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Byrd doubles, homers to lead Rangers past Reds

Jun 17, 2007 - 10:10 PM CINCINNATI (Ticker) -- Sammy Sosa got the day off, but his replacement made the most of it.

Marlon Byrd doubled and hit his first home run of the season to lead the Texas Rangers to an 11-4 victory in the rubber game of a three-game set with the Cincinnati Reds on Sunday.

Byrd was second in the Class AAA Pacific Coast League in hitting at .358 when he was recalled on May 26. In his 21 games since the promotion, he is hitting .390 after doing a good impersonation of Sosa by driving in three runs from the cleanup spot against Cincinnati starter Bronson Arroyo.

"I'm no Sammy," Byrd said. "But I just tried to do my job. It's huge to help this team take the series. We have to keep plugging."

Byrd doubled off the top of the left-center field wall to plate two runs in the first inning and added his first homer of the season off Arroyo in the sixth that provided a 7-4 lead.

"Byrd's done a good job for us since we brought him up," Texas manager Ron Washington said. "He came out for early batting practice yesterday and after he hit the ball off the fence his first time up, I told him that if he hadn't he would have had enough juice to hit it out. After he hit the home run to center, he came in and said, "How's that?""

Texas broke open the game with four runs in the ninth.

Byrd's performance made a winner of Texas starter Kevin Millwood (3-6), who struck out 10 Reds to win his first game since April 13. Millwood fended off every Red, except Adam Dunn, who launched two home runs.

"I was going to hang myself but the curtain rod broke," Millwood said. "I made some minor adjustments and they made a big difference. The longer the game went the more comfortable I was. It's not exactly where I want to be but it's something to build on."

The Texas manager was encouraged with the turnaround

"He kept his pitches down, used both sides of the plate and he had a good off-speed pitch," Washington said. "The roll he was on turned around and went the other way. He got a pitch up to the big boy, Dunn, but he was the old Millwood, bend but never break."

Millwood reached double digits for the 12th time in his career in navigating six innings, allowing four runs on six hits.

Dunn hit a two-run homer in the third and a solo shot in the fifth. The slugger has hit safely in seven straight games, hitting .448 (13-for-29) with four home runs and seven RBI.

The Rangers had been outscored, 52-22, in the first innings this season, but they scored three off the struggling Arroyo in the first on Sunday.

Kenny Lofton led off with a single and advanced to third on a throwing error by catcher David Ross on a sacrifice attempt by Scott Hairston. Michael Young extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a single to score Lofton in front of Byrd's double.

Adam Melhuse's RBI single in the third increased the edge to 4-1 and Young provided a second run-scoring base hit in the fourth for a 5-3 edge. After Dunn's solo blast in the fifth cut the deficit to 6-4, Byrd homered in the sixth.

Arroyo, who entered 0-5 with a 7.65 ERA in his last seven starts and winless since May 6, yielded seven runs and eight hits in six frames.

The Reds are searching for answers.

"Dick's (pitching coach Dick Pole) gone over the video and split screen," Cincinnati manager Jerry Narron said. "If it's anything mechanical, we can't find it, and Dick's spent a lot of time searching. He's a good pitcher. He had that stretch last year where he didn't win a game. He'll come out of it.

Arroyo is healthy.

"I feel good," Arroyo said. "I don't feel strong, but I feel good. Nothing's bothering me. I don't feel like I have as much zip on my fastball, and that can pose a problem, because then they don't have to respect my breaking ball as much. I have to get back to being able to beat guys with my fastball."

Cincinnati and Texas have the worst record of their respective leagues. The Reds are a half-game better.

"It's not fun," Ken Griffey Jr. said. "Obviously, you don't like it. In every game, something good happens, and even if you lose, you just have to try to build on that. It's up to everyone in here to try and do more, but not trying to do what they're not capable of. I'm as much as fault as anybody trying to go outside of the limits. It's not lack of effort."