The Rangers are the lead story around here

Texas continues to send a message that the fade isn't happening

Baseball is back around here. There is absolutely no doubt.

Last night, the Rangers played their 120th game of 2023 and won their 72nd game of the campaign. The Rangers are 72-48 with 42 games to go. That keeps them comfortably on a 97-win pace, roughly where they have been for a great deal of this unexpected season.

Their record after 120 games in 2022 was 54-66 and was considerably worse down the stretch as Texas limped to 68-94 final record. Now, 68 wins was a step forward from the 60-102 record in 2021, but it also represented a sixth consecutive year of losing baseball. More importantly, the sixth consecutive year that most of Dallas-Fort Worth forgot the Rangers existed.

The Rangers television situation was (and still is) shambolic, and they seemed to barely have any public profile. That is an amazingly difficult thing to achieve after opening a brand new stadium that is air conditioned in one of the hottest climates in MLB.

The Rangers made it possible for fans to bring sweatshirts to baseball games in August in Arlington, but the baseball itself was so bad it wasn’t even worth the trip.

It’s sadly impressive what the Rangers were able to “achieve.”

Baseball has been historically relevant here. Remember the glory days between 2010 and 2016, where over the course of seven seasons the franchise won 90-plus games and reached the playoffs five times. Add in two American League pennants (2010 and 2011) and the closest of calls to winning the 2011 World Series — which is still uncomfortable to think about.

Texas averaged 89 wins during that seven-year era of good times, easily out-performing their Arlington neighbors, the Dallas Cowboys, who only made the playoffs twice.

We had legitimate “baseball town vs. football town,” debates, and even imagined a world where Cowboys training camp didn’t completely drown out the Rangers playoff push each summer.

In chasing the playoffs and the World Series, the cycle ran its course and the Rangers roster and farm system needed a complete re-set, starting with Yu Darvish getting moved at the trade deadline in 2017.

For many of us, that signified the end of the road. Others already knew that road had ended in 2016, and we all watched the Houston Astros ascend as the divisional, and league, power while Texas laid dormant.

The five full non-COVID seasons from 2017-2022 yielded five Astros division titles, four AL pennants, two World Series championships, and one well-documented scandal that certainly tainted things a bit (but not enough to change the history books). By my definition, the Astros are one trophy from a fully-defined dynasty, one of the rarest honors in any of our sports today. Houston has become the gold standard in this sport, whether we like it or not.

You may recall that Houston was awful when Texas was contending (from 2010-16, Houston averaged 68 wins per year and were never a factor) and Texas was awful these last six years as Houston has destroyed everything in their path.

That’s why nobody can handle what is happening in 2023.

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When Texas signed Jacob deGrom last winter, they were still a curious story on the baseball map that appeared to have money to burn and a determined owner in Ray Davis that had claimed last August that he was tired of losing:

“The bottom line is we're not good and we haven't been good for six years.”

No argument was heard from anyone.

The question was what he planned to do about it. When the Rangers built a new stadium with the help of $500 million from Arlington’s citizens, many of us bristled at where the Rangers stood in terms of a payroll. That lack of ownership conviction seemed to put the win total where it was. And those of us who still cared could barely find a single player, after Adrian Beltre retired, that appeared to be worthy of purchasing a jersey.

Were Joey Gallo or Ronald Guzman or Nomar Mazara the piece to build around? Surely, Rougned Odor was here for the long haul (I mean, after all, he did punch Jose Bautista once!), but what else? And can Willie Calhoun ever figure it out here? I remember really over-investing hope in Nick Solak as we watched baseball in a new stadium that sat empty because of COVID in 2020.

It was no way to open a new stadium, but somehow it fit the narrative perfectly. It was a brand new stadium that signified almost nothing. The payroll dropped below 20th in 2021 and they fittingly won 60 games. The Rangers were a big market team playing small-market, irrelevant baseball.

I know the timeline is a bit jumbled with Davis’ public acknowledgements happening after the winter of 2021 signings, but look what happens when a billionaire gets sick of losing and tired of waiting for the farm system:

• Corey Seager: 10 years for $325 million

• Marcus Semien: 7 years for $175 million

• Jon Gray: 4 years for $56 million

• Jacob DeGrom: 5 years for $185 million

• Nathan Eovaldi: 2 years for $34 million

• Andrew Heaney: 2 years for $25 million

• Trade for Aroldis Chapman

• Trade for Max Scherzer

There is plenty more to this story in 2023 than these eight names, of course. Chris Young and Bruce Bochy are up that list and we better not forget about Jon Daniels putting a lot of this roster together when he stole All-Stars Adolis Garcia and Jonah Heim, for instance. But, yeah, when you sign six free agents for $800 million over the course of 13 months or so, you send a message that you have some significant intent moving forward. That message is heard by guys like Scherzer that are happy to green light a belief in joining you for the remainder of his deal.

My general theme for Rangers baseball over this trip through the wilderness is that the onus was on them to “make us care about them again” and they have absolutely done their part.

Not only is it a winning side, but it is compelling and believable in the quality and personality. The Rangers look like a team that can both win big and soon.

It’s not fair to declare this is the year they overtake Houston. Odds still suggest that the Astros are the heavyweight champions for a reason and Texas is an upstart still trying to get its footing.

But, the Rangers absolutely have the Astros attention. We have been doing this dance since mid-May as t-shirt wearing Houston folks have constantly predicted a Rangers collapse. Just wait until this next week or wait until Altuve or Alvarez comes back or when deGrom went down or when they meet up or when Verlander was brought back.

The false alarms from insecure neighbors to the south have been heard daily since before it got hot around here. For a team that has won so much, that Astros fanbase always kind of seems on the brink of a meltdown. Apparently winning for six years doesn’t improve your calmness.

And yet, the Rangers still sit in first. And whether it is admitted down I-45 or not, the Rangers have Houston watching the scores every night. And isn’t that a delightful change?

They have weathered so many storms and yet there are 42 games to go. And then, we might remind ourselves, the real season begins. It seems safe now to predict that the Rangers will be part of October for the first time since 2016, which is an amazing success in 2023 when we review where this thing was at back in Spring Training. The win total line in Vegas was 82.5 and any factoring in the wild card race would be labeled as an amazing step forward.

Yet, it now seems like a good time to reset those sights.

With Scherzer and Chapman and Jordan Montgomery, the roster isn’t one pitcher short anymore. They look like like contenders. It all may depend on the speedy returns of Eovaldi and the wonderful rookie third baseman Josh Jung, but if you squint, you can see a team that is ready to win bigger than first thought.

Can they win the division? Who can say?

Can they make a dent in the postseason? Don’t know.

But, is there a scenario where Max Scherzer starts a huge playoff game in Arlington this year and gives way to Aroldis Chapman for a save to eliminate a hated rival? Maybe someone like Corey Seager carries the team through a playoff round?

Indeed, there is. And that all seems difficult to believe. At least it did in March.

All I can say is this. The Rangers have made us care again. They have made us see that football season approaches, but that doesn’t mean that it can’t wait a bit.

Credit to the ownership (I almost never say nice things about owners, so let the record show I started with him and his $800 million), management, and the players for making us want to find ways to watch this team. The TV Deal still stinks, but when you put out a product that plays .600 baseball, we will figure out ways to watch.

They are the lead story here in DFW and are a doggone fun team to watch right now.