Rangers hope good September boosts Mazara for 2020. He says foundation already in place
.JPG "Texas Rangers’ Nomar Mazara, right, celebrates his solo home run with teammate Isiah Kiner-Falefa in the seventh inning of Wednesday’s 7-3 win against the Toronto Blue Jays.")
A left-handed starting pitcher Tuesday night for the New York Yankees kept Nomar Mazara out of the Texas Rangers’ starting lineup.
The lefty hitter hasn’t had much success this season against the same side. That’s being kind.
But Mazara wouldn’t have played if a right-hander had been pitching. His left oblique started barking Monday afternoon during his first start off the 10-day injured list, and the soonest he will return to the lineup is Thursday at Baltimore.
“It’s still in there,” Mazara said before the Rangers’ 10-1 loss Tuesday. “I’m not going to be 100 percent.”
A setback would seem like the final nail in what looks like a disappointing season for Mazara, who struggled early and in July was told he was a candidate to be optioned to Triple A.
That’s not how he sees September.
Mazara said that he still has goals to reach and, more importantly, a swing to maintain. The Rangers want to see him do that, too.
“It is a big month. I don’t want to understate that,” manager Chris Woodward said. “He’s got to prove that he can be an everyday player. That doesn’t mean he has to have a monster month, but just the consistency of his swings, the pitch decisions, all those things that we’re asking him to be better at, and he has been better at them.”
Mazara doesn’t hide from his season, in which he again has fallen short of expectations. Nevertheless, a good September could give him the best season of his career.
He needs four homers to set a career-high (21) and four doubles for a career-high (31). His .268 average would a career-high, as would his .463 slugging percentage and .782 OPS.
“I still can get some stuff done,” Mazara said.
He is one of four lefty-hitting corner outfielders heading into the off-season, though Joey Gallo has played center field much of the season. Even with Shin-Soo Choo as the primary designated hitter, the Rangers will look to break the logjam.
They could do that by not tendering Mazara a 2020 contract, though general manager Jon Daniels said Mazara is not a candidate to be non-tendered. They could try to trade any of the group, though they might not get the value they believe Mazara commands.
So, September is an important month for him. If he shows that he has a grasp of “the process” the Rangers placed upon him this season, he might earn another opportunity to blossom into the player the Rangers believe he can be.
Mazara believes that he has grabbed hold of the swing changes and approach the hitting coaches wanted him to make. Much of the work took place after he was warned about a trip to Triple A.
That came in a July 16 meeting with Woodward, who told Mazara that he needed to upgrade how he prepares for games. Willie Calhoun was optioned to make room for Hunter Pence to come off the IL.
Over the next 24 games, Mazara batted .300 and slugged .575 before his oblique gave out.
“He was one of our best hitters,” Woodward said.
Mazara described a combination of swing tweaks, like opening his stance and eliminating unnecessary movements, to having a better understanding of how pitchers are attacking him. He said that the league changed its approach to the whole lineup, trying to take advantage of the hitters’ aggressiveness.
Pitchers stopped throwing fastballs in hitter’s counts, and the Rangers were hacking at off-speed pitches that either weren’t strikes or that couldn’t be driven.
“No, I’m trying to be calm and not have all crazy movement at the plate,” Mazara said. “I didn’t start the year the way I wanted to, but I took a lot of stuff from that.”
He struggled the first few weeks of the season and started chasing hits rather than trust his swing and what the hitting coaches were telling him. His average bottomed out at .188 on April 22 at Oakland, and he has hit .284 since.
While he was hot before being injured and seemed to have taken hold of the changes he was asked to make, he said that cage work during his rehab has helped him create better, lasting habits.
Mazara believes a foundation is in place for him to be more consistent and to take off in 2020.
“Before I got hurt, I think it was the most consistent I’ve been,” he said. “I don’t care about the results. I’m talking about the rhythm and how I feel at the plate. In the past I’ve felt really good and have gotten the results, but I don’t think I was as consistent as I’m feeling this year.”
This story was originally published September 3, 2019 at 5:07 PM.
