Finding Justification

   Lets take another crack at this.  In the last 72 hours, the Rangers have let Michael Young go, Zach Greinke sign with the LA Dodgers, and James Shields be traded to the Royals.  This is a pretty big blow to the organization but I don't feel as though it's time to jump off the ship.  I feel like writing a little on Mike and how much and how little impact he had on this decision.

 

   Michael Young.  Mr. Ranger.  Face.  Man this guy has been around for a while.  12 seasons of being a full time player.  I really do love this guy.  Everyone does.  I have not spoke of him recently in the most favorable light as of late, but it sucks that he is gone.  I kinda wanted to maybe try and get back in the swing of writing a small blog, but mainly I wanted to evaluate my feelings on Mike being gone.  Well, here it goes. 

 

   The first contributing factor to Michael Young moving to the northeastHe started at second, moved to short a few years later (where he won a gold glove), was told to play third, then to round it all out, was told to play everything in the infield just about.  His career numbers are not something to blow off.  He has been an everyday player his whole career, a .301 batting average, and an 8 time All Star...aside from owning almost every non-pitching record for the Rangers organization.  But his career numbers couldn't save Mike from what this has come to.  This last year for him was pretty awful.  I think that I heard several times that he was the worst DH in several years.  But the problem was he wasn't a true DH, he was used from first to third, at an overly consistent rate.  Michael's glove was pretty bad.  What was worse is that the players he was replacing were known for having exceptional gloves.  Nothing made me more irate than seeing Michael play 3rd for Beltre for 25 games...I guess he was giving Beltre a little rest, but it drove me crazy seeing Mike make awful misses while out 4 time gold glove (2 in the last 2 years for the Rangers) sit on the bench.  We'll leave it at that. 

 

   The second piece of Michael's game that has caused this change was his hitting.  His bat was equally atrocious.  The reoccurring theme that I remember for Mike at the plate was that he could hardly hit the ball out of the infield.  His batting average was a modest .277, but his slugging % (a stat that is figured by the total bases (single = 1, double = 2, ect.) and dividing it by total at bats) was more revealing.  Slugging, or SLG, is a way to try to see productivity of a batter, higher means they were hitting the ball well enough to reach more bases, such as doubles to home runs.  Young's slugging was .370, showing that he was not getting many extra base hits when he was making contact with the ball.  He walked only 33 times, 3/4's of what his career walk average has been.  Thus contributing to his lowest On Base Percentage in ten years.  One over-arching stat that many rely on for a quick evaluation is WAR.  WAR is short for Wins Above Replacement.  It is a quick figure that says how good a player's performance is compared to the average replacement player.  Meaning if a player for instance has a 10.7 WAR, such as Mike Trout's phenomenal year, Trout is considered to be responsible for 10.7 of the Angels total wins for 2012.  Michael Young touted a miserable -2.4, essentially saying he was single handedly responsible for a total of 2.4 losses.  It wasn't a few bad games that Young had that accumulated this stat, it was his entire season.  Take it or leave it for what it is, but with the logic of Michael was responsible for 2.4 losses, replacing him would have netted us that many wins, which would have been enough to overcome the A's and win the division...at least securing us a best of 5 playoff instead of  the one and done.  There are more stats that show how Michael's performance at the plate was lacking, but most I don't fully understand enough to explain in this blog or even explain to myself. 

 

   So on to the third, and probably biggest reason Mike's going to be a Phillie in 2013, Ron Washington.  I love Wash.  I think he's a great motivator, a good inspiration to the players, and is very stubborn.  I don't always agree with his decision, but he gets the players to go all out for him.  They back him fully.  And Ron does the same for them.  This is great, but how does it lead to Young getting a one way ticket to Pitt?  Ron was fiercely loyal to making sure Michael Young got plate appearances, and play in the field as much as possible.  Michael's primary position was as the designated hitter, making 72 starts.  But he did play more games in the infield, non battery (pitcher and catcher), positions.  There is no way Wash wasn't aware of Mike's plate production and fielding.  But Washington always said he would stick by Michael Young, no matter what.  At one point he made the allegory that if Michael Young was a sinking ship, he was going down with him.  Man...that's extremely admirable, but hard to argue that it's the right move.  I believe it had something to do with when Ron came out and admitted testing positive for cocaine a few years ago, Michael Young was the first to step forward in support for Washington.  That's great...it really is, but there has to come a point where you have to set aside your feelings and emotions and act objectively.  It was painful when realized Michael Young wasn't stepping out of this slump, and was regularly starting in the field.  But I sincerely believe Michael Young could have had a .240 batting average, and would still play just as much as he did.  I'm sure Wash was given more than one stern talking to by people of various levels above him about handling the Young situation.  Like I said before, it's admirable how Wash felt towards Michael...but what's always right isn't always right.

 

   I guess I kinda used this as means to make the fact of Michael Young no longer being a Ranger a little easier to swallow, but it hasn't really.  If you have entered into discussions about Michael Young's performance as a Ranger these past few months, I would have staunchly argued that he was better not being a Ranger, than being one.  I still believe this is true, but the guy was the team when there was no hope for the organization.  One thing I purposely left out because I don't think it deserves the attention it has gotten was Young's $16 million salary.  Yes, it is excessive for someone who has put up the productive career numbers that he has, but being the pure leader of the team for years and being fairly productive for most of his career earned him that.  Therefore, I believe it didn't have as much to lead to this decision.  It sucks that he wont remain a Ranger until he retires.  But it really comes down to are you more of a Michael Young fan or a Ranger fan, and I go with the latter and believe it was the right decision.

The Ugly, The Bad, and The Good 4/12/12

Sorry if this entry seems kinda thrown together.  I'm trying to bang this out between jobs.  My goal for the first 10 or so entries is to try to put one out a day in order to get a feel for what I like as far as format and such.  With this specific entry I am going to outline 3 aspects of the Rangers as The Ugly, The Bad, and The Good.  (And I just noticed that Jayson Stark has a similar series of blogs...but he sucks and is a Phillies fan so who cares).  I think this will be a theme I bring back when I feel fit, and I feel it fit to fire the first one up.

The Ugly- Joe Nathan.  No two ways about it.  Nathan came into last night's game with a two run lead.  There will be loses (I refuse to say "You can't win 'em all" seriously), I understand that.  But the problem I have is that Nathan was one of the best closers in the league up until last year, out thrown by Rivera and very few others.  It seems weird that the Ranger's closer has more losses than all of the starters combined. Now I understand that we are a whole week into the season, but he has both losses.  He has lost 2 out of his 3 appearances this year.  Now, do I believe we need to jump ship, move him to middle relief, and move Adams to closer?  Not exactly yet.  He might just need to get back that feel for the ball, and it may take just a little more time.  Wash might need to monitor Nathan more closely in games in which he pitched the night before.  They're paying this guy $14 mil to do a job, and Wash is not one to normally make brash decisions.  I say that, but a switch of Nathan and Adams at this time in the season would be about a few weeks earlier (I could be a little off) than two years ago when the Ranger's did the same thing with Frank Francisco and Neftali Feliz.  I say sit the guy tonight, and possibly tomorrow against the Twins, then see what he's got.  Showing faith with give Nathan confidence, and that may be all he needs to get everything back together.

The Bad- Ranger's Run Manufacturing Abilities.  Ok, well its not really that bad, but just something I've noticed.  As of today the Rangers have 11 homers scoring a combined 18 runs.  The reason why I am bringing this up is because the team is going on the road now and one of their stops is The Motor City.  It is known as one of the most hitter-unfriendly parks.  I would like to see more ropes to left, and bloops for base hits.  It will show that they Rangers can move around the bases and get runs from something else besides the long ball.  One stat that I think shows how they have not been getting on base and getting a good amount of runs in is stolen bases.  They are at 3.  This team has the speed, or at least they did last year.  The weird thing is it took them 6 games to get a stolen base, which happened last night.  The crazy part is it was done by their catcher.  Mind you there were 2 more steals today, so that is going in the right direction.  But it seems like this team is becoming the team of the 90's, but with pitching.  Now, I am not trying to complain and say stop hitting homeruns, I'm just saying this could be a concern if there is no flexibility within this club when it comes to hitting.

The Good- Starters.  A few days ago, I would have said the relievers.  But, we've already touched on one reason why they are not in this portion.  The starters have pitched 3 shutouts in their starts in 6 days.  I also believe that every starter has gone at least 6 innings into the game, except Yu (5 2/3).  Also, every starter, omitting Darvish again, has has got a quality start, 6 innings pitched with 3 or less earned runs.  They good.  We are seeing the veteran, Colby Lewis, step up and try and change his habit of giving up a ton of homers and getting pop-ups to stay as close to the infield as possible.  Dutch had a slightly rocky first game but has improved with todays start.  Matt Harrison threw a great game, keeping the bats off the ball by only allowing 4 hits.  Darvish showed his stuff, maybe a little later in his first appearance than would be wanted, but he will hone in on it and be great.  Neftali showed that he can stretch out and go deeper than 5 innings.  I know this is a very early assessment of the starting rotation, but its looking very good so far.

Well, I am having to cut this one off here in order to not be too late to work.  Last night's game was fun until...well...you know.  Wish i could have ended my Ranger's 4 game attending in a row thingy with all wins, but things happen.  At any rate I plan on skipping the Yankee's series completely due to the obnoxiousness of their fans and will probably catch a couple Rays games.  Until next time...


FYR

If it ain't broke, go ahead and fix it

Went to last nights game, which was my 4th this season and third in a row.  This was the first game I bought a ticket for this year.  I was really looking forward to seeing Neftali in his first start as a MLB pitcher.

When I bought the ticket, probably about a month and a half ago or so, I asked my old roommate if he wanted to go.  Knowing he is a pretty good Rangers fan and that he lived in Abilene, I knew that he would pony up some cash to get pretty good seats.  So I checked the hub and got tickets for section 15, row 2 for 40 bucks each after all was said and done and we were very pleased with the selection.

I was also excited to find out last week that Nefty would be going up against fellow Irving, Tx product Blake Beavan.  That kid looks like he is going to have a great career, and will go far as long as he gets away from the Mariners.  I really want to see Justin Smoak do well.  I have a soft spot for him, I think just because he was supposed to be our saving grace from Chris Davis.  He was exciting two years ago to watch, especially with his first homer in the all you can eat seats, but never really got his BA high enough to be deadly.  He will be good one day.

Anyways, Neftali came out of the gate with stuff that reminded me of the previous night with a walk to start off the game.  Nefty quickly was able to gain control of his fastball and get it over the plate.  He walked Ichiro, putting Figgins on second.  But soon after Smoak got the GIDP and ended the inning.  He then sat down the next 8 batters in order.  He good.

I think I read somewhere that he threw his fastball something like 70% the first time through the order, then only threw it 40% after that.  I'm not going to bore you with numbers from the game, but I find this facinating.  Feliz's goto pitch when he was a closer was of course his fastball.  He relied on it because he could blow it by the batters at 98 or higher consistently.  My worry going into this season with Neftali starting was his secondary pitches.  The fact that he started mixing in more changeups and his slider is fantastic.  Shows his versitility.

Another fact about the game that got me floored with Feliz is that he threw 108 pitches.  Being a closer last year he would throw 1 inning for normally around 15 pitches, give or take.  Be able in 4 months to build your stamina to handle the work load of a seasoned starter is very impressive.  I am aware that Neftali did start in the minors, and was damn good.  But I heard a few writers say how difficult it could be moving from throwing a ton of pitches, to closing, then going back to starting.  Another thing I take away from this pitch count is that Wash has faith.  I think that may be huge for Neftali's confidence.  When Nolan came into this organization, he said that this team will no longer put pitchers on a pitch limit, and that they were done when they were finished.  Seems like everyone is on board with that philosophy, which shows with letting Nefty, and Darvish for that matter, go as long as he did.

Aaaaand finally, to talk about the other performing portions of the game real quick.  The only run was scored by Mike Young on a Murph hit.  Mike got a double with Beltre already on base.  Beltre got caught in the run down going from second to third, allowing Young to get on second.  Young moved over to third on a wild pitch.  Then Murph did what he's done more than half the time this season, get a hit.  I've always viewed him as clutch, but he has really stepped it up to another level this year it seems.  And speaking of another level, there is our bullpen.  Adams, one of my two favorite Ranger's (Beltre's the other), came in and shut down 3 in order.  Joe Nathan did the same.  So far in this season, Nathan is the only pitcher to give up any earned runs, just the one homer.  This gives the Texas Ranger bullpen a .63 ERA.  They good.

This team looks complete, and I am very pleased with it.  They have the same goal, with the same intensity.  Things are working.


FYR

Disclaimer!!!

This is kind of a test of sorts.  I have thought about a blog for the last few years to kind of thought about creating a blog of sorts about the rangers.  Recently by buddy, Eric, over at www.baseballbalk.blogspot.com said it would be cool to post on his blog.  After trying to bang out a few complete thoughts, I figured I should go ahead and make my own blog and not take up his space.  So, here it is.

To go ahead and warn you, I favored my math classes in school much more than English, so I apologize for the number of fragments, run ons, and various other grammatical errors you will encounter during this blog.

The reason I have thought about blogging about the rangers as of the very recent is because I love talking to my friends about them.  Big duh reason I understand.  But I feel that if a friend reads a topic or game or whatever I ramble out on here they might want to elaborate on the topic.  Which is my main goal, that and to have something to go back and read about what was going on with me in the past, until blogspot decides to go offline (ie. geocities.com, rip).

As far as the name of the blog goes, it's kind of a thing I coined at the beginning of last year after ranger's wins.  You (see what I didn't do there? #darvish) can figure out what the acronym FYR is.  I try to keep my online content around PG, just to make sure everyone is happy.  But, for some reason the acronym has kind of stuck with me, and I enjoy saying after wins, and a few friends dig it, so I guess it stays for now until something better pops in my head.

At any rate, I appreciate you even reading this.  I will be posting a blog in the morning about tonight's game and about what I think about it, which I am looking forward to.  I would try and work something out tonight but after my 3rd game in a row, I'm pretty tired, dog tired.

Again, thanks for reading it friends, and be excellent to each other!


FYR