Outfielder Endy Chavez went 11-for-21 with four runs scored and five runs batted in on the Rangers’ recent road trip to Tampa Bay and Cleveland.
The Rangers completed their first four-game road sweep in more than a decade Sunday with a 2-0 victory over the Indians at Progressive Field.
The win was the fifth in a row for Texas, which increased its lead in the A.L. West to 2.5 games over the Seattle Mariners.
In Thursday’s series opener, veteran outfielder Endy Chavez went 4-for-4 with a triple and two runs scored as the Rangers bounced back from an early deficit to beat Cleveland by a final of 7-4.
Right-hander Dave Bush, making a spot start for Texas while Matt Harrison continues to deal with a blister on his throwing hand, retired the Indians in order in the first inning but ran into trouble in the second. Carlos Santana drew a leadoff walk and moved to third on Grady Sizemore’s double, and both came around to score on singles by Travis Buck and Orlando Cabrera. Buck later scored on an infield groundout to give Cleveland a 3-0 lead.
Indians starter Carlos Carrasco retired 12 of the first 14 batters he faced before Nelson Cruz led off the top of the fifth with a double. Cruz came home with the Rangers’ first run on a ground ball by Yorvit Torrealba, and Elvis Andrus and Josh Hamilton added RBI singles in the inning to tie the game at 3-3.
Left-hander Michael Kirkman took over for Bush and kept Cleveland off the board for two innings while Texas scored another three runs. After a sacrifice fly by Torrealba had given the Rangers a slim 4-3 lead with two outs in the sixth, Endy Chavez kept the rally going with an RBI triple into right field. Chavez then scored on an error by Carlos Santana during Ian Kinsler’s at-bat to put Texas in front, 6-3.
Cleveland added a single run in the seventh inning while the Rangers did the same in the ninth for a 7-4 final score.
After collecting a season-high 20 hits last week in Tampa Bay, Texas pounded out another 19 base hits Friday en route to an 11-2 win over the Indians. Right-hander Alexi Ogando remained undefeated in 11 starts this year, limiting Cleveland to one earned run on four hits with six strikeouts across eight innings of work.
The Rangers put together a two-out rally against Indians starter Justin Masterson in the top of the second, as Mitch Moreland and Mike Napoli connected for back-to-back singles before Endy Chavez laced an RBI double into right field. Michael Young added a run-scoring groundout in the third to give Texas a 2-0 lead.
Ogando retired the side in order in three of the first five innings before Cleveland got to him for a run in the sixth. Michael Brantley led off with a single and advanced to third on a hit by Asdrubal Cabrera, then came home when Shin-Soo Choo grounded into a double play to make it a 2-1 game.
In the top of the seventh, however, Masterson allowed a walk and a single before Josh Hamilton lined a three-run home run over the wall in right. Adrian Beltre reached on a fly ball that Brantley and Choo lost in the sun, and Nelson Cruz followed with a two-run homer to extend the Rangers’ lead to 7-1.
Texas added three more runs on a bases-clearing double by Elvis Andrus in the eighth inning and another in the ninth, while Cabrera provided the Indians’ second run with a leadoff homer against Yoshinori Tateyama in the bottom of the ninth.
On Saturday, left-hander Derek Holland tossed a complete-game, four-hit shutout over Cleveland as the Rangers rolled to a 4-0 win. Making his first career start in his home state of Ohio, Holland limited the Indians to five hits and just one walk over nine innings, striking out five while recording 10 ground ball outs.
Texas provided an early lead for him to work with after Josh Hamilton hit a two-run homer off Cleveland starter Fausto Carmona in the top of the first. From there, Holland retired 16 of the first 17 batters he faced while only once allowing a runner to get past third base.
Carmona settled down following Hamilton’s first-inning home run, keeping the Rangers off the board over the next five frames before surrendering a two-run homer to Nelson Cruz in the top of the seventh.
Holland wrapped up his shutout with a perfect ninth inning, which included a swinging strikeout of Austin Kearns to end the ballgame.
Sparked by early home runs from Mitch Moreland and Elvis Andrus, the Rangers completed their four-game sweep with a 2-0 victory over the Indians on Sunday afternoon.
Cleveland starter Mitch Talbot worked a scoreless top of the first before yielding a solo home run to Moreland with one out in the second, and Andrus greeted him with a leadoff homer in the third inning to give Texas a 2-0 lead.
Meanwhile, left-hander C.J. Wilson provided 7 and 2/3 shutout innings of work for the Rangers, recording seven strikeouts while allowing just three hits to earn his sixth win of the year.
The last time Texas had swept a four-game series on the road was April 22-25, 1999, against the Minnesota Twins at the old Metrodome in Minneapolis. The Rangers’ four winning pitchers in that series were starters Aaron Sele, Mark Clark, Mike Morgan and Rick Helling.
Matthews Taken in First Round of Draft
With the 33rd overall pick in this year’s amateur draft, Texas selected left-handed pitcher Kevin Matthews from Richmond Hill High School in Georgia.
Matthews, 18, is considered small at 5-foot-11 and 180 pounds, but his fastball has been clocked in the low-90s and is said to be offset by a good slider and decent changeup. He went 4-2 with an earned run average of 1.68 in his senior year at Richmond Hill, racking up 94 strikeouts in 42 innings of work over 10 appearances.
Signability may become an issue as Matthews has committed to the University of Virginia, though the Rangers feel confident they can work out a deal with him.
Texas used its second-round pick (No. 37 overall) to select outfielder Zach Cone out of the University of Georgia, where he led the Bulldogs with a .317 batting average, 10 home runs and 53 RBIs as a sophomore in 2010.
Delcarmen Inked to Minor-League Deal
The club made a pair of roster moves at the Triple-A level last Thursday, granting right-hander Yhency Brazoban his unconditional release and signing veteran reliever Manny Delcarmen to a minor-league deal.
Brazoban was signed by Texas in mid-December and had a clause in his contract which allowed him to be released if not promoted to the majors by June 1.
Delcarmen, who had spent the first two months of the season with the Mariners’ Triple-A affiliate in Tacoma, possessed a similar out clause as Brazoban and was given his release by Seattle on Wednesday. The 29-year-old was assigned to Triple-A Round Rock by the Rangers.
Across 28 innings pitched for the Tacoma Rainiers this season, Delcarmen posted a record of 2-2 with a 5.14 earned run average in 16 appearances. In parts of six big-league seasons with the Boston Red Sox and, briefly, the Colorado Rockies, Delcarmen has an 11-8 record with a career ERA of 3.97 and three saves.
Nate's Notes 
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