Ahead of key spring, Rougned Odor trained in Miami. Are Texas Rangers OK with that?
Editor’s note: The first in a position-by-position look at the Texas Rangers as they move closer to spring training.
The health of Corey Kluber and Joey Gallo will stand as two of the central questions for Texas Rangers spring training later this month, as well as for the success the team will have in 2020.
Gallo missed more games than he played last season, but was still an All-Star. Kluber is a two-time Cy Young winner who made only seven starts in 2019 because of two injuries.
Another key for the Rangers is the same as the past few seasons, and it involves the most polarizing member of the team.
The book is still out on Rougned Odor and if the second baseman will ever be the player he was in 2016, of if the past three seasons — an average in the low-.200s, lots of strikeouts, all-or-nothing results — is who he is as a hitter.
Their hope is that they are on the verge of unearthing the 2016 Odor, who played his way into a six-year, $49.5 million contract extension.
That hope is based on conversations with Odor, and buoyed by differences the coaches say they saw from him in the cage and at the plate late seasons. He was starting to understand information that could help him.
That was back in September, an impressive month but always a tricky time to evaluate a player. It was also four months and a thousand miles ago.
The miles aren’t insignificant.
Odor, on the cusp of what could be a make-or-break season, chose to do his off-season training in Miami. Rangers personnel has had to come to him for winter checkups, and he was not a participant at the off-season mini-camp last month.
That feels ... wrong. Right?
Those who matter, general manager Jon Daniels and manager Chris Woodward, say it isn’t a big deal that their biggest problem is out of sight. Odor, they said, is working the same facility where Miguel Cabrera, Salvador Perez and J.D. Martinez have worked in the past.
Jose Vazquez, the Rangers’ strength and conditioning coach, and Callix Crabbe, the assistant hitting coach, have traveled to Miami to check in with Odor at Bommarito Performance. They have returned with positive feedback.
Everyone is on the same page, even the famed trainer who doesn’t work for the organization but is training the organization’s biggest lineup headache.
That’s the evidence at hand, in addition to frank conversations the Rangers had last season with Odor. They told him he needs to earn his job this spring after a season in which he hit 30 home runs but batted only .205 and was a -0.3 WAR player.
If he doesn’t improve he might not be just a second baseman anymore. The Rangers could turn to Matt Duffy to play second regularly or possibly Isiah-Kiner Falefa or Nick Solak, and Odor would become more of a utility player.
For his part, Odor has told key club officials that his performance had been weighing on him heavily. He was embarrassed. Daniels disclosed that Jan. 25 during a Q&A session during the Comerica Peek at the Park.
Maybe what the Rangers were offering locally wasn’t working for Odor.
Maybe he hit rock bottom last season.
Maybe that’s what it will take for him to listen to the Rangers as they hope he can be the player he was in 2016.
But maybe it would have been nice for them to see his progress for themselves this off-season.
