3 observations from the Texas Rangers opening series win against Red Sox

Despite the disappointing start to the 2025 season, the Texas Rangers settled in and took three of four from Boston to start the season.

While the offense didn’t blow the Red Sox out, only outscoring Boston 13-11 over the course of the four game series they showed grit on offense and were shut down when it mattered most on the pitching side.

3 observations from the Rangers series win over Boston to kick off 2025

Adolis Garcia is healthy and it’s showing early

Let’s talk about Adolis Garcia. He was great all spring and so far it has translated into the regular season.

The biggest thing I notice is his health. There’s no doubt, mixed with a poor performance, that Garcia was still dealing with lingering issues from his injuries during the 2023 season.

In the first four games of the season, Garcia is hitting .333 with two home runs, four RBIs and a stolen bases. If you look at Garcia at the plate, running the bases or in the field you can see his agility is back and the injuries might be behind him.

The 32-year-old set a goal in spring training to hit 50 home runs this season and very early into the year, he looks capable of reaching that milestone.

The bullpen might not be as bad as we thought, but let’s not go too crazy

I’m not ready to claim that this bullpen is the best in baseball but after the Opening Day loss, the bullpen has only surrendered three runs in 15 innings of work.

Mostly I was impressed with their performance in Saturday’s game when Tyler Mahle didn’t get out of the second inning. The combined efforts of Jacob Webb, Hoby Milner, Gerson Garabito, Robert Garcia and Chris Martin went 7 1/3 innings of one run, eight strikeout relief.

Luke Jackson has also bounced back strong after blowing the save on Thursday to record two saves in a three run and one run games on Friday and Sunday. Those two saves were sat in the middle of Saturday evening save from veteran Chris Martin as well.

It’s still early and I do believe the Rangers still need a true closer to become an elite team but maybe we aren’t in trouble as much as we thought before the season started.

Tyler Mahle might be more of a concern than the two young starters

Although it’s only been one game and Tyler Mahle still just surrendered two runs, he did so in just 1 1/3 innings of work on Saturday.

On the other side Jack Leiter had the best MLB game of his career in his first start of the season. In five innings he only gave up one run, struck out four and only one walk which is such a positive sign to success.

We still have Kumar Rocker’s first start on Monday against the Reds but if he is able to give a start close to Leiter, the rotation might look to be in better shape.

The only worry then that remains would be Mahle. In his start he did get pinched a little by the home plate umpire but he still struggled to find the zone and land his pitches. If he can’t get that under control, that’s a bigger concern to me than a potential rough game from either of the young arms in the rotation.