Last night, the Milwaukee Brewers became the first team to clinch a playoff spot in 2025. Not the mighty Dodgers with their $348-million payroll. Not the Mets with their $339-million payroll. Or the Yankees and their $297-million payroll.
The Brewers. Whose payroll is twenty-third in all of baseball at $112 million.
The Dodgers and Yankees will reap the rewards of all their spending because they will make the playoffs. The Mets might.
But what does it say when the Brewers continue winning—clinching their seventh playoff appearance in eight seasons—with a relatively low payroll and the Rangers only starting to win this season when their big payroll-busting players are out of the lineup?
The Rangers won their sixth in a row to go 79-70. They’re a season-high nine games over .500. They’re playing their best baseball of the year. And they’ve done it once Corey Seager, Marcus Semien, and Adolis Garcia were gone.
I’s not like the Rangers are a better team without Seager. When he’s playing, they are 55-47, eight games over .500. Every team is better with Corey Seager. But losing him didn’t cripple the Rangers. They’re 66-59 with Adolis Garcia, 13-11 without him. But they are 17-7 without Marcus Semien in the lineup, 62-63 with him.
Take those high-dollar players out of the picture, insert major league minimum earning Cody Freeman, Michael Helman, and Alejandro Osuna and you have a winning team. They’re ten games over .500 with Freeman playing, thirteen games over with Helman playing, nine games over with Osuna playing.
It doesn’t make any sense. Or, it makes all the sense in the world. And when the three big guys—Seager, Semien, and Garcia—come back, what do they do with the three spark plugs who have affectionately been nicknamed “The Little Rascals?”
They could not ever sit Seager. But what about Semien and Garcia? If the Rangers are trying to win, are they better without them?
How are the Rangers better without their superstars? How do the Brewers keep winning with such low payroll?
How does any of this make sense?
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