Opening Day for the Major League Baseball season is less than three weeks away. Much like the decision to open up Globe Life Field to full capacity for their home opener against the Toronto Blue Jays on April 5th has the potential to do so, this past week has brought mixed results for the Texas Rangers. Here is a look at some Rangers spring training notes for mid March.
Up and Down Starters
Even though the Rangers’ overall spring record of 5-5 may not reveal it, their starting rotation has gradually improved. Despite Wednesday’s 6-0 loss to the Oakland Athletics, Rangers lefty Taylor Hearn was the silver lining in this one as he threw two and one third innings of hitless baseball. He hit second baseman Tony Kemp with the first pitch of the game, but he then managed to retire the seven hitters that he faced after that. Another Rangers starter who is still getting his feet wet is right-hander Dane Dunning. He faced one of his old teams, the Chicago White Sox, on Friday. In that outing, he went 2 1/3 innings. He allowed three straight singles before hitting his pitch limit, forcing the Rangers to make a change. Hopefully the Rangers starting rotation can use what is left of spring training to stretch out their innings.
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Rangers Injury Report
Every spring yields at least some bad news for every team, and the Rangers received their first piece of bad news this past Tuesday. Right-hander Jonathan Hernandez suffered a low-grade UCL strain, and will be shut down for the next four weeks. Hernandez was a crucial piece to the Rangers’ bullpen in 2020. In the abbreviated season, he pitched 31 innings, posting a 2.90 earned run average and a WHIP of 1.032. Losing him for the first several weeks of the 2021 season will be a very tough blow for the Rangers. Hopefully manager Chris Woodward has a few tricks up his sleeve in Hernandez’ absence.
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Players/coaches/managers mentioned:
Taylor Hearn, Tony Kemp, Dane Dunning, Jonathan Hernandez, Chris Woodward
