Even though the Rangers were swept in Baltimore, they scored a ton of runs in their first two games of that series.
They broke open last night’s game with a six-run explosion in the fifth, then hung on for dear life.
They are scoring runs, at least. Even if the pitching is starting to show signs of fatigue.
It’s not a co-incidence that this resurgence of offense comes at a time when Corey Seager and Marcus Semien have finally emerged from their season-long walks in the wilderness.
With Semien, his light switch kicked on in June. After a dismal April (.157 average, .226 on-base, .443 OPS) and a slightly less dismal May (.233/.298/.619), Semien finally got it going. His slash line in June was .287/.331/.849, with seven home runs and fifteen runs batted in.
While he was doing that, Corey Seager was flailing. Seager sprinted out of the gate, hitting .300 the first ten games of the season. Then, he fell and couldn’t get up.
Seager’s May was almost as miserable as Semien’s April, with a slash of .214/.308/.746. The only thing that kept his OPS even remotely respectable was the fact he was hitting home runs. But very little else. While Semien was getting hot in June, Seager was still lost.
He seems to have found it. July is only eight days old, so it’s too early to call him found, but Seager is scorching so far in July. His three-run homer last night was the punctuation on that six-run fifth. And, as it turned out, it was the difference in the 6-5 victory over the Twins. But that was a continuation of the July Seager is putting together. Batting .321, with a .367 on-base, and an all-star-caliber .902 OPS.
This is the Seager the Rangers committed ten years to. And this is the Semien they commited seven years to.
Just signing a player to a big-money contract does not automatically mean they will perform up to those expectations. But you certainly didn’t expect them to crash and burn like Seager and Semien had done. They were a tag team of misadventure at the top of the lineup. Two automatic outs where opportunity should reside.
If they start to resort to the numbers on the back of their baseball cards, the offense should really start to take off.
Now, it’s up to the pitching to stay together.
These are the woes of a team trying to find itself.
*****
