Bringing baseball to the D-FW area was a chore in itself, but Mayor Tom Vandergriff finally got the Washington Senators to relocate to Arlington in 1972. Bringing a champion here? That took three stadiums, 25 managers and 52 seasons, but when it happened, it felt like general manager Chris Young had pulled an all-nighter to bring a trophy home. And longtime Texas Rangers fans were on top of the world.
The 2023 Rangers will be remembered in these parts forever, but, nationally, they will be recalled as the road warriors who never lost away from home during a long, productive, postseason — 11 wins in Tropicana Field, Camden Yards, Minute Maid Park and, finally, Chase Field in Phoenix where the Rangers were crowned champions in five games on Nov. 1.
They will be remembered also for featuring a record-setting hitter in right field who did not even finish the playoffs on their roster. Adolis Garcia drove in 22 runs, breaking the record set (brutally) against the Rangers by St. Louis’ David Freese in 2011. But Garcia suffered a strained oblique in his final at-bat in Game 3 and was removed from the postseason roster the next day. His replacement in right field, Travis Jankowski, drove in two runs and scored twice in Game 4 — a shining example of the kind of resilience the team displayed while playing through the inevitable list of injuries all season.
Although it took 52 seasons to field a champion, in the end, things came together quickly. Almost too quickly to believe.
A year ago, Nathan Eovaldi was pitching for the Boston Red Sox and Jacob deGrom was a New York Met. Bruce Bochy was watching the World Series from his couch in Nashville, three years into his retirement from baseball. Heck, Jankowski spent most of 2022 as a Syracuse Met.
In late July of this year, Max Scherzer was yet another New York Met and Jordan Montgomery was a St. Louis Cardinal. In early September, less than a month before the postseason began, outfielder Evan Carter was cranking out base hits and taking walks for the Round Rock Express.
Most of the 2023 season, Jose Leclerc was a reliever without a station. He was striking out batters at a high rate as always but, 4 of 9 in save situations, he was not part of Bochy’s regular seventh-eighth-ninth inning crew up until the playoffs when he closed everything in sight.
Eovaldi and Montgomery would pitch this team into the World Series, almost by themselves as starters, winning seven of the team’s nine victories. Corey Seager, the $300 Million Man signed by GM Jon Daniels before the 2022 season, would turn on baseballs like Reggie Jackson, earning his own Mr. October status with his second World Series MVP award.Related:Corey Seager caps off gaudy postseason with championship, World Series MVP trophy
In the end, only the in-state rival Houston Astros fought the Rangers to the very limit, in the American League Championship Series. The Rangers made the rest of the ride look easy, which is remarkable, not just in terms of the franchise’s long history of futility but its recent battles with failure.
After being swept by the Toronto Blue Jays in the first round of the 2016 playoffs — the fifth time in six years that Texas had played beyond 162 games — the Rangers vanished from baseball’s radar. In 2019, their pitchers gave up a club-record 241 home runs. In 2020, Chris Woodward’s lineup shattered another team record with a .217 season batting average. In 2021, they lost 102 games.
From 102 losses to World Series champs in two years is unprecedented even in this era of quick resurrections. Kansas City lost 90 games in 2012, went to the World Series in 2014 and won it in 2015. Houston endured 111 losses in 2013, made the playoffs in 2015 and captured its first World Series in 2017. The Cubs suffered 101 defeats in 2012, advanced to the NLCS in 2015 and ended their 108-year Series drought in 2016.
The Rangers transitioned from ridiculously bad to the best faster than all of them. The Turnaround Gang was a nickname given to Billy Martin’s Texas Rangers some 49 years ago. This year’s Rangers truly deserved it.
Related:Five defining 2023 Texas Rangers moments that led to a World Series title
For Rangers fans, the postseason celebration could go on for some time, but this doesn’t have to be a one-and-done situation. You really can’t predict baseball, as all the above worst-to-first stories show (even the Diamondbacks were a 110-game loser in 2021). But the 2024 Rangers should, at the very least, compete once again. Imagine a rotation that includes Eovaldi, Montgomery, Scherzer, Jon Gray and Andrew Heaney next summer, then perhaps adds deGrom in August or September. Imagine a full season in the outfield for Evan Carter, and what does the club even do with first-round pick Wyatt Langford, an outfielder who hit .360 with power in the minors this summer? How much can Bochy’s magic do with that set of tricks?
It’s a consideration for a later date. It took 25 seasons for the Rangers to make their first postseason and just a little more than that to finish the job in 2023. I have no doubt they will do it again someday, and perhaps soon, but when you have waited this long, it’s time to enjoy a record-busting playoff run of road wins we may never see again.
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