Rafael Palmeiro still needs one home run to reach 500 for his career.

Rafael Palmeiro still needs one home run to reach 500 for his career.
ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) -- There were a couple of things missing from Rafael Palmeiro's near-perfect night. He didn't get his 500th home run, and the Texas Rangers lost.
Palmeiro gave the crowd some drama with a couple of long foul balls in his final at-bat. He ended a 10-pitch affair with a two-out, two-run double in the ninth before the Rangers lost 9-5 to the Cleveland Indians on Friday night.
The closest Palmeiro came to 500 was on the pitch before the double, when he hit a ball into the stands just right of the foul pole. The crowd was going wild, but Palmeiro knew that wasn't the one.
"First of all, I knew it was foul. Second of all, I hit it off the end of the bat," Palmeiro said. "Eventually, it's going to happen."
Palmeiro finished 2-for-2 with a sacrifice fly and two walks. He moved into 25th place on the career RBIs list with 1,597, passing Mike Schmidt and George Brett.
Vizquel leads attack
Omar Vizquel had four of Cleveland's season-high 16 hits and Matt Lawton had the only home run in the game.
Twice against Indians starter Jake Westbrook (2-2), Palmeiro hit first pitches -- the run-scoring fly to center in the first and a line-drive single to right in the sixth. He walked in an 11-pitch at-bat against David Elder in the eighth.
"When I came up to the plate every time, I really wasn't thinking about doing anything other than just seeing the ball, trying to get a good pitch to hit like I've always done," Palmeiro said. "I want to get back in a grove and hit the ball every time up, and I think I did."
Westbrook tried not to think about Palmeiro's pursuit of history, but admitted it was hard to ignore with the loud cheers each time the slugger came to the plate.
"You think about it, but you've got to go out there and try to keep the ball down," Westbrook said. "I was just trying to get him out, and I didn't even do that."
The Rangers were already down 7-1 when Palmeiro walked on a full-count pitch in the third.
To the showers
Cleveland chased John Thomson (2-4) with consecutive one-out RBI singles by Shane Spencer and Travis Hafner in the third. Tim Laker greeted reliever R.A. Dickey with a two-run double that made it 7-1.
Dickey didn't allow another run until Lawton led off the sixth with his fifth homer, a 429-foot shot into the second deck of stands in right-center field for an 8-2 lead. Lawton added an RBI double to right in the eighth, but was thrown out trying to stretch the hit into a triple.
Westbrook gave up two runs on seven hits over 6 2-3 innings, his longest outing in six starts this season. He struck out two and walked only Palmeiro.
Last Saturday, Westbrook hit Palmeiro's right elbow with a pitch. Palmeiro then went 0-for-12 before hitting his 499th homer in the eighth inning against Toronto on Thursday, a week after his previous long ball.
"Raffy had some great at-bats tonight, and I don't think he is feeling any pressure to hit No. 500," Rangers manager Buck Showalter said. "He wants it to be in a winning effort."
Ellis Burks was the only Cleveland starter without a hit. The Indians came in hitting .237 as a team with five of its starters under .230.
The Indians (10-24) have won three of four against Texas this season. At 15-20 under Showalter, the Rangers are a game worse than the same point last year when they went on to finish last in the AL West for the third straight season.
Vizquel's had a one-out double in the first, and scored on Milton Bradley's single. The Rangers got even in bottom of the inning when leadoff hitter Carl Everett was hit by a pitch and eventually scored on Palmeiro's sac fly.