ARLINGTON – The last time the Rangers had an off day, manager Ron Washington went home to New Orleans unsure if he'd return with his title.

Today, he'll run some errands. Those errands will never seem easier.

Sure, the Rangers lost, 4-3, in 12 innings to Seattle on Wednesday, but that didn't dim the fact his club has won six straight series and gone from the brink of destruction to the brink of .500.

"I think we've been playing well," Washington said. "We've given ourselves a chance to do what we are capable of doing.

"Today, we just didn't get a hit when we needed it. I still feel pretty good. I hope we come back here and continue to play good baseball."

In the 16 games between off days, the Rangers went 11-5 and won two series each over AL West rivals Seattle and Oakland, as well as one over Kansas City. The Rangers had won two of three against Minnesota before the off day. Texas is now 20-22.

That kind of consistent performance allows the Rangers to brush off the events of Wednesday afternoon as one game in which they simply got beat. Two weeks ago, a bobble and a wild throw, a ball lost in the sun and the inability to manufacture a run late might have led to more internal meetings.

The Rangers couldn't hold a 2-1 lead to start the seventh. Ramon Vazquez, who hit a game-winning homer Monday, bobbled a grounder by Jose Lopez and threw wildly to first.

Lopez went to second on the error and scored the tying run when Josh Hamilton lost Jeff Clement's fly ball in the sun. When Hamilton found it, it was rolling to the wall for a triple. Clement scored on a two-out double by Yuniesky Betancourt off Scott Feldman, who pitched his fourth consecutive quality start.

The Rangers missed a chance in the bottom of the seventh, when pinch hitter Marlon Byrd bounced into a double play with the bases loaded in his first at-bat after a month on the disabled list. Byrd hit for Vazquez against left-hander Arthur Rhodes. The Rangers have kept Vazquez, one of their hottest hitters, from facing lefties.

"We got back in the game and we had opportunities to win the game," Washington said. "We just didn't do it today."

The Rangers tied it in the bottom of the eighth on a sacrifice fly by Hamilton, but they left two runners on. They stranded runners or had them erased by double plays in five of the last six innings.

And when Seattle manufactured a run in the top of the 12th on a single, a bunt, a fly out and a two-out hit, the Rangers couldn't answer.

"We are happy about the way we are playing, but we're not satisfied with just taking two out of three in this series," shortstop Michael Young said. "We wanted to win this game. More than anything else, we go into this off day a hungry team. I think that's a good team to be."