With Wyatt Langford starting to put it together and with Max Scherzer making a successful debut, the Texas Rangers enjoyed a sweep of the Kansas City Royals.
ARLINGTON, Texas — For a weekend against the Kansas City Royals (42-37), the Texas Rangers (37-40) were firing on all cylinders and looked like a club worthy of the banner they raised this spring. During a total team effort, there was a breakthrough performance that was, in some ways, a long time coming, a redemption pitching performance, and a long-awaited return.
The Rangers wrapped up a homestand with a season high-tying four-game winning streak as they won a series for the first time since taking two of three from Los Angeles earlier this month. Overall, Texas enjoyed a successful homestand, rebounding from a series loss to the New York Mets, while putting themselves back on the road to respectability with a very convincing sweep of the Royals.
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Game 75: Kansas City 2, Texas 6 (W: Eovaldi, 4-3, L: Schreiber, 3-2)
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Game 76: Kansas City 0, Texas 6 (W: Gray, 3-3, L: Wacha, 4-6)
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Game 77: Kansas City 0, Texas 4 (W: Scherzer, 1-0, L: Marsh, 5-5, Sv: Ureña, 1)
Click, click, boom
After going over a month without a five-run inning, the Rangers posted their third such outburst in three games during the homestand. It started with a five-run inning in the series finale victory against the Mets. Texas posted another one when they scored five runs in the sixth inning in the opener against the Royals and then scored five runs in the eighth inning on Saturday.
Last year, Texas led the majors in innings of five or more runs at this point in the season; since the 2024 campaign started, the Rangers haven’t been witness to nearly as many as they thought they’d see, especially with minimal turnover in the lineup.
Both five-run innings against Kansas City culminated with a huge hit that cleared the bases – in the opener, Marcus Semien laced a bases-clearing double and on Saturday, Wyatt Langford put the game out of reach with the first grand slam of his young career.
Pitching redemption
Two starters for Texas – Nathan Eovaldi and Jon Gray – were in need of bounce back performances and found their groove against KC over the weekend. Eovaldi, in his last outing against Seattle, lasted only three innings while giving up four runs and walking four. Gray, meanwhile, gave up a ghastly nine runs on 11 hits in three innings against the Mets last Monday.
Facing the Royals, Eovaldi opened the series with home field advantage. Eovaldi is sporting a 2.09 ERA at Globe Life Field thus far this season, and he held the Royals to two runs over six innings of work, allowing just one walk and four hits. Those were the only two runs that the Texas pitching staff would allow all weekend.
Gray was convinced that he was tipping pitches against the Mets and sought to fix those issues in his outing on Saturday. Against Kansas City, Gray was far better at inducing contact, keeping the ball in the yard, and working efficiently. In six innings, Gray shut out the Royals on just 72 pitches.
The rookie arrives
Part of the reason for the Rangers’ drop in offense early in the season has been the unexpected underperformance of both Evan Carter and Wyatt Langford. Coming into the season, the idea of both of these Rookie of the Year candidates hitting in the same lineup was something to dream on, but had become a nightmare.
Langford was drafted last year as a standout hitter, and progressed through the minor league ranks quickly last summer before appearing to be ready for the Major League roster with a standout spring training performance.
Carter lit the world on fire when he was called up last September, helping the Rangers down the stretch and being a key performer in the playoffs while finishing as the No. 3 hitter in the lineup for the World Series champions.
However, despite the expectations to further enhance the American League’s top offense from a year ago, each youngster struggled early this season and each also spent time on the injured list. Langford strained his hamstring at the start of May but is now back in the lineup, while Carter has been shelved with back soreness that has lingered.
When Langford hit the IL, he was sporting a .224/.295/.293 slashline. In the 21 games since coming back, including his grand slam performance against the Royals on Saturday, Langford has hit .299/.342/.481, looking much more like the hitter that Texas expected to be a fixture in the middle of their order.
Langford also contributed again in the finale, drilling an RBI-double to open the scoring; he’s now had hits in nine of his last 15 attempts with runners in scoring position and has five straight games with an RBI, totaling 10 over that stretch. With news of Josh Jung potentially coming back on the upcoming road trip, Langford’s offensive emergence is coming at a good time.
Nearly pitch perfect
Max Scherzer’s season debut was the first of three highly anticipated pitching returns for the Rangers. If they all go like they did for Scherzer, Texas will be quite pleased.
In five innings, Scherzer faced just one over the minimum, pitching a perfect game into the fifth, when the Royals registered their first hit with two out. He walked nobody, struck out four and qualified for the victory on just 57 pitches. Scherzer’s fourth K also tied him with Greg Maddux for 11th most all time in MLB history.
The brevity of his outing was a bit of a cause for alarm as he left while still pitching effectively but Scherzer spoke after the game to mention that he’s still monitoring his thumb and forearm soreness and won’t push things further than his arm will allow.
Nevertheless, the future Hall of Famer was sharp and efficient, going to a three-ball count on just three of the 16 batters that he faced. Jose Ureña would eventually relieve Scherzer and toss four scoreless innings of his own to pick up a rare four-inning save and secure the Rangers’ fourth win in a row.
Texas now embarks upon a seven-game road trip, beginning with a series against the NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers and finishing with a four-game 2023 ALDS rematch against a very dangerous Baltimore Orioles club.
Do you think the Rangers are turning the corner now that they’re getting healthier? Share your thoughts with Matt on Twitter @FisherWritesMLB.