Corey Seager had a 458-foot home run among his three hits, Cal Quantrill pitched six strong innings and the Texas Rangers held off the Arizona Diamondbacks 7-6 on Sunday in Phoenix to move to within one game of the American League West lead.
Seager hit a two-run homer eight pitches into the game, drove in three runs and scored twice.
Quantrill (9-5) gave up two runs on five hits, with four strikeouts and no walks. He used 70 pitches, leaving after Geraldo Perdomo opened the seventh with a single. Quantrill has won five of his last six starts with a 1.89 ERA.
Nolan Arenado hit a three-run homer off the left field foul pole against Tyler Alexander in the seventh as the D-backs closed the deficit to 7-4, and he led off the ninth with the first of three doubles off Jacob Latz.
Tim Tawa hit an RBI double and Jordan Lawlar’s one-out double off the left field fence made it 7-6. Latz struck out Tommy Troy and intentionally walked Ketel Marte before he got Gabriel Moreno to pop out for his 29th save.
Moreno homered and Perdomo had three hits for the D-backs, who have lost three of four.
Josh Jung and Brandon Nimmo had two hits and an RBI apiece for the Rangers (74-76), who are two games behind Cleveland for the final AL wild-card spot.
Arizona starter Eduardo Rodriguez (15-6) gave up eight hits and six runs (three earned) before leaving with one out in the sixth. He struck out seven and walked one.
The D-backs (79-71) lost a chance to gain ground in the National League wild-card race. They are two games back of San Diego for the third NL wild-card spot.
The Rangers took a 2-0 lead when leadoff hitter Justin Foscue singled and Seager homered on the first pitch he saw.
Moreno homered to lead off the fourth to close the deficit to 2-1.
The Rangers took advantage of two D-backs errors to score three unearned runs for a 5-1 lead in the fifth. Foscue reached on third baseman Arenado’s fielding error and Seager singled to center to put runners on first and third.
Jung lined a single that got past left fielder Lars Nootbaar as two runs scored and Jung took second. Nimmo singled in Jung to cap the three-run inning.
Danny Jansen had a run-scoring double and Seager singled in the final run in the sixth for a 7-1 edge.
