Category: Daily Report

Foscue
Per various reports, IF Justin Foscue will replace the injured Josh Jung on the Texas roster. Congratulations to him.

I wrote at length about Foscue’s bat last month. Short version: highly mature and patient approach, tough to whiff (especially on fastballs), decent exit velocity if a little light at the top end, a terrific contact rate that would be aided by a little less variance in his launch angles.

Foscue has played two games at second and one at first in AAA this season. I’m not expecting Foscue to slide into Jung’s spot on a regular basis, but since he is replacing him, I wanted to entertain the possibility. Foscue made 35 starts at third for Round Rock in 2023. Despite some practice there, he didn’t log any innings at the position in Spring Training games.

In his top-ten Texas prospect writeups, Grant Schiller of Baseball Prospectus described his 3B play as “a greater success in 2023 than anticipated, and it appears he may be able to man the position passably.” I would have written something similar last May or so and remember telling a scout making his first visit to to the Dell Diamond that I was more interested in Foscue at third than second. Since then, however, my quasi-enthusiasm has waned.

Last night, I re-watched every 2023 error by Foscue. That’s obviously a biased sample that would lead to a negative impression of even elite fielders, but I wanted to see what types of mistakes he was making at third (and second). I watched several “ordinary” plays as well. Nearly all of Foscue’s errors were on throws to first. He isn’t known for his range, but he’ll glove what he can reach with assurance. But when the situation called for a snap throw and no time to set his body, he sometimes slung or sailed his throws.

Can he play there occasionally? Sure. As an everyday replacement for Jung? I’m not seeing it. I’m happy to be wrong, though. Jung has been better than average defensively, compared to my expectation of dead-average.

Leiter
I forgot to link to my video of his fine performance Saturday. Here you go.


Part II of the Daily Report Primer: Stats I Love and Loathe

Age
The best prospects tend to receive aggressive assignments and are young for their levels. Down the road, they’re often omitted from my annual 40-Man / Rule 5 preview because they ‘ve forced their way onto the MLB squad months earlier (15 months earlier in the case of Evan Carter). If all you know about a player is his age, you actually know quite a lot. 18-year-old Anthony Gutierrez at Down East last year. 20-year-old Cam Cauley at Down East (and the Arizona Fall League). 20-year-old Carter at Frisco, Round Rock, and Texas. The Rangers are letting you know they’re well-regarded without you needing stats or confirmation from a prospect-oriented publication.

One shouldn’t get carried away with age, though. Of course, players drafted out of college will be older, so dismissing them for being 23 in high-A would be ridiculous. However, the older the player, the higher the expectations. (Incidentally, that a good many college players don’t handle A-level ball reinforces just how hard the pro game is.) Catchers tend to take more time, as do many pitchers.

The Rangers don’t promote as aggressively as a decade ago, and promotions feel more player-tailored and less driven by organizational culture. Still, with the exception of Frisco’s pitching staff, all of Texas’s full season squads had groups of hitters and pitchers below the league-average age.  

Slash Stats (Average / On-Base Percentage / Slugging)
In the Majors, batting average isn’t completely useless, but it matters far less than on-base percentage and slugging. In the minors, I still like to keep an eye on it. Putting the bat on the ball with frequency and authority is what gets players noticed and moves them up the ladder.

Here’s two fictional players with 500 plate appearances. Both have a .360 OBP and .440 slugging percentage:

A)    100 hits, 10 doubles, 25 homers, 80 walks, 160 strikeouts
B)    150 hits, 33 doubles, 8 homers, 30 walks, 60 strikeouts

Same OBP, same slugging percentage, very different hitters. Player A is kind of a cut-rate Joey Gallo, batting .238 with huge number of walks and good-but-not-elite power. James Outman was in that general range last year. Player B batted .319 but doesn’t walk much or offer much more than doubles power. There aren’t many Player B type nowadays. Luis Arraez is the best example.

Knowing the batting average in addition to OBP and slugging can be surprisingly informative. That said, even in the minors, OBP and slugging are much more useful.

These stats mean the least at lower levels and gain importance as players advance. They also matter more to offense-oriented positions. Except at the extreme margin and probably not even then, a first basemen cannot compensate for weak hitting with outstanding defense. He has to hit.

OPS (OBP + slugging) is grotesque aesthetically because it sums two stats with different denominators, but it nevertheless usually describes a hitter adequately. Still, I’m more inclined to just give you entire slash line.

Walks (Hitters)
The goal of a hitter is to reach base safely, so the ability to lay off iffy pitches can define a career. Walks create hitting situations with runners on base, wear down the pitcher, and mitigate inevitable slumps Aaron Zavala began 2021 with an 0-for-16 slump but also drew eight walks, producing a .333 OBP. Would that all slumps were so productive. Zavala gave his teammates eight opportunities to hit with a runner on base, and he scored three runs in those four hitless games. Fellow early slumper Justin Foscue reached four times and scored twice during his 0-for-18 start last year. It’s something.  

Even for Zavala, walks are a means, not an end. I do worry about players who seem to rely too heavily on walks, which is easier to do at the lower levels where control is often absent. Selectivity is a great attribute. Passivity, not so much. I occasionally see hitters looking passive at the plate, and honestly, much of the time i can’t blame them. Control is worse than ever nowadays. Why swing at junk? That said, eventually the hitter will rise to a level at which most pitchers not only have control but a semblance of command, and the hitter will have to adjust.

Strikeouts (Hitters)
To some extent, we can ignore hitters’ strikeouts. What really matters is how they perform when they don’t. Not to be flip, but strikeouts for hitters don’t matter until they do. At some point, they reach a level that forces a herculean batting average on contact just to get by. Prior to 2021, I gamed out how Adolis Garcia could achieve a .300 OBP with so many strikeouts. “Let’s say he can manage a 5% BB+HBP rate (well below league average) and a 30% K rate (well above, even in 2021). That means he needs to bat .263 for a minimum .300 OBP. And with all those Ks, that requires a .376 average on contact, about 50 points above the league average and better than what he’s done in AAA.”

That season, Garcia ended up with a 6% BB+HBP rate and struck out in 31% of his plate appearances, close to my guesses. He also batted .364 when he made contact, roughly the 75th percentile among AL batters with at least 400 plate appearances. So, very good in that respect. And what did that high average on contact get him? A .286 OBP, 9th-worst among that same set of batters. Incidentally, Garcia still strikes out a lot but upped his walk rate to 10% last year. He had 25 fewer plate appearances and 15 fewer hits, but he reached more often because of 25 additional walks.

Some hitters are exceptionally good at avoiding strikeouts, but not particularly to their benefit. Most of the time, weak contact on marginal pitches isn’t any better than a strikeout. While I certainly wouldn’t call Justin Foscue a “weak contact” type, I noted a while back that his exceptional ability to avoid strikeouts improved his walk rate but hadn’t contributed much to his  production on contact.

ERA
I do list ERA when recapping pitchers. Much of the time, it’s a handy stat, but it’s not the end-all and sometimes is lying to you. Let’s take two pitchers from the lower levels in 2023:

Player A: 3.86 ERA, 6% BB/HBP rate, 38% SO rate, .252 opposing OBP
Player B: 3.73 ERA, 19% BB/HBP rate, 24% SO rate, .313 opposing OBP

Player B had the slightly better ERA, but I’d pick Player A in a critical situation without question. B had a decent strikeout rate but gave nearly one of every five batters a free pass, and his opposing average on balls in play was unsustainably low. Pitcher A combined excellent control with a terrific strikeout rate, but a small handful of rough innings inflated his ERA. Usually, situational performance (such as runners in scoring position) tends to even out in the long run.

Sometimes a single terrible outing can wipe out a reliever’s ERA. An infamous example is John Smoltz back in 2002. He allowed eight runs in 0.2 innings in early April and needed three months of quality outings (including 37 saves!) just to drag his ERA below 4.00.

So, you’ll occasionally read something from me like “he’s pitched better [or worse] than his ERA would suggest.” If Players A and B continue to pitch as they have, Player A is far more likely to have the lower ERA eventually.

Player A is Kumar Rocker.

Homers, Walks, Strikeouts (Pitchers)
These are better indicators than ERA, which is often tied to luck on balls in play and how well relievers strand runners left behind.

Homers are trickier to analyze. More fly balls equal more homers, of course, but HR rates can bounce around crazily from year to year for no other reason than variance. Walk and strikeout rates tend to stabilize more quickly.

Walk and HBP rates are up across the minors post-2020, particularly at the lower levels. A combined BB/HBP of 10%, slightly problematic a dozen years ago, is now well below average in most leagues. My old rule of thumb was that a BB/HBP rate of 15% was untenable for a would-be starting pitcher because he’d run into trouble too often and force too many bullpen innings. Last year, among the 66 pitchers with at least 10 starts in the low-A Carolina League, more had a BB/HBP rate of at least 15% (21) than below 10% (15). So much for my thumb. More pitchers seem to be able to abide the higher walk rate because they’re darn near unhittable otherwise, and they aren’t being asked to face as many batters. Even so, as they climb the ladder, those walks are more likely to cause trouble.

Strikeout have risen so much that I still have to remind myself what constitutes an acceptable rate. In 2007, my first year on the job, the best team in the low-A Midwest League (which contained Texas-affiliated Clinton) had a strikeout rate of 21.3%. Last year, the worst team in the low-A Carolina League (including Down East) had a rate of 21.8%. San Jose set a low-A record in 2021 with a 31.5% rate. As I mentioned earlier, a rate of nine strikeouts per nine innings is below average.

The gap between starters and relievers has shrunk. Comparing the 50 busiest starters in 2007 to the 50 relievers who finished the most games, relievers struck out about 36% more batters. In 2023, that difference was only 12%. 

HBPs are kind of an afterthought in typical stat-watching, but they’ve risen greatly in recent years, and some pitchers are plunk-prone enough to seriously degrade their performance. Last year, low-A St. Lucie hit 130 batters in 128 games.

As you can see, I tend to refer to these stats in rates per batter faced rather than per nine innings. Per-nine accounting can be skewed by the number of runners allowed. If two pitchers strike out a batter per inning, they obviously are striking out an identical amount per nine innings, but if one is allowing one runner per inning and the other two, the stingier pitcher has a 25% strikeout rate compared to the other guy’s 20%. That 5% is meaningful.

Opposing Slash Stats
The opposing batting line relates closely to the pitcher’s core peripherals. I mention it often and think it’s interesting. Every year, I wish it would gain more traction, but it doesn’t.

Field and League Context
Here’s the park-adjusted league averages for Texas’s full-season affiliates in 2023:

Round Rock: 5.9 runs per game, .264/.360/.440 slash line, 0.97 park factor
Frisco: 5.2 runs, .253/.343/.404, 1.00 park factor
Hickory: 5.0 runs, .245/.338/.397, 1.00 park factor
Down East: 4.4 runs, .221/.332/.341, 0.96 park factor

Round Rock suppresses offense relative to most of its peers, but the Pacific Coast League is so hitter-oriented as a whole that even Express hitters’ stats have to be viewed with a little cynicism. Down East has a pitcher-friendly park in a pitcher-friendly league.  

The homer rate in low-A is about 40% lower than MLB. A good many players haven’t reached full physical maturity.

Fielding
Fielding is trickiest to evaluate from an outsider’s perspective. Fielding percentage rarely tells the whole story.

For example, over the course of a season, let’s pretend two infielders share shortstop duties equally. On their first 400 grounders, they’re identical statistically. But then on their next 20 grounders apiece, Shortstop 1 never touches a single one, but Shortstop 2 reaches all of them and turns 15 into outs and throws 5 into the stands, allowing those hitters to reach second. Shortstop 2 will have a worse fielding percentage, but he also turned 15 more balls into outs. Would you rather an opposing batter reach first safely 20 times, or reach second 5 times but get put out the other 15 times? Shortstop 2 is far more effective despite making more errors.

Even with no stats, you can learn plenty simply from where someone plays. 85% of Evan Carter’s outfield starts in Frisco were in center. Dustin Harris only played in left. An unprecedented two-thirds of Trevor Hauver’s OF starts were in right, perhaps partly in deference to Harris while he was in AA, but also because he’s improved out there.

Statcast
Statcast data became available for Texas’s AAA league in 2022, and oh how I adore it. Pitch speed, horizontal and vertical movement, exit velocity, and launch angles, all giving me a new realm of information to analyze.

Did the starter emphasize a changeup and ditch his curve last night? Did he hold his velocity deep into the outing? Is a hitter seeing a particular type of pitch more often, and to what effect? Are his homers certainties in most MLB parks or PCL gifts? Did a pitcher who allowed five runs get nickled-and-dimed? I can answer those questions even if I didn’t see them game.

I categorize every ball in play based on what it typically produced in the Majors, not in AAA. Plenty of balls that become extra-base hits in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League may just be long outs in a typical MLB park.

Some examples of the analysis I was able to provide last year that would have been absent or in the form of observational anecdotes previously:

Sam Huff, of all people, was aggravatingly grounder prone.

Jonathan Ornelas, despite a .359 slugging percentage, has serious, MLB-worthy top-end exit velo. He, too, is hindered by a high grounder rate, which at least makes superficial sense given his more modest stature compared to Huff.

Dustin Harris batted a respectable .273 with a .455 slugging percentage, but his exit velocity was alarmingly low. Also, while he wasn’t necessarily whiff-prone against breaking stuff, his production against it was sorely wanting. (The good news is that if last year included a minor but nagging injury or a mechanical issue that could be corrected, he could really break out in 2024.)

Justin Foscue’s swinging strike rate against fastballs was a comically low 4%, yet he actually hit better against breakers (.281 with a .531 slugging percentage). He’s a mature hitter, if not quite fully developed.

OF JP Martinez deserved his call-up, but his .298/.418/.543 line in AAA included more than a little luck in terms of grounders and soft shots finding holes.

Cody Bradford really was all that. All his pitches were effective.

Marc Church’s slider was glorious. 50% of opposing swings drew air! The fastball probably prevented a 2023 MLB debut. Not enough whiffs, plenty of hard contact.

Luck
The likelihood of a .250 batter going hitless in 16 consecutive at-bats is small: almost exactly one in 100. Spread that to 36 hitters* (nine per Texas’s four full-season teams) and the likelihood that someone starts the season 0-for-16 jumps to nearly one in three, still uncommon but not rare. Aaron Zavala began 2022 0-for-16 (with eight walks). Last year, Justin Foscue didn’t collect a hit until his 18th at-bat.

Now, consider the entire season. The likelihood of someone having an even longer hitless stretch is virtually assured. In 2021, Luisangel Acuna had an 0-for-30 stretch (with five walks). Abi Ortiz, who batted .294 overall, followed a 1st-inning homer with 20 hitless at-bats last August. Statistical variance in baseball is much higher than most people think. Don’t place too much emphasis on the short run, whether good or bad.

* Texas isn’t going to stick with the same 36 minor league hitters game after game, but I’m trying to make the math easier.

Runs Scored, RBI, Pitcher Wins/Losses
Ignored except as occasional anecdotes. All are byproducts of more important measure of production.

Box Scores

AAA: Round Rock 8, Sugar Land (HOU) 6
Round Rock: 8 hits, 9 walks, 9 strikeouts
Opponent: 6 hits, 5 walks, 9 strikeouts
Record: 2-1

SP Adrian Sampson: 5 IP, 3 H (1 HR), 2 R, 1 BB, 4 SO, 77 P / 49 S, 3.60 ERA
RP Antoine Kelly: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 SO, 0.00 ERA
CF Elier Hernandez: 2-4, 2B, BB
C Sam Huff: 2-3, 2B, BB

After some difficult late-March outings that cost whatever chance he had of making the Opening Day squad, Adrian Sampson had a nice first start in AAA.

Justin Foscue and Trevor Hauver walked twice. The Astros aren’t known for good control in their minor league system and ranked among the worst in walk rate in the PCL the prior three years.

Depending on when you see him, you might wonder why Daniel Robert isn’t in the Majors. Not Sunday. Up six in the 9th, he retired only one of four batters and left with the bases loaded. Jesus Tinoco promptly surrendered a grand slam but recorded the final two outs.

Five Years Ago Yesterday
Part of my minor league roster preview: “Texas has only 40% of the current rotation under contract for 2020, and [Mike] Minor could re-emerge as trade bait.  The Rangers need a decent portion of their upper-level rotation prospects (Hearn, Burke, Hernandez, Palumbo) to pan out, or they’ll once again have to buy those innings on the free-agent market while they wait for the next wave of pitchers to advance.”

Daily Report Primer Part 1: How The Game Is Played
Every year, I publish a primer as a guide to my daily reports: how the minors are structured, how the game is played and managed, what I look for, what stats I follow and ignore. 

Winning
These are developmental leagues. Rosters aren’t constructed and games aren’t managed to win, at least not as a primary goal. Good prospects aren’t going to be benched if they perform poorly. Does the prospect quality of a system correlate to its performance in the minors? Here’s a chart of every team’s organizational ranking in 2023 per Baseball America and its full-season winning percentage:

In some years I’ve seen a hint of a pattern. Not so much this year, except perhaps having the three worst winning percentages among the seven worst-ranked clubs. Just like last year, the regression indicates one higher spot in the rankings is worth about three-quarters of one win over a span of around 600 games, and the confidence interval is vast. That said, over the years, the quality of Texas’s system has correlated reasonably well to its record. But for 2024, what does the Rangers’ current #12 ranking actually represent for its winning chances, given that their top two prospects likely won’t see an inning of the minors?

Some organizations emphasize winning more than others. For my outsider’s perspective, my concern isn’t about winning as much as excessive losing. In 2021, White Sox-affiliated Kannapolis lost its first ten, then 16 of the next 20, and then dropped to 46 games under .500 until an 8-1 finish. That just doesn’t seem conducive to a positive development environment.

Irrespective of how well farm quality translates to winning, I do prefer reporting on winning teams.

Starters
Last year, I wrote how the six-games-a-week schedule encouraged a six-man rotation. So it does, but the Rangers actually pushed against that a little more than I expected in 2023. Not uncommonly, a team would use a five-man rotation, and whoever was starting twice in the week would have a restricted count on Sunday.

Regardless, the idea of a workhorse has disappeared. In 2010, 20-year-old Wilfredo Boscan threw 163 innings in 27 starts, averaging 26.2 batters per start. The old format was 140 games in 151 days, so he averaged six innings every 5.6 days. A substantial workload, but not considered excessive at the time.

That would be inconceivable today. In 2010, 26 Texas minor leaguers averaged at least 18 batters per outing (minimum 10 outings). Last year, only nine did. In 2012, 18 pitchers faced at least 450 batters during the season. Last year, and in 2022, the number was four. In 2023, the median length of a start by a Texas minor leaguer was only 4.0 innings. The organization had only one complete game, itself a technicality in the form of Aidan Curry’s rain-shortened four-inning outing. There were only 73 complete games across the entire full-season minor leagues.

Surprisingly, Texas’s AAA starters haven’t tended to work longer on average than the lower levels the past two seasons. More bullpen starts and some struggles by pitchers expected to last longer have conspired to bring the median AAA outing length down, but even excluding obvious bullpen starts, AAA SPs aren’t throwing more than their lower-level colleagues.

Even with this limited workload, Texas does want starters to get their innings, so pitchers will often be allowed to press through situations that might get an MLB starter pulled. What will get a starter pulled early is excessive pitches. If the inning’s count has crept into the mid-20s with no end in sight, the bullpen will be active. Once it surpasses 30, the pitcher (especially if younger) could be yanked unless the batter he’s facing makes the final out. An unfortunate example would be Brock Porter’s professional debut: 32 pitches, six batters faced, four walks, only two outs recorded.

In the past, Texas’s AAA workload used to have semi-rigid removal standards. Mid-inning pitcher replacement was uncommon; the expectation was a pitcher would finish an inning. I used to jokingly mock opposing managers who removed pitchers mid-inning just to have some authority into the proceedings. Well, the joke’s on me, because Round Rock manager Doug Davis, who took charge last year, loves the mid-inning switch. Honestly, such an approach adheres more closely to MLB management, so I can’t really complain.

Some organizations have more fluid roles. Houston’s two A-level squads had 19 pitchers who both started and finished at least three games. Texas’s Hickory and Down East teams combined for four. The traditionalist White Sox had none.

Relievers
Minor league relievers tend to pitch on a schedule rather than in situational roles. Even in AAA, nominally the final training ground for the Majors, relievers usually pitch on prescribed days. 

Pitching on consecutive days, already a rarity below AAA, has become exceptionally rare even in AAA. Last year, Round Rock’s eight busiest relievers combined for only five back-to-back outings: Yerry Rodriguez (twice), Chase Lee (twice), and Jacob Latz (once). Not even the experienced Jonathan Hernandez, optioned to AAA for much of the season, pitched on consecutive days.

In the old days (circa 2018), pitching on consecutive days was a tell that a reliever might be headed for Arlington soon. Now, the relatively rigid AAA workloads and expansion of up-and-down relievers may have made that idea obsolete. AAA is still the final audition, but even with manager Doug Davis’s predilection for mid-inning changes, relief usage operates less like the Majors than it ever has.

AAA usage has also changed much more than low-A over the past decade:

Texas AAA in 2023: 39 relievers, 3.6 per game
Texas AAA in 2012: 22 relievers, 2.4 per game

Texas Low-A in 2023: 34 relievers, 2.5 per game
Texas Low-A in 2012: 20 relievers, 2.0 per game

A good many “relievers” in low-A are tandem starters (think the DJ McCarty / Dylan MacLean pairing in Down East last year) working multiple innings, while in AAA, relievers commonly work a single frame, so more are needed on a given night.

45 Texas minor leaguers saved a full-season game last year, led by Antoine Kelly with 11. Only four pitchers had more than five, and 19 had exactly one. Teams don’t have set closers, or to the extent they do, they tend to place trustworthiness above ceiling. In the last 16 years, nine Texas minor league relievers have recorded 20 saves in a season. None has ever subsequently saved a Major League game.

Sometimes in critical situations, managers have leeway to use relievers who’ve proven their trust more traditionally. In 2021, Frisco leaned heavily on 2021 draftee Chase Lee and Daniel Robert down the stretch. In 2022, Nick Starr finished three of Frisco’s four playoff games. Last year was different, however. For example, Down East’s Paul Bonzagni and Izack Tiger had minimal pro experience, but both made multiple appearances in the Woodies’ five-game playoff run.

Batting Orders, Position Player Starts
Batting orders aren’t necessarily optimized for run production and or aligned with the relative qualities of the prospects. Don’t worry about them.

Players tend to receive regular rest. No Marcus Semiens in the minors. Elier Hernandez accrued 612 plate appearances last year, most in the system since 2012, and he missed 12 of 149 games. Even well-regarded prospects may find themselves in a rotation, receiving a day off each week to accommodate a crowded infield or outfield. Likewise, even the least heralded will receive occasional action. A typical team might have only 12 position players consisting of three catchers, five infielders, and four outfielders (with some positional flexibility, of course). Nobody is going to gather dust on the bench.

Walks and Strikeouts
Usually, both increase down the organizational ladder. The combined BB/HBP rate in MLB last year was 9.5%. The minor leagues ranged from 11.9% to 16%. Atypically, high-A exhibited the best control last year.  

Walks exploded in low-A in 2021, something I attributed to an unscheduled year off and automated umpiring in one league. True, but not the whole story, as rates of walks and HBPs have remained elevated. Since the reclassification of the minor league system in 1990, there have been 1,002 low-A team-seasons. The top 16 and 33 of the top 34 highest BB/HBP rates have occurred in the last three years.

Strikeouts have finally leveled off after years of increases, which is to say they remain historic. Not that long ago, almost any pitcher with a 25% strikeout rate was noteworthy. In 2022, all of low-A had a 25.5% K rate, and last year dipped to 24.7%. Nine of the top ten and 52 of the top 60 strikeout seasons in low-A have occurred in the past three years. No league at any levels averaged fewer than nine strikeouts per nine innings. Again, a pitcher with one strikeout per inning is at best average, usually below.

Errors and “Mistakes”
The number of miscues that give the opposition free runners or bases increases greatly at the lower levels.

Likewise, fielding mistakes that don’t appear in the box score increase down the ladder. For example, fielder’s choices that don’t result in outs, throws to home that miss the cutoff and allow the trail runner to advance.

Running
With MLB adopting the runner-friendly rules tested in the minors, you’ve probably got a better idea of how they affect the game. The Rangers have been especially adept at exploiting these rules. In 2021, Down East set an all-time low-A record for most successful attempts per game (2.41), and their total of 290 was only nine short of the record despite playing 20 fewer games than normal. The next year, the Woodies stole 308, setting the low-A record and falling five shy of the most by any minor league team since at least 1990. Last year, the team settled for a middle-of-the-pack 209.

Teams run much more often in the minors than MLB, ranging from 36% more in AAA to 156% more in the DSL. Across the minors in the US last tear, the success rate on the bases was 77%, and rates don’t decline despite the increased attempts.

Promotions
Promotions and demotions aren’t made in a vacuum. A promoted player is necessarily taking someone else’s spot. Should that other player also be promoted? Demoted? Moved to a different position? Should the players share the position and moonlight at DH? Should the promoted guy move to a different position instead, and who would that affect? These decisions are sometimes complicated, and a player might advance more slowly than you’d like because Texas has to sort through all these issues.

Report Tone
Even in a deep system, most of Texas’s minor leaguers aren’t going to reach MLB or make much impact if they do. Texas has 26 Major Leaguers and well over 200 minor leaguers. The cold math turns most of them into “failures.”

They are not failures. They’re exceptional athletes in an industry with a limited number of jobs. If you’re the 2,000^th best accountant in the country, you’re doing great, plus you can start your own business if you want. The 2,000^th professional baseball player is in Double A, and he can’t start his own league to compete against MLB.

Also, we can argue about the relative entertainment quality of the current high-strikeout era, but the players themselves have never been better. There are pitchers stuck in AAA with repertoires that I guarantee would have made them passable MLB relievers a dozen years ago.

Ultimately, I want to be honest about a player’s likelihood of reaching the Majors, and I focus on the prospects most likely to help Texas in the future, but I’ll cover anyone having a great day.

Box Scores

AAA: Round Rock 8, Sugar Land (HOU) 6
Round Rock: 15 hits, 2 walks, 10 strikeouts
Opponent: 7 hits, 3 walks, 13 strikeouts
Record: 1-1, tied for first

SP Michael Lorenzen: 2.2 IP, 3 H (1 HR), 3 R, 2 BB, 3 SO, 50 P / 34 S, 10.13 ERA
RP Jack Leiter: 5 IP, 2 H (1 HR), 2 R, 0 BB, 9 SO, 3.60 ERA
RP Marc Church: 1 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 BB, 1 SO, 9.00 ERA
2B Justin Foscue: 2-5
3B Davis Wendzel: 1-4, HR (1), BB
LF Dustin Harris: 2-4, SB (1)
RF Trevor Hauver: 2-4, 2B
SS Jonathan Ornelas: 4-4, HR (1)

Jack Leiter has a couple of outings that are statistically superior, but I’m here to tell you that last night was his best performance as a professional. Certainly, I’ve never seen him look more comfortable. So many of his nights have involved such struggle just to get by, with him seemingly having to recalibrate mentally and physically before every pitch. Last night, he made a difficult task look easy. 

Leiter fanned nine of 17 batters and missed 11 bats out of 33 swings. Yet what impressed me most is not that he simply blew the ball by people. Six of his nine strikeouts were looking, five of those on fastballs. He consistently got ahead, and instead of snapping off a slider as might be expected, he usually dealt another fastball, very consistently inside lefties and outside to righties. Sugar Land didn’t catch on. Across his 3rd and 4th innings, four consecutive batters stared dully at fastballs for strike three.

Leiter has always missed bats, and the Space Cowboys* swung through several elevated fastballs and diving sliders. But for him to succeed repeatedly with location is another matter.

Sugar Land finally did catch on in his final inning. He wasn’t quite so sharp. He retired two of the first three batters but needed seven pitches for each out. Then, on an 0-2 count to lefty slugger Joey Loperfino, Leiter again turned to the inside fastball. Loperfino sent it 420 feet the other direction. Leiter then worked another seven-pitch out culminating with Trey Cabbage’s swing through a high fastball.

Leiter’s fastball reached over 22 inches of induced vertical break on three occasions. That is truly elite, particularly for pitches thrown 96-97 MPH. In case that term is alien to you, for purposes of judging four-seamers, it represents the apparent ability to rise, and to the extent the ball differentiates itself from the average fastball, it is often harder to hit.

Leiter’s less frequent curve was most effective as a first-pitch strike-stealer, and one change (deemed a sinker by Statcast, but I think not) resulted in a groundout.

I have to provide the caveat that it’s just one night. If he belly-flops his next outing, we’ve got a different discussion.  But last night, living in the moment, I hadn’t been that excited since he was drafted. I’ll have video later. The Express have video now.

Michael Lorenzen didn’t have an attractive line, but for what was essentially a Spring Training start, he was fine. The velocity was typical. I didn’t see anything to worry about.

Unfortunately, Marc Church was closer to the 2023 version than the one who nearly claimed a bullpen job in Arlington to start the season. Called to protect a three-run lead in the 9th, he missed on seven of his first nine pitches, and three balls in play afterward were medium-hard or worse. With what already might be the defensive play of the season, CF Elier Hernandez pulled back what would have been a game-tying homer. Please watch.

I whined Saturday about Jonathan Ornelas continuing 2023’s trend of hard but fruitless grounders. Last night, he added three more balls in play of at least 100 MPH. All airborne this time, all hits, including a two-run homer.

* (that’s their actual name, not something I made up)

Podcast
Sean Bass of the Ticket, Michael Tepid and I has resumed podcasting. Links to our first episode of the season are in my signature.

Today’s Starters
AAA: Adrian Sampson

Box Scores

AAA: Round Rock 2, Sugar Land (HOU) 4
Round Rock: 4 hits, 5 walks, 7 strikeouts
Opponent: 8 hits, 5 walks, 11 strikeouts
Record: 0-1, 1 GB

SP Owen White: 4 IP, 4 H (1 HR), 4 R, 2 BB, 6 SO, 79 P / 50 S, 9.00 ERA
RP Cole Winn: 2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 HBP, 3 SO, 0.00 ERA
RP Grant Anderson: 1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 SO, 0.00 ERA
LF Dustin Harris: 1-3, BB

Owen White offered the reverse of the Jekyll/Hyde performance I saw in Surprise. This time, Hyde (the bad guy) arrived first. White needed 51 pitches to complete the first two innings, walking two and allowing a two-run homer and deep double to right-center. His velocity was fine (92-95 fastball), a couple of tics above what he often dealt in 2023, but basic control was absent, resulting in three three-ball counts in addition to the walks.

Dr. Jekyll arrived in the 3rd. White needed only 26 pitches in the next two innings, regaining his control such that he could deceive opponents with first-pitch changeups and sliders, and nothing but sliders to one batter followed by nothing but fastballs to another. Much, much better. A single to start the 5th ended his night. On the whole, White did throw a higher percentage of swinging strikes than he averaged last year, and he dealt first-pitch strikes to 12 of 18 batters.

I don’t wish to make such an ominous pronouncement on day one of the minor league season, but here it is: The difference between White’s second two innings and first two is the difference between getting back to the Majors and not. Mr. Hyde can’t be out there throwing half his innings.

I’d marked a couple of early pitches from Cole Winn as changeups, but they looked a little funny, tending to dive in toward left-handed batters’ feet. Statcast called them sinkers. Statcast can get a little carried away with pitch categorizations in the minors, and the spin and movement figures were in the same range as his straight change, but yeah, many of them appeared to be sinkers. Winn hit a batter and walked another, but the sinker (or sinker-change tandem) was effective, and every pitch had its moments. A new, effective pitch in Winn’s arsenal would be a blessing, and after his trying Spring Training, it’s nice to be able to look forward to his next outing.

Offensively, the Express didn’t cause a fuss until the 9th. Facing Wander Suero, who as an OKC Dodger threw the final pitch of Round Rock’s season in the Pacific Coast League finals, Davis Wendzel was hit by a pitch and Matt Duffy doubled. With two out, Sandro Fabian doubled them home. After another, uglier HBP that forced CF Derek Hill out of the game, Justin Foscue lined a 3-2 cutter directly into Suero’s glove.

Sugar Land starter Spencer Arrighetti had his own trouble throwing strikes, walking five in 4.1 IP, but he allowed only two singles and befuddled the Express with a mean sweeper. 11 swings against it generated eight whiffs, two fouls and a batted out. All eight misses were on pitches outside the zone.

Jonathan Ornelas generated solid exit velocities last year, but his production was limited by the highest grounder rate in the PCL. He had Round Rock’s two hardest-hit balls last night (105.3 MPH and 104.2), both on the ground, resulting in three outs.

Today’s Starters
AAA: Leiter (and Lorenzen)

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.