Scott Lucas

The Texas Rangers have added:
Pitchers Marc Church, Jose Corniell, and Antoine Kelly
Infielder Justin Foscue

Available in the Rule 5 draft will be IFs Blaine Crim and Davis Wendzel, SP prospect Dane Acker, and numerous relievers including Justin Slaten, Anthony Hoopii-Tuionetoa.

At present, the Rangers have roster space to participate in the Rule 5 draft.

Not comprehensive, but here’s a list of fresh free agents who played in the Rangers organization recently and/or were originally signed by the Rangers:

RHP Joe Barlow
LHP Alex Claudio
RHP Kyle Dowdy
RHP Jerad Eickhoff
LHP Robbie Erlin
RHP Luke Ferrell
RHP Brett de Geus
RHP Demarcus Evans
RHP Tyler Ferguson
RHP Wilmer Font
RHP Chi Chi Gonzalez
LHP Taylor Hearn
RHP Ronald Herrera
RHP Wei-Chieh Huang
RHP Drew Hutchinson
LHP James Jones
RHP Spencer Patton
LHP CD Pelham
RHP Ryder Ryan
RHP Tayler Scott
RHP Drew Strotman
RHP Tyree Thompson
RHP Ricky Vanasco

C Jorge Alfaro
IF Charlie Culberson
IF Yonny Hernandez
IF Charles Leblanc
IF Mark Mathias
IF Josh Morgan
IF Nick Solak
IF Tyreque Reed
IF Yoshi Tsutsugo
OF David Dahl
OF Steven Duggar
OF Clint Frazier
 

I never recovered from 2011. I came to terms with it, after a fashion, but I wouldn’t call it closure. Yes, it’s just sports, but our lives would be different had Texas prevailed.

Some time in early 2012, one of the D/FW sports-radio hosts decided that re-listening to Eric Nadel’s call of that play would serve as an exorcism. Maybe so for him, but for me the call merely reopened a poorly stitched wound. I’ve never watched highlights of that Series. Any time a clip would appear on the tv, I would avert my eyes.

Worse still was something I’d mentioned to my wife, that Texas could be better in 2012 and not even reach the World Series, given the vagaries of playoff baseball. That fear became manifest, as the Rangers were indeed better for much of 2012, until they weren’t.

The Rangers weren’t quite done, at least in the regular season, winning two more division titles and even leading the AL in wins in 2016. That edition was essentially a .500 club with incredible one-run luck, but still, 95 wins! Texas even began 2019 with a record of 46-36 and were tied for the wild card at the end of June.

Then, the window slammed shut. Texas began what would become the worst 500-game stretch in franchise history, 204-296, which extended into May of this year. ¹ There’s nothing magical about 500 games – it’s three full seasons plus two weeks – but it’s a long time. This period was the worst lengthy spell in franchise history, surpassing the dreaded 1982-1985.

Six months later, the Rangers are champions.

I’ve seen grumbling (mainly from an extremely online subset of Astros fans) about how Texas simply purchased a winner, an affront to the noble, process-oriented methodologies of other clubs. ² Whatever. The Rangers had a process, too. They just compressed each step into the shortest time possible.

My podcast mates and I stressed for years that Texas would never construct a postseason-worthy squad with the farm alone. Sure, given that I write about the minor leaguers and you read about them, a squad stocked with homegrown talent is arguably more enjoyable. But at the same time, I have no delusions about team-building. Prospects are a means, not an end. Few reach their ceilings. Some are blocked. As such, their value to an organization is often maximized by trades. Holding onto them out of some warped sense of propriety is malfeasance.

This championship club is as genuine as any other. There’s more than one way to build a winner, and that’s very much a good thing. Ownership, management, coaches and players all pulled together and pointed the ship in the right direction, and their hard work paid off in the best way possible. (And Jon Daniels deserves plenty of credit, too.)

There’s something about being a fan. I guess, in a more cynical frame of mind, you could call it hypocrisy, but I prefer duality.

On the one hand, I’m careful to avoid the word “we” when writing about the Rangers. I’ve never worked for them. I can take zero credit for what they’ve accomplished. If I decide to ignore them, they’ll roll on, unimpeded and carefree. There’s no “we.” Plus, sometimes baseball dares you to pay attention. Work stoppages. An increasingly fractured and unnavigable collection of media rights-holders, but no end to blackouts. Eradication of a quarter of the minor leagues, with potentially more to come. The ever-obtuse Rob Manfred. I could go on.

On the other hand: No. We are the Rangers. You and me.

When Josh Sborz caught the corner for that final strike, I barely moved. ³ I just watched while listening to Eric Nadel’s call. ⁴ 55 years of fandom distilled to an instant. A wave of emotions. Memories of attending games with my father as an official member of the Dr. Pepper Junior Rangers Kids Club, evenings at the ballpark after my work shift at Six Flags, get-togethers I organized in the late 90s and early 2000, Newberg Report nights. Happiness that my wife, who accompanied me to so many playoff games in 2010-2011, was with me. Happiness that a cat she and I named Ranger in 2010 lived long enough to claim “his” title. Sadness that my father couldn’t be here. ⁵

Maybe your parents took you to games as a kid. Maybe you went with friends, with partners, with your kids. Maybe you’ve never set foot in Texas and latched on for other reasons. However you got here, you have a lifetime of memories, some good, some bad, all building up to last night. The “Texas Rangers” are the shared experience. If you’ve been watching, waiting, hurting, you’ve got as much of a claim on that trophy as anyone.

The championship belongs to us. And it’s ours to enjoy for the rest of our lives.

Thanks for reading.

Ranger and me during Game 4

Footnotes
¹ I know that sounds weird. How could any portion of 2023 belong to a “worst-ever” stretch since the Rangers started so well?  The explanation is 2023 with a solid 22-14 record, but in the 36 games before the worst-ever 500, they were slightly better: 23-13.

² Texas’s payroll is $14 million higher than Houston’s. That’s a 6% difference. I tend to think fan bases around baseball are pretty much the same – mostly fine, a few jerks and trolls – but a small but vocal portion of Houston supporters fans are very tightly wound.

³ Admittedly, I spent most of the previous few innings pacing the living room in advance of what was shaping to be an unimaginably tense 9th (or extras!). Once Texas broke open the top of the 9th, I could finally just sit.

⁴ Not that we need to rank deservedness, but does anyone deserve this more than Nadel?

⁵ You can forestall Death with a game of chess, but asking him to wait until a Texas Rangers championship is a bridge too far. 

…as the Rangers enter their third World Series:

ADOLIS GARCIA
Texas acquired him for beer money in late 2019 and designated him for assignment on February 12, 2021, to create room for free agent pitcher Mike Foltynewicz. The move barely preceded the date when teams could stash injured players on the 60-day list, making a waiver claim slightly more difficult, but realistically just about any team could have found a spot for him if desired. But to what purpose? Garcia was 28 (!) with prodigious power but so-so contact and a 7:1 ratio of strikeouts to walks in AAA. I took scant video of Garcia and no notes during the “alt site” minor leagues games between the Rangers and Astros preceding the delayed start of the minor league season, in part because he was quickly called up when Ronald Guzman was injured, but mostly because he was a DFA’ed 28-year-old.

EVAN CARTER
Is Carter here if Garcia hadn’t injured himself trying to rob a Houston homer in early September? It’s easy now to say “don’t be silly, just look at him, he would have forced his way on regardless,” except that he really wasn’t forcing anything at the time. In the six weeks prior, he was walking at will but batting .273 with one homer and a .396 slugging percentage. I wasn’t worried about his composure in MLB at all, given his otherworldly maturity, but I can’t say I expected such an impact. And in fact, he cooled to a more modest .240/.321/.360 in the ALCS, but the timeliness of his hitting and fielding exploits has been heroic.  

JONAH HEIM
He’s a Ranger because a duffel bag crammed with 13,500 hundred-dollar bills accompanied Elvis Andrus to Oakland. He’d already been traded twice and was entering is ninth professional season. I was hoping he’d become a plus backup, like a “#1b” instead of a “#2.”

JOSH SBORZ
Whew, fans were tired of Josh Sborz in early 2023. When he was activated from the IL in April, out of options, my comment was “if you hate him, you should be glad he was called up, because if he’s bad he’ll be DFA’ed and you won’t ever see him again.” I was never a Sborz supporter, per se, but he had terrific stuff, certainly the best among the AAA options, so I thought he deserved another shot.

JOSE LECLERC
Leclerc has a chance to save more games in the postseason than regular season. He saved four games during the 2023 regular season. Four! After Will Smith’s 22nd and final save on August 11, only six of Texas’s 21 regular season wins involved a save, split equally by Leclerc and Aroldis Chapman. Incidentally, Leclerc is the only current player who was in the organization the last time Texas played in the World Series.

JOSH JUNG
He’s pretty much who I imagined offensively. While he was in the minors, I insisted he’d be the perfectly average defender, someone who’d rarely elicit an emotional reaction. He’s been better than that, sometimes shockingly so.

JORDAN MONTGOMERY
How much future money has he earned this month? Even if Thomas Saggese becomes a starting 3B and TK Roby a #3 starter, the Rangers have won their half of the trade, irrespective of where Montgomery lands in 2024. They aren’t here without him. The Rangers are making a strong organizational case for retaining him, but he’d be foolish not to test the market, and the Rangers would be foolish to bid against themselves while on an emotional high. Cliff Lee moved on, but he’s still a hero around these parts. Life goes on. Enjoy Jordan while you can.

MATT BUSH
Bush’s last MLB outing was with the Brewers in June. He’ll get a playoff share and maybe a ring despite not having thrown a pitch in for Texas since 2021.

MOMENTUM!
On a Diamond Pod immediately after Houston’s three-day demolition of the Rangers in early September, I said:

I don’t believe in momentum, and certainly the events of 2023 are a convincing argument against it.

Both Texas and Houston are good but flawed teams that kind of backslid into the postseason. The Rangers were 50-52 over their last 102 games and lurched into a wild-card spot with a collection of stomach-churning winning and losing streaks. Houston seemingly had the division in hand but lost seven of nine games to KC and Oakland before closing with four straight wins to reclaim it on the final day. Then the Rangers swept the 99-win Rays and 101-win Orioles before capturing the pennant against the Astros.

Meanwhile, Arizona began the season 50-36 and closed 34-42, a period during which only the Giants and Rockies lost more in the NL. The Diamondbacks were 10-3 against lowly Colorado and under .500 with a negative-46 run differential against everybody else. Getting into the playoffs depended heavily on the Cubs posting an NL-worst 7-15 record down the stretch. Then, then!, they swept the 92-win Brewers and 100-win Dodgers before capturing a pennant against the Phils.

Nobody knows anything.

Texas is a good if flawed team that got hot at the perfect time. The Dbacks… I don’t know. The totality of their 2023 is pretty much average. But their peaks have been lofty, and they’re unquestionably good enough to win the World Series.

As I’ve gotten older, I no longer have any expectations. The MLB postseason is not designed to crown the best team. Some of that is due to an ever-expanding number of teams permitted to play in October. Mostly though, the nature of baseball prohibits it. Bad teams can and do take two of three or even sweep good teams. Even elite teams lose a third of the time. There is no series of plausible length that can truly decide who’s best.

Much as I love minor league ball, it’s almost never a visceral, edge-of-seat experience. This certainly is: a lifetime of fandom and memories, years of occasional semi-glory and dashed hopes condensed into a handful of games.

It’s a heck of a thing to want something so badly and not only have no control over the desired result but not even be able to calculate its likelihood with any confidence. Why do we do this to ourselves?

Ah, well. I’m in this deep, I’m not getting out now. I don’t even want to. It’s an experience I want to share with family, friends, and y’all. Wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Go Rangers.

Ranger, 2010. Still with us, waiting for a championship.

The minor league season is over, save for instructionals and the Arizona Fall League. Today concludes my daily coverage of the system. I’ll be back occasionally with some wrap-ups, 40-man/Rule 5 coverage, and other news. Thanks to those who donated (see bottom of email if still interested), and thanks to all for reading. Go Rangers.

Box Scores

AAA Pacific Coast League Championship
Round Rock 2, at Oklahoma City (LAD) 5
Round Rock loses best-of-three 0-2
Round Rock: 5 hits, 2 walks, 13 strikeouts
Opponent: 8 hits, 2 walks, 8 strikeouts

SP Owen White: 4.1 IP, 8 H (2 HR), 5 R, 1 BB, 3 SO
RP Grant Anderson: 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 SO
RP Yerry Rodriguez: 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 SO
1B Blaine Crim: 1-4, HR
RF Sandro Fabian: 2-4

I suggested yesterday that four innings and three runs from Owen White would be acceptable. He worked four innings and allowed only two runs on a single and Jonny Deluca homer to open the second. I was out last evening and happened to check the score just after the 4th ended. Mission (as defined by me) accomplished, yes?

Unfortunately, White was not done, nor were the Dodgers. With one out, Hunter Feduccia doubled, Drew Avans singled, and Michael Busch homered the opposite way on on a 3-2 slider well outside the zone to put the Dodgers up 5-1. Had Busch taken the pitch for ball four, the bases would have been loaded with one out and the score still 2-1. Grant Anderson was warming and perhaps could have escaped the jam or at least mitigated the damage. Or maybe White himself could have allowed fewer than three more runs. Instead, the game was practically out of reach.

Round Rock’s game-defining opportunity at the plate came in the 1st. Elier Hernandez singled, and Wyatt Langford and Justin Foscue walked on a combined nine pitches. Blaine Crim then grounded into a forceout of Hernandez at the plate, and Sandro Fabian and Dustin Harris struck out. After loading the bases, OKC starter Gavin Stone missed six bats the rest of the inning, five on changeups. For the next five innings, Round Rock generated only one baserunner in the form of Blaine Crim jogging after a solo homer.  Two reached in the 7th, and Jax Biggers drove in one on a sac fly, but the Express would never seriously threaten afterwards. Ricky Vanasco retired five batters, and Wander Suero again closed out the 9th.

Round Rock was 4-16 with -59 run differential versus OKC and 85-46 with a +207 differential against everybody else.

Wyatt Langford was 0-5 with three strikeouts and four walks in the series.

Box Scores

AAA Pacific Coast League Championship
Round Rock 3, at Oklahoma City (LAD) 8
Round Rock trails best-of-three 0-1
Round Rock: 4 hits, 7 walks, 13 strikeouts
Opponent: 10 hits, 7 walks, 7 strikeouts

SP Robert Dugger: 1.1 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 2 BB, 1 SO
RP Edwar Colina: 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 SO
RP Triston Polley: 2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 1 SO
RP Scott Engler: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 SO
LF Wyatt Langford: 0-2, 3 BB, SB
3B Davis Wendzel: 2-4, 2B
RF Sandro Fabian: 2-4

I mentioned OKC’s favorable starting pitching yesterday in the preview, and it was indeed critical to yesterday’s result. In 29 starts, Round Rock’s most reliable starter Robert Dugger had failed to reach three innings only twice. Yesterday became the third. Dugger walked two and allowed four balls in play in excess of 97 MPH, all hits.

As for OKC’s Kyle Hurt, Round Rock had scored five against him in eight innings across two regular-season appearances, but on Tuesday Hurt matched his AAA-best eight strikeouts and limited the Express to a run in four innings. Hurt’s fastball hovered mostly around 96-97, and he added a highly effective changeup and a few curves.

Down 4-0 in the 4th, Davis Wendzel singled and later scored on a Sandro Fabian single. Another run came in the 5th when Wyatt Langford drew the second of his three walks, stole second, and scored on an error.

Round Rock had its best opportunity in the 6th. Wendzel began with a double and scored on another Fabian single following a Jonathan Ornelas walk. With two on and none out, the Express gained nothing more than another Langford walk, leaving the bases full. OKC catcher Hunter Feduccia rapped a solo homer off Kyle Cody in the 6th.

The 7th was a mess. With one on and one out, a hard grounder up the middle deflected off SS Ornelas’s foot (or maybe very hard off his glove) into center, ruled a hit. Then, reliever Antoine Kelly muffed a potential double-play comebacker. He retrieved the ball in time for a possible out at first but airmailed the throw. Instead of a 5-3 score heading into the 8th, OKC led 6-3 with two runners in scoring position and one out. Both runners would score on a subsequent single by leadoff hitter Drew Avans, 4-4 with a walk on the night.

The hits by Wendzel and Fabian that I mentioned were the totality of Round Rock’s batted output. The Express had one baserunner after the 6th. Ex-Ranger Ricky Vanasco threw a scoreless 8th despite throwing outside the zone on nine of 12 pitches.

Tonight, Owen White faces off against Gavin Stone, who has spent most of the last month in the Majors. Stone faced the Express three times during the regular season, twice dealing six scoreless innings in OKC and once allowing a lone run (on a Justin Foscue homer)  in 5.1 innings in Round Rock. I saw the Texas outing and had mixed feelings, as Stone had trouble with location but also induced a ton of whiffs against his changeup. Stone is good but not indomitable.

White faced the Dodgers on the road three times in August and never allowed fewer than five runs. If he can complete four innings with, say, three runs, that’ll be… okay. Fully rested bullpen members are Anderson, Bush, Church, Rodriguez, Slaten, and Speas. The roster also lists Josh Sborz on rehab.

Tonight’s broadcast is free per MiLB.tv, so everyone has a chance to watch. Or you could read a book, go for a walk, take a relaxing bath. It’s up to you.

Late news: IF Davis Wendzel was IL’ed, and IF Jax Biggers is active.

Awards
MiLB announced the AA Texas League award winners. OF Evan Carter is on the All-Star team along with LHP Antoine Kelly. The league MVP is IF Thomas Saggese, who batted .318/.385/.551 with 25 homers and 11 steals between Frisco and Springfield. Saggese was recently promoted to AAA Memphis, where he hit .207/.270/.345 in 13 games.IF Luisangel Acuna was named as a utility player.

Rangers Division Scenarios After Today’s Result
MLB eliminated single-game playoffs in case of regular-season ties, but that doesn’t make the situation any less complicated. More so, if anything, because Houston owns the tiebreak over Texas, Texas owns Seattle, and Seattle owns Houston, plus Seattle owns the three-way tiebreak, and there still a possibility that all three finish with 89 wins.

Houston is eliminated from division contention with a loss today, no matter what Texas does. Houston’s path is complicated by Texas and Seattle playing each other this weekend, meaning Houston can only gain ground on one team on any given day. The best scenario for Texas today is a win plus a Houston loss, which eliminates the Astros and reduces Seattle’s path to a four-game sweep of Texas this weekend. The worst would be a Texas loss and Houston win, which eliminates nobody and leaves a path for the Astros to claim the division without a sweep.

Best as I can tell, there are 512 potential W-L permutations between the three teams, and Texas comes out ahead in 460 (89.8%). Fangraphs gives Texas an 87% chance of winning the division.

Here’s a really confusing chart with all the paths for a non-Texas team to win the division depending on today’s results.