ARLINGTON, Texas -- The Texas Rangers' homestand ended with a huge thud. The Seattle Mariners, who came into the final two games of this series on a five-game losing streak in which they had scored just 11 total runs, blasted the Rangers 21-8, one night after beating them 10-3. Befitting the football score, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo threw out the first pitch. That's 31 runs scored for the Mariners in two games.

It was not the way the Rangers hoped to head into Thursday's off day and three-game series against the Los Angeles Angels this weekend. And now they must hope that a day of rest can lead to a rejuvenated team as they try to extend their lead in the AL West against an Angels team that has been playing very good baseball recently.

The Mariners scored eight runs in the second inning and another eight in the third, ending up with 21 runs on 20 hits in front of another large crowd of 43,580. To their credit, most of them stayed until the late innings, but they didn't witness the kind of offensive fireworks they expected.

"They hit all night, as simple as that," Michael Young said. "That was basically the story of the game. They hit all night and they didn't let up. They swung the bats extremely well."

The mission for the Rangers is to forget about it and get ready for the Angels. The club leaves for Anaheim late Thursday afternoon. The Angels are playing well and should present a challenge for the AL West-leading Rangers.

"West coast trips are pretty tough, but we're used to it," Young said. "We'll be ready to go. We always expect them to be a tough opponent. We respect them. We'll focus on ourselves and focus on what we do well and be ready to go on Friday."

Texas ended up 4-2 on the homestand and will go into the weekend series at 5 1/2 games in front of the Angels. Their goal: Get better starting pitching and get back to scoring early runs.