This team sucks! 19 strikeouts last night!? You've got to be kidding me............

BRING BACK BUCK!

Yeah, fire Washington but keep that great hitting coach...

Think it is a little too early to tell if it is washingtons fault.

Sell the team, burn the stadium, drag the management into the street for a ruthless tar-and-feathering, bring in the people from Florida's expansion team days and build a dome. You'll have a winner in a few years.

Texas is snakebit, and has been since at least 1989 when I started watching them. One could hardly have more success in making poor decisions and making a shambles of the whole franchise if it was planned that way.

It's not Ron Washington's fault, the conditions to win in Texas are just too great to overcome, especially with this year's lack of power to mitigate the situation.

A lot of what he's doing isn't working right now but pretty much everything he's done so far I would have done too.

For example, putting Kam Loe into the rotation. Today it's not working out but I want him in the rotation. I like the way he's rotating all the outfielders in and out and giving everyone a fair shake. I like the way he goes out and talks to the pitchers in key situations instead of just sending the pitching coach. I LOVE how he's sending runners instead of just depending on homers like Buck did.

I think if we turn it around, it'll all be because of Ron Washington because I think he's pushing all the right buttons so far. I just don't know if the players are gonna help him out.

There's dissention in the ranks...and it's only April.

On a more serious note, the Rangers are what we (read: I) thought they were.

Team ERA: 5.11 (27th)
Oppo Batting Avg.: .272 (26th)
SO: 110 (26th)
BB: 82 (7th most)
R Allowed: 112 (5th most)
ERs allowed: 99 (4th most)

I don't care what you're hitting or who your hitting coach is, those kinds of stats simply don't allow you to have a winning record. That's not winning baseball. Combine that with being tied for 4th in the league with the most errors AND 27th in the league in fielding percentage and you have a perfect storm of pathetic baseball.

They can't pitch, they can't catch, and they're making up for it by not hitting.

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Im Calling it Now!

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OH CRAP, let me go alert the press!

Rudy Jaramillo is the most overrated POS of all time. What a joke. We have not been a consistently good offensive team since the mid/late 90's. Note the word consistent...it has not existed with the rangers in quite some time.

Jaramillo is the best thing to happen to the Rangers since Nolan Ryan. They HAVE consistently raked since he got here, although it's understandable to overlook because the pitching has been so bad.

Can we keep Washington and fire Hicks?

Brandon Stewart<Randy McCown<Mark Farris<Vance Smith<Colby Freeman<Dustin Long<Reggie McNeal<Stephen McGee<Jerrod Johnson

162 games...

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Jaramillo is the best thing to happen to the Rangers since Nolan Ryan. They HAVE consistently raked since he got here, although it's understandable to overlook because the pitching has been so bad.

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Jaramillo is the most overrated hitting coach of all time. He may have been good in the 90s, but it has been a while since he has done anything tohelp the offense. His idea of hitting is swing hard and hit it to the gap.

http://texas.rangers.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070426&content_id=1931319&vkey=news_tex&fext=.jsp&c_id=tex

Above is an artilce which points out what he wants from the hitters. Washington is trying to get them to be more selective in the box. Teams like the A's and Boston and Minn. come to mind. IMO Rudy and Washington are dirt and water together. One of them is going to have to go before the end of the season and I hope it is Rudy and he takes Hicks with him.

Washington DC, Washington Senators (Ranger's ancestor), Washington Nationals, Ron Washington. Washington has been going downhill ever since George.

The first poster maybe on to something....

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Washington finally has a little class because of George.

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fify

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A lot of what he's doing isn't working right now but pretty much everything he's done so far I would have done too.

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I agree. Obviously the team hasn't started out as well as we would have hoped, and there have been a few times that Wash has made some mistakes that a rookie manager would make (he's left pitchers in too long a couple of times), but the team has also been victimized by some bad luck and bad breaks. The fielding has been poor so far, but I don't foresee that to be something that continues from now on, Wash is too good of a fielding coach. I like the fact that we're counting on contributions from young players, and guys like Tejeda, Kinsler, and CJ have been huge. I like the fact that Lofton is running around the basepaths like a madman. I LOVE the fact that the guy who is agreed upon to have the best stuff on the team and probably the entire organization, Jack Benny, looks like a different pitcher both in his pace and his mental toughness, and he very well may finally achieve his potential.

ttt- anyone want to dispute this now!?

I would not trade ANYONE for Buck again...

Nobody can be more frustrated with the way this team has played than Washington, and you could tell it from his post game interview last night...He looked worn out and in dis belief that all of this is going the way it is...

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ttt- anyone want to dispute this now!?

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Yes. As bad as these guys look, I fail to believe that it's all Wash's fault. This is on the players. They wanted a new manager because they were oppressed by Buck, so they got one. And now? They look like they're just going through the motions. Have you seen Michael Young's uniform constantly filthy as in year's past? Apparently his new contract doesn't require him to work as hard in the field. Kinsler has had his head up his butt for two weeks. Sammy is working hard at the plate, but other than Wilkerson going Rusty Greer on the leftfield wall last weekend, this team has exhibited very little passion. No one looks like they're ready to go homicidal over this losing streak. I've always been a big fan of Young and Tex, and it pains me to say this, but this team has no leadership. There's no one willing to get in the face of everyone else on the team and tell them to wake the eff up. There's no one that will take a baseball bat to a clubhouse tv to vent his frustration. There's no one to plant a baseball in Vlad Guerrero's back to inspire the team. There's no one swearing profusely coming off the mound. There's no one that wants to light a fire under the rest of the team and pull them together to overcome adversity. This team needs someone like Will Clark, Nolan Ryan, Ozzie Guillen, Curt Schilling, or Jason Varitek.

I don't care if you have Ron Washington or Casey Stengel in the dugout right now. Our 25 man roster has too many players who just don't want it bad enough. They're fine with showing up, playing nine innings, and then receiving their paychecks regardless of whether they win or lose. This roster needs to be blown up.

i blame the coach and players...Mostly the coach though, as thats how the sports world turns...

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"HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW TUCKER! HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW!!! - Ron Franklin

"HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW FRAN! HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW!!! - AW 1880

nm - Jon Daniels sucks.

[This message has been edited by PatronSaint (edited 5/18/2007 12:08p).]

Fact of the matter is, looking at the talent on this team to expect them to get any higher than 3rd in the AL West was just wishful thinking.

A lot of the unknowns that you needed to pan out have (Sosa, Tejeda), but likewise a lot of the things you were counting on haven't (Young's slow start, Laird, McCarthy, Millwood).

That's the thing about any team -- yeah you can say if Player X, Y and Z do well than the team has a shot -- but the problem is if you have a team with that many question marks, it's not likely that player A, B and C will also play up to what they have in the past.

Jaramillo and the entire scouting department need to be thrown to the curb.

Wasn't it here where it was discussed a few weeks ago about the Rangers being one of the few teams that do not advance scout anymore??? Or was that in a mail bag somewhere???

It was mentioned on a telecast. Advance scouting is just going ahead to the next opponent and seeing their pitchers and what their tendencies are, etc... For the most part can be completely done on film (though I guess it could be another sign of how cheap our front office is).

I'm talking about scouting as far as draft picks and trade values.

I think the Rangers need to take a long look at their minor league coaches, too. When is the last time the Rangers really developed a guy all the way through their system? It seems like every big minor league prospect they have fails to pan out.

Its tough to compare... As far as first round draft picks go, ignoring the debacle that was the 2002 draft, the Rangers haven't drafted that poorly:


2000 Draft: #26 pick, Scott Heard (C). Guy never made it past A ball.

Adam Wainwright taken at #29, Aaron Heilman at #31.


2001 Draft: #5 Pick, Mark Teixeira (3B). Hard to argue with this pick, but honestly the only reason he dropped to us was signability issues (Minnesota, Tampa Bay and Philadelphia picked before us and all drafted much more signable players -- Cubs could have afforded him but they went with Prior).


2002 Draft: #10 Pick, Drew Meyer (2B). Drafted a "utility" guy when we could have thrown a dart at a draft board and hit a current major league stud (Hamels, Kazmir, Francis, Saunders, Greene, Adams, Swisher, Blanton, Cain).


2003 Draft: #9 Pick, John Danks (P). Looks now to be a pretty good draft pick.

2004 Draft: #10 Pick, Thomas Diamond (P). Not a terrible pick considering the only two remarkable players taken later (Jered Weaver and Stephen Drew both dropped as far as they did due to signability, not talent). Also picked up Eric Hurley at #30.

2005 Draft: #19 Pick, John Mayberry (RF). Not looking like a great pick, but still early. Other than Garza, not a lot of talent taken after our pick.


But if you want to look at why some team's farm systems are well developed and our isn't -- a lot of it just has to do with # of draft picks in the first 5 rounds.

In the 2000-2005 drafts (the drafts that would make up most team's farm systems at this point), Texas had 27 picks.

In those same years, Minnesota had 38 picks and Oakland had 44 picks.

The more guys you take in the first 5 rounds, the better chance you have of them panning out.

Mayberry is still in A ball. It was a terrible selection. This entire oranization is pathetic.

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It was a terrible selection.

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Like mhayden said, it's still early. Do I think it was a great pick? Not right now, but it's a long ways from "terrible", which would best be applied to the Drew Meyer pick. It's not like we passed on loads of can't miss talent when we took Mayberry.

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Mayberry is still in A ball.

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The current location of all first rounders taken after Mayberry:

Mark Pawelek: Low-A Midwest League
Cliff Pennington: High-A California League (same as Mayberry)
Aaron Thompson: High-A Florida State League
Jacoby Ellsbury: started out in Double-A Eastern League, just promoted to Triple-A International League
Brian Bogusevic: High-A Carolina League
Matt Garza: Triple-A International League
Craig Hansen: Triple-A International League (saw some big league action last year)
Joey Devine: Double-A Southern League
Colby Rasmus: Double-A Texas League
Jacob Marceaux: High-A Florida State League
Tyler Greene: Double-A Texas League

Not saying that Mayberry is going to be a success, but again, it's not like we took him and passed on a whole slew of can't-miss guys who are already in the big leagues.


[This message has been edited by WestTxAg06 (edited 5/18/2007 2:48p).]

You are the biggest Ranger homer of all time

Ya know (and I'm stealing from ESPN 103.3 on this), but Melvin back in the day WANTED to blow this whole thing up and start fresh again, which Hicks was behind, and then a month after getting behind him on it, Hicks turned around and signed Pay-Rod...

This is an organization as a whole that doesn't have a CLUE what it wants to be right now...

thats some good stuff WTA... where and how long did that take you to find?

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thats some good stuff WTA... where and how long did that take you to find?

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Not too long. I just found the list of first round draft picks in 2005 and put their names into the Baseball America minor league stats database to see where they are right now.

Cj, I won't deny that I'm a Rangers homer, but that's irrelevant to the discussion. You're lambasting the pick as "terrible", I'm simply trying to provide more information about who we passed on. The Meyer pick was terrible. It may end up being terrible if Ellsbury becomes the next Johnny Damon and Matt Garza becomes Johan Santana, but right now the Mayberry pick is just questionable.

Basically from my research, over the last 6 years the only first round draft that you can flat out say was BAD by Texas was 2002 (which was the debacle to end all debacles).

2000 was a very weak year, and most players taken after our pick of Heard never made the bigs either. I mentioned Heilman, but just now realized he didn't actually sign and went back to school -- meaning the only reason he dropped that far was because of signability issues -- so he would have been an even worse pick.

2001 we got a legitimate Major League stud at #5 out of a pretty weak class (Mark Prior, Gavin Floyd and Chris Burke were the creap of the crop to come out of that class other than Teixeira.

2002 ugh.

2003 we got a legitimate Major League starter in Danks.

2004 we got a solid arm in Diamond, and nothing else was really available that has done any better. And we got Hurley.

2005 its still too early to tell, but as I and WestTexas have pointed out, Matt Garza is about the only guy drafted after Mayberry that has done anything significant in the Majors.

I don't think the problem we have is who we pick in the first round -- I think the problem is the low number of draft picks we are getting in the first 5 rounds (due to poor trades and free agent signings forfeiting draft picks).

For comparison, look at the Chicago Cubs:

Looking at the 2000-2005 drafts, they've had 12 picks in the 1st and 2nd rounds combined, including a #2, #3 and #6 pick.

Of those 12, Mark Prior is the only one that had a Major League appearance as a Cub.

I notice the firebrands disappeared from the thread after a factual recounting of the draft results in question was introduced.