Arlington, Texas — Things went askew for Tyler Alexander well before he took the mound for his first start ever at Globe Life Field.
He grew up in the Fort Worth area and went to college at TCU.
And yet, on the wall in the visitors’ clubhouse where the Rangers have photos of all the current big-league players from Texas, Alexander is not among them.
“I guess I’m not Texan enough,” he said before Friday’s game.
It’s a technicality. Although he spent virtually his entire life in Texas, Alexander was born in Chicago.
Then the game happened.
“Three innings worth of crap,” was how Alexander explained it.
He gave up three loud home runs and lasted just three innings as the Tigers opened a three-game series against the Rangers with a 7-6 loss.
BOX SCORE: Rangers 7, Tigers 6
“I don’t know,” he said. “I thought I made some good pitches. I got ahead of guys and couldn’t put them away. It seemed like every ball they hit hard went over the fence.”
Before Friday night, Alexander had seemingly gotten his home run issues under control. He came into his start against the slugging Rangers with a career-best 2.8% homer rate (seven in 60⅓ innings).
He had a relapse.
Nathaniel Lowe, who has been the American League’s hottest hitter since the All-Star break (.362, OPS over 1.0), lashed a cutter from Alexander off the batter’s eye in center field, a 449-foot missile, in the first inning.
Then with two on in the second, Ezequiel Duran got another mislocated cutter, this one up in the zone, and sent it flying 412 feet over the wall in left.
Four runs on two swings of the bat, both off Alexander’s cutter.
The Rangers scored three more times in the third, two on a 398-foot home run to right field by designated hitter Mark Mathias. That one came off a slider.
Three homers, 1,259 feet traveled, six runs produced.
“When Tyler executes poorly like tonight, it’s a tough night,” manager AJ Hinch said.
But the Rangers stopped scoring after Alexander left.
Rookie right-hander Garrett Hill, his first outing since Aug. 16 and the first relief appearance of his young career, held the Rangers in check for three innings on two singles and a walk.
“We needed to get him in there and he needed to be that bridge,” Hinch said. “He held them there and gave us a chance to come back.”
He struck out four, including the first three hitters he faced — Bubba Thompson, Marcus Semien and Corey Seager.
Jason Foley and Jose Cisnero also put up zeros.
And rookie Riley Greene almost brought the Tigers all the way back by himself.
“It just shows that we’re never out of it,” said Greene, who was a double short of a cycle and produced four RBIs. “We’re going to fight until the last out.”
Against Rangers right-handed starter Glenn Otto, who has kept left-handed hitters in check this season (.193 average), Greene produced a single and a triple, knocked in two runs and scored twice.
“I just stuck to my approach I use against all pitchers,” he said. “Be on time, and then back side up the middle. He’s got that two-seamer he was throwing to lefties, trying to go front hip or throw it down the middle so it ends up catching the corner on the outside.
“I just tried to stay going the other way with him.”
Then in the ninth against right-hander Jose Leclerc, Greene pounded a 2-2 slider into the right-field seats, a two-run homer. The ball flew 411 feet and cut the Rangers’ lead to one.
After Victor Reyes extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a single, Leclerc struck out Javier Báez and Harold Castro to end it.
“Our guys will play,” Hinch said. “We play hard from the beginning of the game until the end of the game. We’re not going to quit. The character of this team is really good. Our record is not. But we play the full game.”
cmccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky