Why in the world are the Texas Rangers branching out into esports?

Most of the news regarding the Texas Rangers is strictly baseball related. Between the fascinating roster battles down at camp including Wyatt Langford's dominance, and the speculation that Texas could come out of nowhere and land Dylan Cease, there is plenty to talk about if you are a Rangers fan. However, what very few thought would be a story would be the Rangers venturing into...esports?

However, that is precisely what is happening. Texas, in a partnership with Rival, is launching "Rangers Gaming," an online, Rangers-centric gaming community. As to why Texas is doing this, we have some guesses.

Rangers join strange trend of teams looking to appeal to gamers with "Rangers Gaming"

The Rangers are not the first MLB team to try this, as the Guardians were the first baseball organization to launch this sort of thing. Given that Texas has decided to get in on the fun and help fans play Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, Valorant, or whatever the next in vogue FPS ends up being against each other, Cleveland must have seen some benefits from the move.

It is hard not to view this as anything more than a pretty shameless money grab with the slight hope that this forced attempt to try and gain a foothold into a completely different form of entertainment pays dividends. The press release is absolutely right that online gaming is a massive market with a ton of eyeballs. However, trying to force a marriage of the two is going to be really, really tough, unless there is a lot of prize support for tournaments in the community. Even then, it could get sketchy, as the track record of esports circuits/organizations lasting very long is decidedly poor.

With the Rangers losing out on some TV revenue going forward, giving this esports venture a shot isn't the worst idea, especially since it is with a company that already has a relationship with MLB. Rangers fans just shouldn't hope that this is going to be the cash cow that allows them to bring back Jordan Montgomery.

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