You know how the Angels just salvaged their season by beating up on a soft portion of their schedule? Yeah, that was pretty cool, right? They should totally do that more often.
Now, back at .500, the Halos are within striking distance of the Texas Rangers in the AL West. If they want to continue closing that gap, they have a perfect opportunity to do so this weekend. Actually, they need to pick up at least one game in this series if they even want to be something more than a distant dot in the Rangers’ rearview mirror. As it turns out, that “soft schedule” thing slices both ways.
Once the Rangers finish up the series in Anaheim, they embark on stretch of their schedule so filled with cupcakes that all of the past, current and future contestants on Cupcake Wars just forfeited and declared Texas the champion-for-life. Starting June 4th and running all the way through July 2nd, the Rangers face ONE team with a winning record, that would be the Giants, who are a National League, so they barely even count. Everyone else is at least three games under .500.
But wait! There’s more. The streak for Texas breaks on July 3rd when they play the suddenly red hot White Sox, but then they get a second helping of cupcakes. The next nine games are against the wretched Twins, the lousy Mariners and the crappy Athletics. After that the Angels head back to Texas and, um, well, the Halos aren’t over .500 either, so, there’s that.
The point is that from this Angels-Rangers series until the next, Texas plays 37 games and only six of those games come against teams that are currently over .500. SIX GAMES.
Not to be pessimistic about it, but the Halos will be lucky if the Rangers “only” widen their division lead by two games in that time. That is why the Angels really need to take this series, if not sweep it just so Texas doesn’t pump their cushion back into double-digit games before the Angels ever get to face them again.