It’s 2019. Time to start looking forward to the upcoming season. Here is the schedule. You should be able to drag this off here and onto your desktop.

The Rangers will be put to the test almost immediately. Twenty-three of their first twenty-eight games are against division foes. Texas could get out of the gate strong, Or be buried early.

No time to find their sea legs.

It will be a season when there is nothing to get excited about except that fact that this is the last season in The Ballpark In Arlington. There will be a huge banner unfurled every night counting down from 81 to 0 the number of home games left in this still amazing ballpark. Regular season games. Not counting playoffs.

The excitement for the season will be the gradual winding down of the season. Like counting down the days until the last day of school on the first day.

Texas will pair with the NL Central this year in interleague play, meaning series with the Cubs, Pirates, Cardinals, and Reds.  Texas opens against the Cubs open here in Arlington. The two don’t play in Wrigley this time around. The Rangers have two games against the Pirates here and two in Pittsburgh, in what might be the most beautiful ballpark in the country. They play three here agains the Cardinals in mid-May. Their series against the Reds will be in Cincinnati. They don’t play the Brewers this year since they have to fit in a two here and two there series against natural interleague rivals the Arizona Diamondbacks. You can just feel the anticipation of this history and spirited rivalry.

If the Rangers get off to a rough start, they will certainly have a daunting finish. The last six games will be against Boston and New York, two teams that won 214 combined games in 2018.

Happy 2019, everyone. Let the season begin so the Rangers can count down to when the season ends.