After being denied his first career home run twice on Wednesday night, Adolis Garc¨ªa played hero for the Rangers in the series finale, finally hitting his first career home on a go-ahead shot in the 10th inning to secure a 6-4 win over the Rays on Thursday at Tropicana Field.

In doing so, he became just the second player in Rangers/Senators franchise history with an extra-inning homer as his first career home run, joining Bud Zipfel (on Aug. 2, 1961 in the 11th inning). He is also the first batter in Texas Rangers history (1972-present) to hit a go-ahead home run in extras as his first career homer.

Garc¨ªa drove a slider up over the plate from reliever Cody Reed into the right-field seats, approximately 45 feet from the spot where he missed a homer the night before. In that wild sequence, the ball plunked off the yellow line and a screen above the right-center-field fence instead of sneaking over, and Garc¨ªa wound up called out at the plate after a replay review.

As he rounded first base Thursday night, Garc¨ªa said he thinks he jumped pretty high at the realization that he had, in fact, officially hit a home run.

¡°Just to see the joy when he's running around first base, that's so cool to watch, not only as manager but just as a baseball fan to see true joy like that,¡± said manager Chris Woodward. ¡°That's why we play this game. And we don't play for any other reason, obviously there's a lot of money to be made for these guys, but the true reason you play this game is for moments like that.¡±

Woodward said pregame that he hoped Garc¨ªa would make up for the missed home runs on Wednesday. Garc¨ªa said he told a friend Wednesday's events that ¡°it is what it is," remarking that he would "get it tomorrow." So when tomorrow came, he absolutely knew the ball -- which traveled 366 feet at a 101.1 mph exit velocity -- was out of the park when he hit it.

¡°I was focused on my bat, trying to stay focused on my approach to continue doing everything I did in every other bat,¡± Garc¨ªa said. ¡°I thank God that today I hit my first home run on Jackie Robinson Day. It's a very special day for everybody for everything that he did to allow people from all colors and races to be able to come and play the game of baseball.¡±