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Computers (Still) Don’t Like The Rangers

Listen, I like projections. I like playoff odds. I like what computers have to say, because computers are the closest we can get to objective truth in baseball. There, I’m guilty.

The fact is that computers haven’t been impressed by the Rangers over the last couple of years. They still are not impressed. 

Before the year I wrote that FanGraphs and PECOTA projected the Rangers at 81-81 and 80-82, respectively, and a 3rd place finish in the American League West. At the moment Texas is 12-10, and both sites now project a 79-83 final record.

I know, let’s all cry foul at the bias. Clearly these emotionless statistical machines are against us. Right?

Probably not. PECOTA and FanGraphs both predict, as of April 29th, the Mariners to win the AL West, but only at 84 and 82 wins, respectively. That’s either 5 games better than the Rangers or just 3, a meaningless difference with 140 games left to play. 

It’s also to say Texas hasn’t exactly set the world on fire to open the year. Out of 15 American League teams, the Rangers rank 14th in strikeout rate (18.3%), 12th in walk rate (9.2%), and 13th in HR/FB rate (15.7%). That’s the formula for Fielder Independent Pitching (FIP) — the three things pitchers can control — and Texas has suffered in every category.

Fortunately, the Rangers team ERA is only 3.75, which ranks in the middle of the pack. As always, we can look at such good fortune in two ways: Either expect them to fall off a cliff at some point, performing closer to the projections (4.51 xFIP), or take it as banked production and move on. Texas pitchers have combined for -0.3 fWAR on the season, the worst mark in the AL.

The offense, meanwhile, has been a little better. They rank 11th in walk rate (7.4%), 8th in strikeout rate (20.7%) and next to last with 18 HRs. As a team they are slashing .250/.313/.385, and their 90 wRC+ is tied for 12th in the league with the White Sox. 

I think I need to change the thesis of this article to How The Hell Are The Rangers Above .500 Right Now.

In spite of the poor rankings on both sides of the ball, Texas ranks 4th in the AL in runs scored (95) and 8th in runs allowed (86). Their +9 run differential is 5th-best in the league, behind Chicago (+21), Baltimore (+20), Seattle (+17) and Boston (+11). Oh and did I tell you there are 140 games left in the regular season?

Intuitively, Rangers fans have good reason to like their club’s chances this year. Houston, the presumed biggest threat to Texas’s odds of winning the West, has spotted the Rangers a five-game advantage through 22 contests. With Yu Darvish’s return looming over the next 3-4 weeks, conflated by an offense that hasn’t yet fully clicked, Texas is a while away from reaching its ceiling. 

Computers don’t possess that intuition, or those feelings. Right now they see a team who has overachieved to this point, and overachieved they have. The fact is, over the course of a season the Rangers won’t be able to win consistently with the rates they’ve generated thus far. They have to improve. 

It seems like FanGraphs has generally slanted against the Rangers and for the Mariners, which kind of makes sense since Dave Cameron and Jeff Sullivan came from the U.S.S. Mariner. (Sullivan, for what it’s worth, is great.) But PECOTA says the same thing as FanGraphs, because the lukewarm data hasn’t changed. 

The Rangers Are 13-10

Ladies and gentlemen, your first place Texas Rangers.

  • Colby Lewis started today’s series opener against the Angels, and it was a very Colby Lewis start. He gave up a solo home run to Geovany Soto in the 3rd, gave up another run in the 4th on a Soto RBI single, but limited the damage to that. He finished 7 innings on only 80 pitches, and while he didn’t walk anyone, he also didn’t notch a single strikeout. Like I said, it was a very Colby Lewis start.
     
  • Ryan Rua started the Texas scoring in the bottom of the 5th inning with a solo home run that left the bat at 110 mph. I’ve been saying for awhile that when I watched Rua take batting practice in San Antonio that his contact sounded different than anyone else the Rangers had there. Now I know why.
     
  • The big blows came in the bottom of the 6th inning. Rougned Odor drew a leadoff walk, and Nomar Mazara singled. With men on first and second, Adrian Beltre grounded into a double play. With Prince Fielder due up in a two-out, man on third situation, it seemed that the inning was likely over, as I posited on Twitter than the Angels should simply go after Fielder. So what did Prince do? Singled to right field, plating Odor and tying the game at 2-2.
     
  • The scoring wasn’t done, though. Ian Desmond doubled to left field, and Prince Fielder somehow managed to gas his way from first to home, and Desmond got to third. Mitch Moreland singled to right field, scoring Desmond, and giving us our final margin of 4-2.
     
  • It was interesting that Fielder and Moreland were two of the key hitters in the inning. Against the lefty, I had both pegged to struggle tonight, but they came through in big spots. I’ve been critical of both, but it’s important to give credit where it’s due. Great job, guys.
     
  • Heading into the top of the 8th inning, and with Colby only at 80 pitches, I was surprised to see Jeff Banister go with Sam Dyson. I didn’t have a problem with it, it just surprised me. However, on second glance, the Angels had the heart of their lineup coming up, and Dyson has been the team’s best reliever.
     
  • Dyson came in, and other than a Mike Trout double, worked a clean 8th inning. Shawn Tolleson came in and induced a ground-out and two strikeouts in the 9th inning to preserve the victory.
     
  • They’ll do it all over again tomorrow at 7:05 PM with Derek Holland on the mound.

The Rangers Are 12-10

A series win against the Yankees. We’ll all take that, yes?

  • Martin Perez started today’s game, and in the first inning, showed flashes of the pitcher we’ve all been hoping to see. He attacked the zone, throwing 12 of 15 pitches for strikes. He struck out all three hitters he faced, and it looked like we might see a different Perez tonight.
     
  • Perez then came out for the top of the 2nd and promptly walked two hitters and giving up a run on a Starlin Castro single. He ended up going 6 innings, giving up 2 earned runs on 86 pitches, so it was overall a good effort. And yet, those first two innings were a microcosm of what Perez often does. He’ll seem dominant one moment, then very on-edge the next.
     
  • There weren’t many hits to be had today, but the big one came from the bat of Elvis Andrus. An RBI triple in the bottom of the 6th inning gave the Rangers the lead for good.
     
  • The bullpen did a solid job in its three innings of work. Jake Diekman work both the 7th and 8th innings, doing so without allowing a base runner, and Shawn Tolleson worked the 9th inning, managing to work around a hit to close out the 3-2 Texas victory.
     
  • Off day tomorrow before the Rangers welcome the Angels to Arlington.

Ian Desmond and The Pillow Contract

I wasn’t crazy-thrilled on February 28th when the Rangers signed Ian Desmond to play left field. The investment was minor, just one year and $8 million, but it also caused Texas to forfeit a first round pick to Washington as compensation.

The draft pick is how Desmond, who slashed .275/.326/.462 (116 wRC+) and was worth +13.4 fWAR from 2012-2014, ended up unsigned for so long. Since the Nationals tendered Ian a qualifying offer — on the heels of a disappointing .233/.290/.384 (83 wRC+) 2015 campaign — it meant whatever team that signed him had to surrender its first pick in the upcoming amateur draft.

I assume most of you understand the way this process works. And how, in cases like Ian Desmond’s, the player can really get screwed. Because acquiring talent is so hard in 2016, particularly due to international spending caps and penalties, the slot values of higher draft picks mean more free revenue for the individual club. Basically, draft picks have never been worth more, so teams would rather not give them away for anything less than an impact player.

Ian Desmond didn’t qualify as one of those. So it was easy to feel underwhelmed when Texas picked him up. Especially confronted by the fact he was coming off a down year, and that he was about to play in a new league, in a new ballpark, playing an entirely new position. What could possibly go wrong.

Then something funny happened. Desmond played in his first 14 baseball games for the Rangers, and totally sucked. Through 50 plate appearance he was hitting .109/.180/.109 (good for a -30 wRC+) with zero extra-base hits and a 4/15 BB/K ratio. Ian was quickly turning into the early-season scapegoat for why the offense was struggling so much, even at a time when more critical hitters like Rougned Odor, Prince Fielder and Mitch Moreland started slowly out of the gate.

There I was, a fan neither of the signing nor the player, feeling frustrated at some of the unreasonably immediate backlash I was reading against the new guy. It wasn’t fair. That’s when I decided to go against the grain and do something radical: Actually cheer for him. 

Above all, I submit the Rangers know more than I do. So if they thought it would be wise to pay Desmond $8 million and give up a draft pick — which they are historically stingy at — then why not trust their judgement further than 14 games? I gave in.

Let’s not forget, Ian isn’t simply a piece to help the Rangers win in 2016. He has a ton at stake this year, personally. A few years ago as one of the top shortstops in baseball, Desmond probably envisioned signing something in the neighborhood of $100 million once his free agency came up. His stock fell so low after 2015 that he ended up on Texas’s lap for just one year and seven figures.

Different players, sure, but something similar happened to Adrian Beltre in 2010. After a disappointing five-year stint with the Mariners, Adrian signed a one-year, $9 million “pillow” contract with Boston to reestablish his market for a bigger contract in the future. Like Desmond is now, Beltre was 30 at the time. 

No longer a shortstop, Ian is now playing on his own pillow contract. And in spite of his slow start, he has lately been out proving why the Rangers wanted him. Over his last 7 games he’s slashing .400/.516/.840 (277 wRC+) with 3 HRs, 2 2B’s and a strong 6/4 BB/K ratio — he’s now up to .211/.309/.366 (88 wRC+) on the season. Oh, how we do love the small samples.

My own intuition has yet to become a viable Sabermetric, but as a general rule I don’t like to bet against players who are in a free agency year. That argument can be thrown in my face vis a vis Ian Desmond, himself, who was godawful last year heading into free agency. But he can’t escape that he is one big year away from a significant contract, and another down year from being paid like a platoon player.

Smart baseball writers have always told me there is no such thing as a bad one-year deal. Rangers fans might counter with Roy Oswalt and Lance Berkman as examples to the contrary, but even then there wasn’t a Fielder-esque trail of seasons to go from there. They played, they were bad, and the Rangers moved on. 

I’m confident Ian Desmond will only play one year with the Rangers, but that’s less to do with the (high) hopes I have for him in the lineup, and more to do with the fact that Texas just has too many outfielders coming up from the minor leagues. He will play, and the Rangers will move on.

But what happens in the meantime remains important to both parties. Depending how Prince recovers from his awful start, and if Nomar Mazara continues being strong out of the 2-hole, Ian Desmond has a chance of being one of the 3- or 4-best hitters in Texas’s lineup in 2016. That’s not something I would have bet on when he signed with the Rangers, and certainly not after his abnormally slow start.

The Rangers Are 11-10

Back above .500, and in grand fashion.

  • A.J. Griffin got the start tonight, and went 8 strong innings. He struck out 5 and walked 1 while giving up only a single run. That run could just as easily have been classified as unearned after Elvis Andrus failed to make a play on a sharp grounder by Mark Teixeira. All in all, fantastic start by Griffin, who earned a game score of 74. Great job, A.J.
     
  • The offense, after scoring 5 runs in the previous four games, erupted tonight, putting up 10 runs. Elvis Andrus had himself a 3-hit night. Nomar Mazara, Ian Desmond, and Mitch Moreland each had 2-hit nights. All in all, it was a fun night to watch the Rangers.
     
  • Interesting situation in the bottom of the 3rd inning that ended up leading to the big 5-run inning. With 2 outs in the inning, Mazara and Beltre had back-to-back hits, putting them on second and third base. With first base open, Joe Girardi elected to intentionally walk Prince Fielder. Fielder, of course, has been among the worst hitters in baseball this season, and his RE24 — a run expectancy stat that looks at expected runs versus actual and accumulates throughout the season — was -4.33. Ian Desmond came up next and drew an unintentional walk, then Mitch Moreland and Elvis Andrus followed with RBI hits of their own.
     
  • Between the 5th and 8th innings, the Rangers put up another run in each inning, capped by Rougned Odor hitting a solo home run in the bottom of the 8th.
     
  • Tony Barnette came in for the 9th inning and finished off the 10-1 victory, the largest scoring output of the season for Texas. They’ll go for the series win tomorrow evening with Martin Perez on the mound against the Yankees and C.C. Sabathia.