82-69
/Colby Lewis (6 IP/2 ER) delivered another quality start, the offense banged out 10 runs on 11 hits, and the Rangers blew out Oakland on Wednesday night.
Lewis, Texas's leader in innings pitched (196.0) and fWAR (+2.4) in 2015, completed 6 innings on just 2 runs and 5 hits. He struck out 3 and walked 2. Tonight was his 20th quality start in 31 appearances this season and, even though pitcher wins and losses don't really mean anything, he does have 17 of those, too.
In the WTF department, Elvis Andrus broke the game open in the 4th with a monster 3-run HR just a shade left of dead-center field. It was his career-high 7th HR, and he also added a double in the contest.
The other offensive standout was Adrian Beltre, who went 2-5 with a 3-run HR of his own. It's his 16th of the year and has his triple slash line up to .279/.323/.438 (100 wRC+) on the year -- exactly league average -- which is a huge leap from where he was offensively for most of the season.
With the Astros loss to Anaheim earlier in the afternoon, the Rangers own possession of the West by 3 full games (and 4 if we're talking about the loss column) with just 11 left to play.
The magic number is 8.