Hello, offense. 140 comments


For the first time this season, Mike Napoli seems to be finding his swing. He found it twice, in fact.

 

We’ve seen the good. We’ve seen the bad.

The good is much more fun to watch.

The Rangers have won seven out of eight, mostly with great starting pitching. But the last two they’ve added a layer of smash mouth offense.

We’ve seen this offense is neutral. Where they struggled to get runners on base, and struggled even harder to get them in.

Yesterday, they scored in just two innings. But five runs in both of those. We’ve seen that be one run, if that.

What a difference offense makes.

The five-run outburst in the first came after the first two were out. Then they poured it on, punctuated by a Mike Napoli home run. Earlier Napoli as a strikeout machine.

Then in the sixth, when the Mariners got within one run, Odor, Napoli, and Choo homered to plate five more to put the game away.

Odor seems to be officially out of his slump. He swings wildly at anything. At least now he is hitting something. Napoli had two home runs and four RBIs. And the offense, top to bottom is contributing.

A team is pretty tough to beat when offense happens. We’ve seen the opposite to know that.

The Rangers are now peeking over .500 again. Let’s enjoy the view while it lasts.

We’ve seen the other side too often.

*****
TODAY’S GAME:

Christian Bergman (3-4, 5.75) vs. Yu Darvish (6-4, 3.03)
Game time: 2:05

How the Mariners hit against Darvish.
How the Rangers hit against Bergman.