There are many things wrong with the game right now but perhaps we got a peek behind the curtain at the real culprit in a seemingly innocent comment Rangers manager Chris Woodward made to Evan Grant in The Dallas Morning News.

Grant’s article was on Elvis Andrus and his stagnating offense production this season, and how the Rangers were hoping he can still produce. (Of course they are, they certainly aren’t hoping he falls apart.)

In trying to identify some issues between the old-school approach Andrus grew up playing and this new-school process the Rangers are now demanding, Woodward said, “It’s hard when he’s had ten years in the league under one process and we are asking him to change. He loves to swing the bat and get hits, to get 200 hits. But 200 hits isn’t as coveted as it once was. If he stays in the strike zone more, he can do more damage than by going for those singles.”

A two-hundred hit season isn’t coveted anymore? Those “singles” are frowned upon, even looked at as a detriment? 

Really? What an ugly beast this game has devolved into. 

It’s all about doing “damage” yet all we are seeing is night after night of double-digit strikeouts and night after night of anemic offense that generates six or fewer hits, and can score only when it hits a home run. That’s the damage they are looking for?

Now we know why this team is struggling offensively. They had too many players trying for those worthless, undesirable, cheap hits, instead of doing damage.

Woodward added that Andrus is “still learning some of the newer processes.”

That explains why, this season, Elvis Andrus has only ten home runs. What a failure.

*****

TODAY’S GAME:

Ariel Jurado (6-10, 5.48) vs. Patrick Sandoval (0-1, 6.47)

Game time: 9:07