DALLAS — It is my firm belief that when Jon Daniels said that this was a time to showcase what the young kids in the organization could do, he meant that he’d like to keep them at one level for the majority of the year. He didn’t want to keep shuttling these kids up and down, which could potentially ruin their development, start clocks and create inconsistencies.
That’s why I believe he signed veterans on one year deals for the rotation and opted to not pursue options for center field beyond a cost-controlled incumbent and a Rule-5 acquisition.
The Baseball gods had a different interpretation apparently. It was never in the plans for Isiah Kiner-Falefa or Ronald Guzman to be up in the Majors this year – at least, this soon.
After losing Rougned Odor, Elvis Andrus, and Delino DeShields to the disabled list, and Jurickson Profar missing time under concussion protocols, Daniels had to dip into his already shallow depth and bring in another utility guy in Renato Nunez to supplement the big league club without continuing to expose his farm.
The kids, it would seem, are alright.
April 13-April 24
Opponents: @Houston Astros, @Tampa Bay Rays, Seattle Mariners
9-Game Record: 4-5
Overall Record: 8-15
Injury Report: Doug Fister (10, right hip strain), Rougned Odor (10 day, hamstring), Elvis Andrus (60, fractured elbow), Tony Barnette (10, shoulder inflammation)
Notable Stats: Lefty Slash vs. Lefty Pitchers (.290/.330/.484, 101 plate appearances), Batting Average against TEX Pitching (.306, last 7 days), K/BB Last 7 days (3.46), Starting Pitcher ERA (4.72), Reliever ERA (6.62), Errors (7)
On the Mound
Thank goodness for Bartolo Colon, right? I don’t just mean the entertainment of flirting with a perfect game and no-hitter, because that was awesome for sure, but the rest that the bullpen needed was immense. Going into the Houston series, the bullpen had nearly thrown as many innings as the rotation, which, as mentioned then, is not good. Colon stretched himself out and did a great job in saving a lot of those arms – even though they couldn’t reward him with a win in his start against Seattle on Saturday.
Martin Perez struggled mightily in the Tampa Bay opener for his third of three abysmal outings to start his 2018 campaign. He would go on to say that he found a mechanical flaw that may have exposed his pitches to hitters and it seemed he worked out the kinks with a quality start against Seattle on Sunday.
Matt Moore pitched well against his old team, but it’s hard to tell if that was solely because of the reintroduction of the cutter, or if it was just the Rays; all that said, the Rays took two out of three from Texas, scoring twelve runs total in their two wins.
Cole Hamels was able to go twice through in this road trip, and both times he pitched well enough to win, pitching six innings and giving up two runs in Houston, and going 6 ⅓ innings in Tampa Bay, suffering one meltdown inning as he left the game.
The highlight of the road trip: The bullpen shined. Yes, Kevin Jepsen gave up the winning run in a tie game in Houston (Hamels’ start), but Matt Bush was the only other reliever to be scored upon (one run in the 9th inning, in which Texas was up by six against Tampa Bay). Two runs surrendered in sixteen innings is a pretty stout line for an overworked Texas bullpen.
The lowlight of the series against Seattle: The bullpen flopped. That success on the road trip obviously couldn’t be sustained and the number of innings put on the arms in the ‘pen started to show its wear as Texas relievers allowed 12 runs to the Mariners throughout the weekend from the 7th inning on.
Those runs spoiled leads and led to losses in the first two games of the series but despite allowing a couple of runs late in Sunday’s game, the bullpen righted the ship and came through in the finale.
At the Plate
Kiner-Falefa and Guzman showed that they’re looking to make the most of this opportunity of unfortunate circumstances. Kiner-Falefa started every game of the road trip and went 7-for-25, including a four-hit affair in Tampa Bay and his first home run in Houston. He followed that up with hits in each game of the series against Seattle for a current five game hitting streak. Guzman went 5-for-18 on the road trip, driving in four runs, and he hit his first home run in the same game that Kiner-Falefa did; the two helped Texas overcome a 5-0 deficit.
One of the more fun things about that game that Texas won in Houston was that all of their runs came on homers. That’s not a sustainable model, but it is certainly fun to see that the power is in the lineup. The home run leaders on the club are Joey Gallo at 7 (expected) and Shin-Soo Choo 5 (unexpected).
Gallo also leads the team in runs batted in (by a large margin), which isn’t necessarily the best indicator of success, but it does show that Gallo is a little more comfortable in the middle of the lineup with people on base. The manager seemed to agree as Gallo batted fifth in the lineup with Delino DeShields returning to the top of the order on Sunday.
The rest of the lineup is still suffering with runners on and runners in scoring position. Of course a lot of changes have been made and momentum can only be a factor if the lineup is relatively consistent. It has been anything but that, given the different and unknown characteristics of the hitters on the team. Again, timing is everything, and even when this version of the lineup starts to gel, it’s going to be flipped on its head again as players come back.
Texas ranks fifth in the AL in hits, which shows that they’re putting bat to ball, but the results and runs scored – where Texas ranks tenth in the AL – shows that they’re not linking them together very well. They rank sixth in homers, so, as mentioned, they’re relying on homers for their runs. Overall, the Rangers need to find other ways to score runs and most urgently, find a way to put some of those hits to use with runners on base. Home Runs and their impact on the game are partially hope-related, and hope isn’t a plan.
In the Field
With the arrival of Renato Nunez, a bat-first utility fielder, and the demotion of Ryan Rua, Jeff Banister has had to be even more creative with his lineup. We saw Joey Gallo take his first reps this season in Left Field with the Crawford Boxes behind him. We’ve seen Drew Robinson at short (bad) and 2B (not as bad), Isiah Kiner-Falefa at short (good) and 2B (not as good), Ronald Guzman at first (great), and Jurickson Profar (bad).
There are obviously going to be some growing and adjusting pains as the unpolished rookies get shuffled around the diamond – this is a Spring Training stretch for sure, but unfortunately, we’re in the regular season and this is going to have to be on the Job training.
Guzman and Kiner-Falefa has certainly held their own, surprising some with how well they’ve adapted to the stage of The Show. The biggest problems, though, have been the replacements for Elvis Andrus and Rougned Odor – Profar and Robinson have combined for six errors this season – and the overall poor play of the ragtag group of outfielders.
But it’s hard to blame any one player for defensive shortcomings. The team as a whole is failing in the field. For a pitching staff that is still evolving into a strikeout staff and still pitches to contact, that’s a killer. The Rangers allowed one runner to reach on errors in each game of this road trip, resulting in three unearned runs on eight errors total. Against Seattle, they made it just one game error free. That is awfully difficult for any pitching staff to overcome.
Overall, Texas has a built in deficit of about a run and a half to make up each game to win. The lineup is scoring 3.7 runs per game on average, while the pitching staff is giving up 5.2 runs per game. It is within these margins that the Rangers must improve if they want to start creeping back to .500 ball.
All is not lost, as both the Angels and Astros have shown themselves to be human, but Texas needs consistency from both sides of the ball and so far that’s been too much to ask for a team as banged up as the Rangers have been.
Up Next:
April 23-25: Oakland Athletics
April 27-29: at Toronto Blue Jays
With the Rangers still looking for the combination to consistent play in 2018, Matt will be on Twitter @FisherWritesMLB rooting on Isiah and the Condor.
