Depressive Realism

The Rangers are now 3-12 in their past 15 games, and have been outscored 62 to 36 during that span (I may have to defer to Jon Heyman if this is another case of having “too many good players“).

And from that, I summarize that it is difficult to win when you have been outscored by a 2:1 ratio, but hey, that’s just my opinion.

Just to clarify, that’s 137 innings of some of the absolute worst baseball that the Rangers have played in years—though, the end of the 2012 season comes to mind.

Jul 28, 2013; Cleveland, OH, USA; Texas Rangers relief pitcher Ross Wolf (55) walks off the field in the eighth inning against the Cleveland Indians at Progressive Field. Mandatory Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports

On another somber note, the Oakland A’s defeated the Walking Dead for a third consecutive day, extending their lead atop the AL West to 6.0 games over the Rangers, but don’t fret, it could be worse, right?

No, actually, I doubt it could get worse, but that’s a good thing.

While searching for a tangible reason as to why the Rangers have been having such an abysmal time of late (I’ll save the lack of #Leadership for another article), I stumbled across this statistic, which I found interesting:

In 2013, when batting with men on base (1693 PA), the Rangers have a BABIP of .276, which is second worst in all of MLB to only the Cubs. Additionally, with runners in scoring position (961 PA), the Rangers have a BABIP of .259, which is also good for second worst in all of MLB. Lastly, in high leverage situations (372 PA), the Rangers have a wRC+ of 55, which is the absolute worst in all of MLB.

Of course, all of this could be a result of luck, rather, lack thereof on behalf of the Rangers’ offense, or the team’s startling lack of #Leadership (dammit, I intended to save that topic for next time) but either way, it adds an interesting and tangible supporting reason as to why the offense has struggled so badly to score runs.

There is no question that the Rangers are, and have been, struggling to score runs, but based on typical regressions, the Rangers are indeed due for a tilt on BABIP in the positive direction.

The Rangers are ailing, but they’re far from dead. The Rangers aren’t perfect, but they’re far from actually being the team we’ve seen in the past 15 games. If anything, the Rangers just need a spark of life—not a trade or anything of that matter, but something as simple as a lineup change.

It’s funny how these sorts of things all work out.