Homers by Rowdy Tellez and Joc Pederson back Merrill Kelly's pitching as Rangers blank Guardians 5-0 to sweep series

ARLINGTON, Texas — For the second straight day a Texas pitcher kept Cleveland batters guessing while the Rangers had no problem figuring out how to put enough runs on the scoreboard. Rowdy Tellez and Joc Pederson homered, and Merrill Kelly earned his first win with Texas by pitching seven terrific innings as the Rangers beat the Cleveland Guardians 5-0 on Sunday to sweep their three-game series. Kelly (10-7) faced two batters in the eighth and struck out eight, the most in his five starts with Texas since being acquired from Arizona on July 31. "He's been a really good pitcher in this league for a long time," Guardians managers Stephen Vogt said. "The criss cross came down and away, it came up and in to our lefties, and the change-up is the exact same spin and tunneling as his fastball and he just didn't leave anything out over the plate for us to hit and we couldn't get anything going." The Rangers (66-66) have won three straight for the first time since sweeping Atlanta from July 25-27. They're back at .500 for the first time since Aug. 14. After Adolis Garcia walked to lead off the fourth inning, Tellez sent his shot over the center field wall for a 2-0 lead. Josh Jung then hit a one-out single to center, Ezequiel Duran reached on an infield single to shortstop and Wyatt Langford drove them both in on a two-out single to shallow right. Pederson added a solo blast to right field in the seventh. Gavin Williams (8-5) allowed three runs on three hits and four walks in 3 1/3 innings. Williams leads the majors this season with 72 walks. "Just a lot of 3-2 counts, having to make pitches at certain times and the walks really hurt us again today," Vogt said. "Not Gavin's best, but we all know he'll bounce back. "I think a lot of it is right now as a whole is we're struggling when we're ahead in the count putting balls in the zone. Our guys have good enough stuff to get people out in the strike zone and we're just not making them make decisions in those mid-counts. Just non-competitive misses that are leading to the 2-2 and 3-2 counts and we just have to clean that up." The Guardians (64-65) were shut out on eight singles over the final 19 innings of the series and have lost four in a row overall, dropping below .500 for the first time since July 29. "We're frustrated," Vogt said. "This was a really hard road trip. Stretches like this happen, we've been through these before and it's frustrating. But this is how we show up (today). We're excited to get home and play in front of our fans. It's been a long road trip for us and we did not play well." Key moment Tellez, a left-handed hitter, homered off Williams, who leads the majors with a .146 opponents' batting average against lefty hitters. Key stats The Rangers have the majors' best team ERA (3.43) while the Guardians have the majors' lowest team batting average (.225). Cleveland has been shut out an AL-most 14 times. Up next Guardians RHP Tanner Bibee (9-9, 4.62 ERA) faces Tampa Bay LHP Ian Seymour (1-0, 3.86) on Monday to begin a six-game homestand. Rangers RHP Jacob deGrom (10-5, 2.76 ERA) returns to the rotation Monday at home against Angels RHP José Soriano (8-9, 4.00) after missing a scheduled turn last Wednesday to manage his workload following some shoulder fatigue. Texas' lone All-Star this season, deGrom has one win following the break and is 0-3 in his last four starts.