Texas Rangers Have Run Quota to Meet if They Expect to Turn Season Around

WASHINGTON — Much has been made of the Texas Rangers’ scuffling offense and its inability to back up its exceptional pitching consistently.

Manager Bruce Bochy doesn’t need the reminder. Texas has done all it can to get the offense going short of pushing a button and blowing it up.

But games like Saturday’s 5-0 win over the Washington Nationals remind him of something else, something so frustratingly simple that it may end up defining whether Texas makes the playoffs or not.

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The Rangers are 23-4 this season when they score at least four runs in a game after Sunday's victory over the Washington Nationals. The only team with a better winning percentage in those games is the Detroit Tigers.

When the Rangers and Tigers matched up in mid-May in Detroit, the Rangers won two out of three. The wins were 10-3 and 6-1. The loss was 2-1 to perhaps the best pitcher in baseball, the Tigers’ Tarik Skubal.

With the Rangers’ starting pitching keeping Texas in practically every game this year, the four-run line is important to meet. Texas is scoring 3.34 runs per game, third worst in the Majors. That’s nearly a run down from last year’s 4.22. The offensive changes were supposed to boost run production, not lower it.

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Texas has won 10 of its last 12 games in which it has scored four or more runs. That run started on May 10 in Detroit. Since then, Texas is 13-14. The Rangers have scored 97 runs in those 27 games, an average of 3.6 runs per game.

But the breakdown from there is critical. In the 12 games with four or more runs the Rangers scored 75 runs, or 6.25 runs per game.

In the other games, Texas scored 22 runs, or 1.57 runs per game.

It’s an incredible differential. It means when the Rangers’ offense gets going, it really gets going. In those 12 games, Texas exactly four runs three times. The other nine games have been above that total.

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Marcus Semien has been a part of this recent surge, as his batting average is now over .200 and he’s been among the best sluggers in baseball the past week. Benching Adolis Garcia for the Cardinals series has paid some dividends. He has at least one hit in his five games this week, though he hasn’t hit a home run.

Bochy has committed to keeping the lineup more fluid, getting more days off for players that need it and trying new combinations to try and jolt the offense.

At some point, something must consistently take hold, or this incredible rotation will go to waste. It’s as simple as counting to four.

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