Andriese bested by Darvish, top-seeded Rangers

ARLINGTON — Despite already clinching the American League West, it was echoed throughout the Rangers clubhouse that their regular-season mission would not be complete until they secured home-field advantage throughout the postseason.

They secured it, for the first time in club history, on Friday night with a 3-1 victory over the Rays at Globe Life Park behind a stellar pitching performance from Yu Darvish. Due to the AL winning the All-Star Game, the Rangers are assured home-field advantage for the entirety of their postseason run. The Rangers and Red Sox could still end with the same record, but the Rangers hold the tiebreaker over them with a better intra-divisional record.

“It’s great for us and great for the fans, we’ve played really good at home this year,” said Rougned Odor, who hit a solo home run in the sixth. “So it’s going to be nice to start [and end] the series at home. We can’t take it easy now. We just have to keep doing what we’re doing and keep playing how we play.”

Darvish, who was making his 100th career start, struck out a season-high 12 batters over six innings of work on his way to a win. His only blemish was an RBI double from Rays third baseman Evan Longoria in the sixth. Longoria’s double was just the third hit — and only extra-base hit — Darvish allowed.

“Just explosive stuff tonight,” Rangers manager Jeff Banister said of Darvish. “It’s great to see from a guy who’s been on an upward trend. I think there’s still another step, another gear from him. [But] very impressive night for Yu.”

Odor’s homer, along with another solo home run from Carlos Beltran, helped Darvish’s performance stand up. Beltran’s came first, when he lined his 29th homer of the year over the right-field fence in the third. The homer left his bat at 109.6 mph, per Statcast™, which was his hardest homer of the year. Odor followed with his solo shot in the sixth.

Both home runs came off Rays starter Matt Andriese, who gave up three runs on seven hits over 5 1/3 innings to take the loss. Andriese came into this start having allowed two runs or fewer in three straight. He had allowed just two homers in his four prior September starts.

“Tough matchup today,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “Darvish really had it going. Racked up a bunch of punchouts, made it difficult basically our entire lineup. He had the fastball going. Pretty unique, a guy that can throw 92, 93, then dialing it up to 97, 98 when he wants to.”

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