ARLINGTON, Texas — Elvis Andrus took off on a home run trot and Texas Rangers fans cheered as he mimicked what was going on in a game 1,400 miles away.
A few minutes later, the fireworks lit up the Texas sky as the Rangers wore fresh AL West championship T-shirts and celebrated their second consecutive division title with several thousand fans who stayed to wait and watch with them.
Texas trimmed its magic number to one with a 5-3 victory over the Seattle Mariners when Josh Hamilton and Adrian Beltre hit long home runs before Craig Gentry had an inside-the-park homer. The Rangers still needed a loss by the chasing Los Angeles Angels to clinch the division, which came about two hours later.
Los Angeles was already down 1-0 going into the fourth inning at home against Oakland when Texas (91-66) ended its game.
When David DeJesus hit a solo homer for Oakland in the top of the ninth for a 3-1 lead, what would be the final score, fans in Texas watching the huge video screen erupted. Andrus took off on his trot and then slid into home plate surrounded by his teammates.
“Elvis called it before it even happened. That was pretty funny,” Michael Young said. “That’s our moment. We were in our ballpark. … Usually you kind of have a point where you can dogpile on your field, celebrate, come up here (in the clubhouse) and have a party. We weren’t sure how this was going to work out, but you have 10,000 people in your home park sticking around, it made it pretty sweet. We wouldn’t have written it up any other way.”
It is the fifth division title for the Rangers, who last year went to their first World Series.
The Rangers were in Oakland last season when they clinched their first AL West crown since 1999. They had never won a playoff series before beating Tampa Bay in the AL divisional series and the New York Yankees in the AL championship series last October. San Francisco won the World Series in five games.
“At the end of the World Series last year after the Giants beat us, we stood in this room and we committed ourselves to get back here and get another opportunity,” manager Ron Washington said in the middle of the clubhouse celebration. “Tonight is what we did, we gave ourselves another opportunity.”
Rangers fans clapped and cheered on each of the Angels’ outs in the bottom of the ninth. Many of the players disappeared into the dugout when the second out was made, then came back after the final out wearing new T-shirts and sprayed ginger ale on each other and some of the fans. That was reminiscent of last year, when they did that in deference to Hamilton’s well-documented substance abuse problems.
Division championship T-shirts and caps were immediately available for fans to buy, too. The team kept the doors open until 2 a.m. at three of its gift shops – at Rangers Ballpark and stores in downtown Dallas and Fort Worth.
“It’s great. Now we have the opportunity to win a World Series,” said Young, the team’s longest-tenured player in his 11th season. “It’s been incredible so far. We’re looking forward to the next step.”
A banner declaring their 2011 division championship was unfurled high above center field soon after the Angels lost.
Texas still has five games left in the regular season, including three next week in Los Angeles for the final series.
The playoffs are set to begin next Friday. The Rangers are tied with AL Central champ Detroit for the second-best record, but would have to finish a game ahead of the Tigers to get home-field advantage in the playoffs and avoid a likely divisional series opener at New York against the Yankees.
Matt Harrison (14-9) worked six innings for the Rangers against Seattle.
Harrison retired 15 of the first 16 batters he faced until four consecutive Mariners reached to start the sixth. Ichiro Suzuki had an RBI single before Robinson walked to load the bases. Dustin Ackley and Miguel Olivo followed with consecutive sacrifice flies.
Gentry hit a liner to left-center in the fourth that rolled to the wall after splitting the gap between two outfielders. Left fielder Mike Carp and center fielder Trayvon Robinson both made diving attempts to catch the ball, Robinson a few feet behind Carp.
“We did exactly what we were supposed to do, which is attack the ball. We both felt we could get it,” Robinson said. “Thank God we didn’t collide with each other or we probably wouldn’t be talking right now.”
The speedy Gentry initially wasn’t even running full speed, and made a stutter-step rounding first base before realizing the ball was rolling to the wall. He then took off and scored standing for his first career homer (in 176 at-bats over 93 games).
It was the first inside-the-park homer for the Rangers since Nelson Cruz at Oakland on Sept. 4, 2006. Cruz was on base when Gentry got his. Washington even got the ball for Gentry to have as a keepsake.
That made it 5-0 and chased rookie left-hander Anthony Vasquez (1-5), the Texas native who gave up three homers and seven hits over 3 1-3 innings.
After Young led off the second with a single, his 206th hit of the season, Beltre followed with a towering 409-foot homer to left, his 29th. That also gave him 100 RBIs, his third career 100-RBI season, and nine homers in 12 games.
An inning later, Hamilton went deep for the sixth time in 10 games. His 25th homer was a 433-foot solo blast over the Rangers bullpen in right-center for a 3-0 lead.
“The one Beltre hit got us on the board first and Hamilton gave us some room,” Washington said. “Then Gentry hit one in the perfect spot, split the outfielders and did the rest with his legs. All of them were impressive.”
Blue Jays 5, Rays 1
In St. Petersburg, Fla., Brandon Morrow pitched seven scoreless innings and the Blue Jays further dampened the Rays’ playoff hopes.
The Rays dropped to 2½ games behind Boston in the AL wild-card race with only five games left.
A night after pounding out 17 hits in a 15-8 road romp at Yankee Stadium, the Rays were limited to Matt Joyce’s second-inning infield single until Casey Kotchman singled with one out in the seventh off Morrow (11-11).
Rays ace David Price allowed five runs — two earned — and five hits in six innings. He walked two and struck out seven.
NATIONAL LEAGUE
D’backs 3, Giants 1
In Phoenix, the Diamondbacks completed an improbable run to their first NL West crown in four years, beating the Giants when rookie Paul Goldschmidt lined a two-run triple off Sergio Romo in the eighth inning.
Ryan Roberts got the go-ahead burst started for manager Kirk Gibson’s team with a double off Matt Cain (12-11) and Goldschmidt finished it off with his first career triple to the corner in right.
Cubs 5, Cardinals 1
In St. Louis, Alfonso Soriano dealt the St. Louis’ wild-card hopes another serious blow with his first home run of the month, a tiebreaking three-run shot in the eighth inning that sent the Cubs over the Cardinals. The loss dropped the Cardinals three games behind the Braves for the wild card.
Braves 7, Nationals 4
In Washington, Dan Uggla and the Braves knocked around Stephen Strasburg a bit in a three-run first inning, and Atlanta helped its bid for a playoff berth by beating the Nationals.