DALLAS — Before we dispense with the elephant in the room that emerged early during the Texas Rangers’ 11-7 win over Philadelphia Thursday, let’s acknowledge and praise the obvious. The local lads can still gear up a victory the old-fashioned Ranger way, a Power-in-the-Park show to provide all the necessary knockout blows.
The Rangers won the top prize on Major League Baseball’s opening day, outscoring every team in the league despite the fact that there were a couple of 10-9 winners. In fact, the Rangers outscored the rest of the American League West by three runs. This is what it’s like having Bruce Bochy in the dugout. He posts a lineup that does not necessarily scare the pants off opponents, then collects his World Series rings in the fall.
That’s not to say that the top four of the Rangers’ lineup isn’t high quality. It better be, given the salaries of the first two batters. But Bochy has made it clear he plans to write down Marcus Semien-Corey Seager-Nathaniel Lowe-Adolis Garcia to start his day on a regular basis. It’s the manner in which the hitters that come after that delivered — three-run home run by Robbie Grossman, two-run shot from Brad Miller — that made for a happy start to the long, long season.
Now about Jacob deGrom…
The issue with the 34-year-old pitcher, for several seasons now, has been his health. It is his availability, never the quality of his pitches, that concerned the New York Mets enough that, even with the most free-spending owner in the game, they said goodbye to an icon whose starts at Citi Field were “events” as should be the case with any two-time Cy Young winner.
When Rangers owner Ray Davis stepped to the plate with his $185 million guarantee, critics thought the contract was for too long (five years), paying deGrom ace money at age 39. No one was shouting “But don’t you understand he’s finished!”
The six extra-base hits deGrom surrendered without finishing the fourth inning were a career high. A man who captured those NL Cy Young honors in 2018 and 2019 with earned run averages of 1.70 and 2.43 will briefly carry around a 12.27 ERA until he takes the mound next Wednesday. But when he’s striking out seven batters of the 11 outs he records before leaving, I don’t think anyone is overly worried.
At least not until it happens again.
Should someone have mentioned his 3.08 ERA in 11 starts last season was easily his highest since 2017? I don’t think so. Opponents hit .175 against him last year. He’s still Jacob deGrom and Globe Life Field, despite opening day results that suggest something else, will never be the hitter’s park and the pitcher’s nightmare that sat across the street.
For 2023, the important point in all of this is that not only can Texas still win on a day where the staff ace gets shelled, the carryover is insignificant. In the past, the Rangers were fortunate if they featured one truly elite level pitcher on their staff. And if Yu Darvish or Cliff Lee or Kenny Rogers or Kevin Brown (or anyone else who at least briefly earned that label) got beat up and left the game in the fourth inning, the strain on the bullpen with so much mid-level mediocrity in the rotation could be staggering.
That’s not to say the Rangers are fine if deGrom remains a punching bag, but we know that won’t happen. And now they follow him with Nathan Eovaldi, with Martin Perez, with Jon Gray, with Andrew Heaney. If this club can keep four of those pitchers healthy enough to make 25 starts apiece, then there’s enough organizational depth to make this a sufficient staff that competes in the West all season.
And while the bullpen lacks extensive experience in parts, it answered the call nicely in Game 1 when called upon far sooner than expected.
The real winners Thursday were the fans in the seats who saw big crooked numbers posted early including a 9-spot by the Rangers, 18 total runs scored, a victory and all in 3 hours, 4 minutes. That’s 33 minutes shorter than the last 11-7 game played at Globe Life, a loss to Toronto in September that went largely unnoticed outside of Canada.
The optimism of the Rangers in 2023 twins nicely with the pace of a game that has been revived by a clock that keeps both pitcher and hitter engaged, by rules that limit throws to first, by the elimination of extreme shifts, by a really sincere effort by MLB to rid the game of the drag that had plagued it for too long.
Baseball’s back and so are the Rangers. Now any time deGrom wants to join the fun, the Rangers are waiting.
Patiently. For now.
