The Texas Rangers lost to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim Monday night 5-2. The Rangers scored their two runs on solo home runs. This is a sign of the offensive slide they’ve been on for over a month.
I saw the Rangers succeeding if they were able to get their ERA around 4.50. The offense seemed more than capable of scoring five runs a game, and an ERA that low would at least put them over .500 for the season. You can see that 4.50 line pretty clearly from May 16th onward. In games in which the Rangers scored 5 runs or more in that time, they’ve gone 14-2. Unfortunately, they’ve played 23 games in which they scored four runs or less, and in those games they are 19-4.
In those 39 games, the Rangers power was there as they team hit 48 home runs. That’s a healthy rate, 199 over a full season. The team, however, is producing a terrible .296 OBA. That combination resulted in 38 of the 48 home runs scoring just one run, 79%. The average AL team in that time hit 63% solo shots. The Rangers power and pitching is still good enough for them to win. They need to find more batters who can reach base and set up the power hitters, however.
Meanwhile the Angels won their sixth game in a row and 13 of their last 16 to extend their AL West lead to 2 1/2 games over Texas. They’ve scored 6.6 runs per game over their last 16 games.
Posted by David Pinto at 8:20 am | Team Evaluation | Permalink | No Comments
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