Texas Rangers 2015 Ceiling Is A Problem

In sports, you want to win.

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No, seriously. In sports, the goal is to be the last team standing. As the saying goes, “If you’re not in first, you’re in last.” This statement is untrue in so, so many ways.

First of all, factually that isn’t the case. And there are a lot of worse places to be than in last. Unless you’re Chan Ho Park‘ing your way to last.

I prefer the revised declaration that “If you’re not contending, be rebuilding.”

The 2015 Texas Rangers are not in first or contending.

They are not rebuilding and last is a nightmarish but, unfortunately, true possibility.

Photo Credit: Bob Stanton-USA TODAY Sports

After competing enough to make two straight World Series in 2010-2011, the team has not reached the Division Series. A casualty to Joe Saunders and the Wild Card Round in 2012 and a play-in game loss to the Tampa Bay Rays in 2013 (the team they beat in both the 2010 and 2011 ALDS) sent the Rangers home well before they planned.

And then there was last year.

At last some fresh faces that seemed a need, Prince Fielder and Shin-Soo Choo. But the accursed and super accurate foreboding injury bug started with players like Jurickson Profar and Derek Holland, forcing players like Josh Wilson and Nick Martinez into roles that mattered on a team trying to get back to the postseason.

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In the end, you know how it went. I know. We all know. It was a mess.

But along the way, the Rangers have used this injury bug as an excuse to hide the blunt truth: It’s time for a rebuild.

Not a Houston Astros or Chicago Cubs rebuild because the Rangers don’t need that.

However, it would be wise for Jon Daniels and friends to Franchise–>Menu–>Transactions–>Check Trade block and test the value of their high prices but still valuable players.

The farm system has a ton of names that fans are already drooling over. Joey Gallo, Jorge Alfaro, Nomar Mazara, Jake Thompson and Alex “Chi Chi” Gonzalez are just a few in a very, very deep system.

It’s still a system with a lot of guys that are years off from any potential impact in the Majors, or even at the higher levels of Minor League Baseball.

Lewis Brinson, Nick Williams, Travis Demeritte, Josh Morgan, Ti’Quan Forbes, Ronald Guzman, Alec Asher, Jerad Eickhoff.

There’s never a shortage of talent in the organization with Jon Daniels running things. However, as enamoured with prospects as JD gets, new San Diego Padres GM and former assistant to Daniels, A.J. Preller, took the baseball world by storm by flipping assets than Daniels either seems too gun shy to do (Profar 2011 and 2012) or simply trades at the wrong time for the wrong pieces (Mike Olt–Matt Garza 2013).

That’s neither here or there and is a separate story, albeit one that’s intensely closely in relations to what’s happening here in Arlington right now.

The Rangers shortage of talent ultimately comes at the level where you can least afford it; the money makers, the high paying players, the Major Leaguers.

This team was a big maybe, with Yu Darvish out of commission they are a big no. It’s sad, I hate it, it sucks. We all want winning baseball to watch and cheer for.

But it would do the Texas Rangers far, far better to sell away the season, build for 2016 and beyond and avoid the dreaded “middle-of-the-pack.”

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