Rangers Pitcher of the Year vote down to Minor or Lynn. Who should win the award?
A few football thoughts from the weekend from a baseball writer:
Good for Shane Buechele, the son of former Rangers third baseman Steve Buechele, for leading SMU to an upset of No. 25 TCU on Saturday.
Despite all of the Horned Frogs’ early woes on offense, shouldn’t a home team win when it scores 38 points, especially when Gary Patterson is in charge of the defense?
To TCU offensive coordinator Sonny Cumbie, let me know if you need Mike Schultz’s phone number. He has plenty of experience dealing with what you dealt with after the game.
Question: Is it time for Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to pay Dak Prescott? It sure seems that way through three games.
As for the Texas Rangers, Sunday was a good day -- their first in a long time.
Here’s some Rangers Reaction from an 8-3 victory over the Oakland A’s.
Lynn or Minor?
The local chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America, with contributions from select others, votes each season for the Rangers’ awards — Player of the Year, Pitcher of the Year, Rookie of the Year, Good Guy and Richard Durrett Hardest Working.
Player of the Year isn’t clear cut, with only a handful of candidates. Pitcher of Year isn’t clear cut either, because Mike Minor and Lance Lynn have been so good.
Minor started faster, earning an All-Star selection. Lynn was considered as a replacement, but he declined as the scheduled starter of the first game of the second half.
Minor has faded the past few starts. Lynn, who struck out 12 on Sunday, is finishing with a flourish.
Minor has a better ERA. Lynn has more strikeouts.
Lynn has been more consistent. Minor has had more dominant performances.
Maybe they share the award. Maybe one is the Player of the Year and one is the Pitcher of the Year.
It’s a tough call.
Still a good thing
Manager Chris Woodward was really looking forward to the Rangers’ stretch of 17 games against playoff contenders to close the season. The Rangers are 3-8 so far.
Weeeee!
Woodward, though, contends that he is still glad the schedule is ending the way it is. In the most difficult month of the regular-season to evaluate talent, the Rangers are seeing the best their from their foes and getting a more accurate gauge of what young hitters and pitchers might be facing next season.
“I don’t think anybody likes getting their butts kicked,” Woodward said. “I don’t want to lose seven in a row. You think it’s an ego thing that I want to end up with a better record than not? I’d rather have the best competition in the world. If we were playing the lesser teams, yeah, we may win games and it may look better at the end of the year. But am I really evaluating my players based on who I can trust?”
Woodward can trust left-hander Kolby Allard, catcher Jose Trevino, infielder Nick Solak and right-hander Emmanuel Clase. There’s no guarantee they are on the 2020 Opening Day roster, especially Solak based on roster composition, but they have made very strong cases.
Rookies aren’t the only ones being watched. These are critical games for Rougned Odor, Nomar Mazara, Ronald Guzman and Delino DeShields, too.
“We may get our butts kicked, but it’s worth it in the end, as far as our development and our messaging,” Woodward said. “I can learn so much more about our players having this, rather than the other way around, even though I don’t like losing.”
20 times 4?
Speaking of Mazara, he homered Sunday and is one home run away from a curious start to his career.
One more home in one of the Rangers’ final six games will give him 20. He hit 20 home runs as a rookie in 2016, as a second-year players in 2017, and again in 2018.
In fairness, he was tracking toward a bigger 2018 season before a thumb injury derailed him at the All-Star break. He is having his best season, at least in terms of OPS (.779).
But he is still rated as a disappointment by the Rangers, who expected much more from him this season. They spoke about sending him to the minors in July and told him during a heart-to-heart that he needed to improve more than he has this season.
Mazara has taken the words to heart, working more closely with the hitting coaches on his mechanics and diving deeper into analytics.
He remains a trade candidate this off-season, with the Rangers needed to clear out one of their lefty-hitting corner outfielders. But the Rangers are still intrigued by Mazara’s potential.
What the do with Mazara is a key off-season story line.
This story was originally published September 22, 2019 at 7:19 PM.
