The Wyatt Langford arrival party happened last night. And on national television, to boot.

The Rangers rookie, who had been struggling like every other Ranger in the lineup, broke out in a big way. He hit for the cycle on ESPN Sunday Night Baseball, driving in four of the eleven runs the Rangers scored.

Yes, eleven. This is a team that does not score eleven runs in a week. And, lately, when they do finally score, they give up more runs.

But yesterday, for one brief moment, it looked like the promise of the 2024 Texas Rangers. It snapped a six-game losing streak, it salvaged one game on this miserable road trip, and it prevented the Rangers from falling to ten games under .500.

The Rangers piled up thirteen hits. None from Marcus Semien (0-for-4) whose monthlong freefall continued. None from Robbie Grossman (0-for-6) who is making it harder to justify putting in the lineup, and none for Davis Wendzel, who is only on the major league team because of desperation. 

But on a night when Derek Hill hit two home runs, boosted his average to .304 and his OPS to 1.056, he was overshadowed by Wyatt Langford. And I’m sure he is perfectly happy about that.

It has been such a frustrating offensive slog, and maybe it’s going to take the Rookie to pull them out of it, like Evan Carter did last year.

Or, maybe this team comes home, falls back into their hole, and slides into the All-Star break in another freefall. 

For one glorious game, the 2024 Rangers showed up. That might be all we get.

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