is starting to look a little familiar. You're excused for feeling fatalistic.

For a little perspective, I took up the case with Darren Oliver, the Rangers' resident philosopher.

First, I asked if he believed in momentum. Inside the confines of a game, yes, he said. Over the course of a series? No. Too many variables impact a situation from game-to-game.

Of course, if he said anything else, it would play into the hands of all who believe the momentum in the series has shifted dramatically from Texas to Tampa Bay. This pretty much covers the media, national TV audience and the 49,218 who filed out Sunday as if it were a funeral.

This sports market has been fooled before. Oliver knew where I was going as soon as I said "Mavs" and "2-and-0."

"Yeah, I know that one," he said. "I'm a big basketball fan."

And the Cowboys ...

"Losing in December," he said, cutting me off. "I know that one, too."

So Darren: How do you persuade fans who have grown up, gotten married, raised kids and lost their minds waiting on the local baseball team that this isn't happening all over again with the Rangers?

"Funny you should say that," Oliver said. "I know that's what they're seeing from a fan's perspective.

"But players don't think of it that way."

You should take no small comfort in that assertion.

The first two games of this series, you never saw a team as rattled as the Rays. Several muttered to themselves in the dugout. Others sat with their heads down or chirped unchecked at umpires. They were the favored team with the better record, and they'd blown their home-field advantage.

Did they choke?

"A lot of it was Cliff Lee," manager Joe Maddon said of his Rays. "A lot of it was C.J. Wilson."

Exactly. Then the Rays come to Texas, and what happens? Taking advantage of the Rangers' bullpen, suddenly a shell of what it'd been all season, they send the series back to Florida.

But it could be worse. This is the reason the Rangers acquired Cliff Lee, as cold-hearted a competitor as there is in the postseason, a man who loves the big stage. You have to like their odds at least a little, even if it means beating David Price twice.

If Lee manages to do it one more time, the Rangers will have done more than simply make history. They will have shown the kind of resolve that wins over any last doubters and proves there's nothing contagious as it relates to the local sports teams. And if they don't? Must be the water.

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