I hope the fans dont show up this yr for AA ball at MLB prices.

alvtimes said:

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I hope the fans dont show up this yr for AA ball at MLB prices.

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Because $0 in ticket sales revenue will help bring in better ball players

Fielder was damaged goods when they got him. His power had declined in the year prior, and even if maybe it wasn't entirely evident to him, I do think some weakness from the nerve compression was starting to happen.

I don't disagree that the Rangers organizational approach could have contributed to the injuries at the minor league level. I don't know that anyone could definitively say one way or the other. Per my five minute internet research, about 15% of minor league pitchers have Tommy John prior to advancement to MLB. Very unscientifically, we seem to be losing about 90% of our best pitching prospects. The "unlucky" that I am referring to is the caliber of players that are getting hurt. The players that I listed had all either shown something already or had been drafted high and were injured before they could even show what they had. I didn't include guys like Tate or Matuella because they were known risks.

Fielder was not doing the due diligence on his health.

We got almost 20 WAR out of Darvish, can't really say we had a ton of bad luck with him. We just didn't score any runs for him.

Locking Harrison, Holland and Perez up on the cheap and then seeing them all go down down (back, knee, arm) was a blow that we simply did not have the farm system and money to recover from (and few teams that had come off back-to-back World Series and then gone out and spent money on guys like Darvish really could have expected to).

Looking back, the timeline really doesn't scream mis-management, more of just finding ourselves in a unique situation in 2018 where we couldn't do a reboot.

2010-2013: True World Series contender window

2014: We made the Fielder trade and signed Choo to try and extend the window. Most knew the back-end of these deals wouldn't be pretty. Fielder injury ultimately tanked this season and probably would have decimated a franchise with less $$$ for years.

2015-2016: Despite the Fielder disaster, Rangers win the division 2 years in a row, but in the process gut their farm system to keep that window open. Trades for Hamels, Diekman, Lucroy, Jeffress and Bektran. In 2016 they won 95 games. But as we know they **** hte bed in the playoffs in both these years.

2017: Top of the rotation 1-2 punch of Darvish and Hamels. Beltre, Andrus, Gomez... Odor coming off a big season. Napoli coming back (100+ OPS in 2016). Mazara looking like he's right on the cusp (as he would look his entire tenure). It wasn't a World Series favorite but it was absolutely a division contender. But Darvish got hurt, Odor tanked, and the division saw the emergence of a team that tanked for draft-picks for a decade.


It was at this point that in a vacuum of "what is best for the franchise's win total" that the Rangers should have completely rebooted. Sell off every major asset and go young. Trying to compete with the Astros the next 3 years was going to be futile, they simply had too many good players on cheap contracts. But 2018 was going to be Beltre's final year, and with him and Hamels in the clubhouse "wanting to win" the franchise made a decision to at least try and construct a team that could compete. It couldn't. 2019 saw a new stadium on the horizon and while they could refrain from making any long-term mistakes, the team didn't want to blatantly wave the white flag while trying to get the park built and seats sold. So we had a piece-meal 2019 season as well.

When Minor and Lynn both showed glimpses of being solid TORPs in 2019 they *should* have sold high, but at the end of the day I think they still wanted to have a winning team in their new ballpark and took a gamble on Kluber and possibly having a team that could beat you with starting pitching. Obviously that didn't even get out of the gate.

So here we are.

That's a stat right there

Since the new park is apparently going to be pitcher-friendly, I'm of the opinion that the team is going to need to transition away from the all-or-nothing Gallo/Odor type hitters, and build a team of contact/line drive hitters. Granted, you need at least one or two thumpers in the lineup, but there is waaaay too much swing & miss with the veteran players on this team.
Players like Solak & Taveras have a better chance to excel in the new park than the big power guys. JMO

KT 90 said:

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MLB breakout candidates for all 30 MLB teams:

Quote:

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Nick Solak: Solak finished last season with a 90.4 percent in-zone contact rate and an 89.9-mph exit velocity. If you can find it in your heart to round up his exit velocity to 90 mph, then he was one of five hitters (minimum 100 plate appearances) in the 90/90 club, joining Mookie Betts, DJ LeMahieu, Anthony Rendon and Robinson Cano. Making contact nearly every time you swing, and hitting the ball hard in the process, is an almost foolproof way to excel at baseball. Who knew? Solak is still dogged by positional questions, but his bat is above reproach. He's going to hit, and hit a lot.

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https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/mlb-breakout-candidates-one-player-from-all-30-teams-whos-ready-to-step-up-as-spring-training-games-start/?eid=b20ee3894af74f9bb09a9fe33fceef39b7d3fda5&ftag=SNL-04-10aaa0b&ET_CID=150788&ET_RID=38651810

Given the lack of quality bats on the team currently, Solak needs to play somewhere on a regular basis: 2B, 1B, LF, DH (or a combination thereof).

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That's some pretty elite company. I can't stand the Yankees but Lemahieu is quickly becoming one of my favorites in baseball.

FYI the mask mandate in Texas is going to be lifted on 4/30

rbtexan said:

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Since the new park is apparently going to be pitcher-friendly, I'm of the opinion that the team is going to need to transition away from the all-or-nothing Gallo/Odor type hitters, and build a team of contact/line drive hitters. Granted, you need at least one or two thumpers in the lineup, but there is waaaay too much swing & miss with the veteran players on this team.
Players like Solak & Taveras have a better chance to excel in the new park than the big power guys. JMO

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Re: pitcher friendly.... is it really going to be???? I know its seems like HR's were low for Rangers in 2020 ..... but it also seems like the postseason games played there had plenty of HR's ....I could totally be wrong.... feel free to correct my allergy brain!!!

One dynamic that I'm going to watch with interest is how much of a hand Chris Young is going to have on player development/acquisitions going forward. While the jury is obviously out on him because he's an unknown at this point, I'm ready to see someone other than JD running that part of the show for a while.

Where are you hearing that?

alvtimes said:

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rbtexan said:

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Since the new park is apparently going to be pitcher-friendly, I'm of the opinion that the team is going to need to transition away from the all-or-nothing Gallo/Odor type hitters, and build a team of contact/line drive hitters. Granted, you need at least one or two thumpers in the lineup, but there is waaaay too much swing & miss with the veteran players on this team.
Players like Solak & Taveras have a better chance to excel in the new park than the big power guys. JMO

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Re: pitcher friendly.... is it really going to be???? I know its seems like HR's were low for Rangers in 2020 ..... but it also seems like the postseason games played there had plenty of HR's ....I could totally be wrong.... feel free to correct my allergy brain!!!

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The roof was open during the post season, and apparently the ball travels quite a bit better there with the roof open. Still a relatively small sample size, so we'll know more after a full season in 2021.

Mr Gigem said:

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FYI the mask mandate in Texas is going to be lifted on 4/30

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This would be good. Plenty more vaccinated by then, and it's time to move on and open things up.

KT 90 said:

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alvtimes said:

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rbtexan said:

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Since the new park is apparently going to be pitcher-friendly, I'm of the opinion that the team is going to need to transition away from the all-or-nothing Gallo/Odor type hitters, and build a team of contact/line drive hitters. Granted, you need at least one or two thumpers in the lineup, but there is waaaay too much swing & miss with the veteran players on this team.
Players like Solak & Taveras have a better chance to excel in the new park than the big power guys. JMO

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Re: pitcher friendly.... is it really going to be???? I know its seems like HR's were low for Rangers in 2020 ..... but it also seems like the postseason games played there had plenty of HR's ....I could totally be wrong.... feel free to correct my allergy brain!!!

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The roof was open during the post season, and apparently the ball travels quite a bit better there with the roof open. Still a relatively small sample size, so we'll know more after a full season in 2021.

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I noticed that as well. However, the entire reason for building a new stadium with a roof was because of the summer heat. I doubt that after mid-late May you'll see many games at all with an open roof, unless they think they can open it after sunset and not have it get too hot.

If I'm a ticket holder, I'd be pissed if I was sitting there sweating my a$$ off because the roof is open to allow for more HRs.

I don't think will happen. I think there is a rule that if the game time temp is above a certain. Temp threshold, the roof will be closed. Also if it's below a certain threshold, it will be closed. Not sure of the specifics, but believe there is certain temp range and below the threshold where it can be open.

Maybe our favorite Ranger employee can fill us in

I think it will be open more than everyone thinks

We will keep it closed all day to keep it cool, then open it right before the game starts. That cool air is more dense than warm air, and will continue to circulate through the seating bowl. #science

Of course if it's 100+ at first pitch, then it'll probably stayed closed

I actually don't think there's a set temperature, at least not that I know any more. It was something like 84/85 in the past, but I think it could be closer to 90. I'll see if I can track that down.

There were a lot of things about the stadium that were one way two years ago that are no longer. It's been a heck of a ride

The ticketing policy we are coming out with is going to be all about assurance and flexibility. It's been a nice change of pace from a year ago, IMO

I have a client whose HQ is in California and they are being forced to comply with current California Covid restrictions. Let me state that again. Every branch in every state they operate in is being forced to comply with the California restrictions, no matter what local state laws and mandates are. How insane is that?

How is that even enforceable?

Ranger #007 said:

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How is that even enforceable?

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No clue, but that's got to be hurting their business here. I have so many other clients who are able to entertain

Ah, I thought California was forcing it.