Texas Rangers outfielder Evan Carter explains his outlook at the start of spring training
Evan Carter’s rookie season was one of the most memorable in the history of the Texas Rangers franchise and culminated with a World Series title. However, his sophomore year was marred by injuries and inconsistent play.
Carter, speaking with the media earlier this week during spring training, explained what went wrong last season and his outlook ahead of the Rangers’ first spring training game on Friday against the Kansas City Royals.
Beginning in mid-April, the Tennessee native was limited by a lumbar sprain that landed him on the 60-day injured list and ended his 2024 season.
“The majority of the season that I got to play last year, I would say probably from middle to late April on, was just me and Donnie [Ecker] and Tim [Hyers] every single day in the cage saying here’s video from ‘23 why can’t we do this? I can’t do that, my body won’t let me do that, it was the most frustrating thing.” Carter said. “It was just not a good situation, so yeah I would say it was not good for a while and we were fighting that for a while so I’m happy to be back hopefully to how it was in ‘23.”
This wasn’t the first major back injury of Carter’s career. In 2021 he had a stress fracture while playing in the minor leagues, and remarked on the injuries’ similarity last season.
Despite remarking on how good he felt Carter said he couldn’t be sure if his back issues wouldn’t reemerge.
“I don’t necessarily have a 100% answer,” Carter said. “I know a normal person who’s not swinging a baseball bat trying to play baseball every day it would go into remission eventually so that’s the plan. I can’t tell you that it will, obviously, [baseball] is really stressful on your back but at the end of the day I feel confident that it’s gonna get managed.”
Last season Carter slashed .188 with five home runs and 15 RBIs in 45 games after batting .306 with five home runs and 12 RBIs in 23 games during his breakout 2023 season.
Injuries notwithstanding one area Carter knows he must improve is against left-handers who have given him trouble throughout his young career.
In 2023, Carter went hitless in 10 at-bats against left-handers with one walk and six strikeouts and didn’t fare much better last year batting .111 with three hits, two RBIs, one walk and 10 strikeouts.
Coming into this season despite the stats Carter says he’s confident he can be effective against left-handers.
“At the end of the day I’m confident and I know everybody’s else stats say a certain thing,” said Carter. “ I think that [spring training] is obviously a great time to get better. I’m not gonna sit here and tell you I’m just as good at hitting lefties as I am righties ‘cause obviously I’m not, but it’s a goal of mine and I’m a hard worker and at the end of the day I’m gonna figure it out.”
