2024 Texas Rangers

Brewers force a game three while San Diego completes a sweep of a depleted Braves team. One more wild card game tonight in Milwaukee then on to divisional series.

HornHuskerDad said:
Not sure the Royals can beat the Yankees, but I'd love to see it happen.
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The Yankees sat at number two on my anyone but list at the beginning of these playoffs and have now been elevated to number one, so we can all be Royals these next couple of days.
 
Well my Astros did what they do quite well.......lose playoff games at home (as all Ranger fans remember quite well). I had made a comment earlier about Hinch getting revenge on Jim Crane and it came true. This year's team can be described in three ways: 1) A decimated starting rotation, but somehow they found their way through that, 2) a very bad clutch hitting team. their overall stats show well, but they rarely hit when they needed it and 3) an overpaid and under performing bullpen. Their pen cost them 15 games this year and of course were responsible for the Game 2 loss. With Hader, Pressley and Montero (released), they have about $50mm of invested salary in their bullpen. Dana Brown was nuts to sign Hader to a 5 year deal at $19.5mm per year.

This may have been the Astros final year to win the division championship as the team will certainly lose a few players, most notably Bregman. Breggie will be looking for a 5 year $30mm per year type contract and given the Astros will have $61mm/yr of dead money entering into the 2025, I doubt Crane will pony up the money necessary to sign him. Take away the $61mm (Jose Abreu, Lance McCullers, Rafael Montero and.........Zack Greinke) and it would be a different ballgame. Thank goodness Verlander did not vest in his option year and he can quietly go away and find another club to take on his injury prone career.

The Rangers will need to revamp their team and find some pitchers that will stay healthy. My big question about them is their hitting. Was 2023 an anomaly or did they simply all have bad years in 2024? Next year we will probably know.

Padres seem to be playing the best ball in the early playoffs and I can't see the Tigers or the Royals advancing. I'll pull for the Tribe in the AL as like most fans, I can't stand the Yankees. That said I'll go with the Pads in 6 games over the Indians (I refuse to call them the G's).
 
guy4321 said:
Do you like AJ for beating the Astros or hate AJ for making the Astros good in the first place?
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I have to admit absolute mixed feelings about AJ Hinch. He built the best team in baseball and did it the right way which I think all of us who are baseball fans can admire even if it isn't a team we cheer for.

But then once he built the best team in baseball he watched as cheating started and he actively knew cheating was happening. Now he told his players not to do it and actively did things to impede them from doing it but he didn't step up and actually prohibit it and put a stop to it. He knew it was still happening. So that has to go in the negative column.

But then he also became the fall guy when the players should have been the one taking the hit not him and for him (and the GM) to be the only guys fired/punished seemed incredibly not fair.

But then the last two days and over the course of this year he showed his managerial acumen by managing a team that had no expectations into making the playoffs, a truly incredible job, and then managed two great playoff games to win a WC series against a much better team.

Hinch really is someone that the ledger has marks on both sides so yeah I guess my feelings about Hinch are mixed but at least for today I love him for ending the 7 straight ALCS run of the 'Stros and for making sure that the last team in Texas to be in or win a WS remains the Rangers.
 
Hookem G said:
This may have been the Astros final year to win the division championship as the team will certainly lose a few players, most notably Bregman.
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I am not sure you lose Bregman. Altuve certainly was leading the calls for bringing him back. 5 years at 125M might do it which is same deal Altuve got and after the crap show that Boras had ast off season maybe Bregman gives Houston a slight hoem town discount. Your pitching will be significantly better next year and you still have Yordan who is just incredible, Tucker, and a future HOF'er in Altuve.

I would still make Houston the odds on favorite to win the AL west. I think it is clear that the Rangers will go as far as their hitting will take them next year and yeah we have to see if the real Texas offense was 2023 or 2024, and frankly it doesn't have to be 2023 it just needs to be closer to 2023 than it was to 2024 because the Rangers should be well set with pitching if they can bring back Eovaldi and Yates.
 
FWHORN said:
I am not sure you lose Bregman. Altuve certainly was leading the calls for bringing him back. 5 years at 125M might do it which is same deal Altuve got and after the crap show that Boras had ast off season maybe Bregman gives Houston a slight hoem town discount. Your pitching will be significantly better next year and you still have Yordan who is just incredible, Tucker, and a future HOF'er in Altuve.

I would still make Houston the odds on favorite to win the AL west. I think it is clear that the Rangers will go as far as their hitting will take them next year and yeah we have to see if the real Texas offense was 2023 or 2024, and frankly it doesn't have to be 2023 it just needs to be closer to 2023 than it was to 2024 because the Rangers should be well set with pitching if they can bring back Eovaldi and Yates.
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This morning there was lots of optimism that Bregman would be resigned. But Boras has a way of screwing things up, although given the disastrous signings of some of his clients this past year hopefully Bregman will be very diligent in how he proceeds. Would I like him back? Certainly, but he simply is not the player he was in 2018 and 2019. Horribly slow starter which means he is a liability for the first two months. Its hard to justify paying someone $25mm-$30mm and he provides no productivity for two months.

Who would you rather have Bregman or Tucker? I cannot see the Astros signing both. Here's one that may be surprising. The Astros should test the interest for Framber Valdez. He will be in his final arbitration year and I don't think he will ever get over his inability to handle the emotional swings of the game. When he is on he has Cy Young award potential, but he stumbles too often. If the Astros could move him for younger arms and/or a 1B who can actually hit that would be a plus.
 
Boras will stretch things out in an attempt to extract the last penny. Any team dealing with him has to assume the player will walk and work from there.
 
The Mets get a ninth-inning rally and beat Milwaukee to crush another small market team's dream in the last WC series.

The division series are set to start tomorrow and there are certainly some interesting matchups. I still see the Dodgers and Phillies advancing but San Diego is a real threat and the Dodger pitching is so questionable if I was actually putting money on this I might lean Padres. The Mets are living on borrowed time but there is a certain something about them that makes them a team to watch. I will be rooting for KC and Detroit in the AL, but I think the Yankees and Guardians advance. Detroit has Skubal and a lot of chaos for pitching and not much else. Meanwhile, KC has Ragans and Lugo to pitch but no offense and I do not see them holding down the Yankees offense like they did the Orioles. So I am picking the four teams with home-field advantage which means I will get at least two and probably three of these wrong just like the wild card so put your bets on Detroit, KC, NYM, and San Diego.
 
Cleveland won 4 of the last 5 against Detroit if that means anything. Detroit has two SP's and a very complementary BP. A toss up.

The Yankees won 5 out of 7 against KC so they should win. However at times during the season, the Yankees went dead.

In September the Mets actually beat the Phillies in 4 out of 7. Philidelphia should win, but after watching the Mets in the WC series, I would not count them out.

Dodgers had a 5-8 record against the Pods in 2025 but won 2 of 3 in September. Another tos -up.
 
A lot of evaluation coming up for Young, other
Rangers decision makers, with Bochy input.

Unfortunately, several big names that I love will not return due to status and big $ demands. Sad Eovaldi will go away...

My hope is Mahle, DeGrom, Gray, Bradford and Leiter can form a formidable starting bunch in 2025.
 
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