Locked On Rangers Podcast: Bradford thriving, Langford day off, Max Scherzer's timetable
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00:00Don't look now, but the Rangers might finally have themselves
00:03a homegrown, good, starting pitcher.
00:06Talk about Cody Bradford's dominant start to the season
00:08and the Rangers snapping the winning streak.
00:10All that and more on this episode of Locked on Rangers.
00:12Let's get into it.
00:16You are Locked on Rangers.
00:18Your daily Texas Rangers podcast.
00:22Part of the Locked on Podcast Network.
00:25Your team, every day.
00:27You are Locked on to the World Series Champion Texas Rangers.
00:40I'm Bryce Patrick, a cripplingly addicted Texas Rangers fan
00:43and covering this team for 11 seasons,
00:44including all six as the founder and host of this podcast.
00:48Thank you all so much for making Locked on Rangers
00:49your first listen every single day.
00:51If you're not already, you can follow me on Twitter
00:52at Bryce Patrick.
00:53You can follow the show at Locked on Rangers.
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00:59grow the show is to comment nearly any single thing below.
01:03Now, before we get into Cody Bradford,
01:05maybe being the prince that was promised
01:07the Rangers home grow a starting pitcher.
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01:24Now, the Rangers got yet another fantastic start
01:27from the Aledo Aledo native, I was about to say the rookie.
01:32I think he cleared all that rookie eligibility status
01:35last year, because so far, the best youngster on this Rangers
01:39team this year has not been Wyatt Langford.
01:42It has not been Evan Carter.
01:44It has been the Aledo kid, the Baylor kid, Cody freaking
01:49Bradford.
01:50It has been so far a series of two local Baylor kids going off
01:56in back-to-back games.
01:57Unfortunately for the Rangers, yesterday,
02:00it was Shea Langelaers, the Keller High native and Baylor
02:05grad or alumnus, alumnus, I should say.
02:10And then today, thankfully for the Rangers,
02:12it was the Aledo native and Baylor grad, Cody freaking
02:15Bradford.
02:16Six and two thirds innings, nearly made it seven innings.
02:19Only one walk, seven strikeouts, one unearned run.
02:24Coming off of an error, a rare error,
02:25from Josh Smith, Pookie Bear, as I believe Twitter is now
02:30referring to him as.
02:32But a great day from Cody freaking Bradford.
02:38Three straight great starts.
02:40And this is the beginning of a trend with Cody Bradford.
02:43He looks different.
02:44This is not the same Cody Bradford
02:47that the Rangers started out there as mostly an emergency
02:49starter last year.
02:50His big league debut was, well, it
02:53was a real feed you to the wolves kind of moment.
02:56The Rangers were on a prolonged road trip, and he was OK.
03:01He was all right against the Orioles,
03:02and then he had to start against the Braves,
03:04where it's like, all right, kid, here you go.
03:06Here is the best lineup that we have seen in decades
03:09and decades and decades.
03:11And he got rocked a little bit.
03:12And occasionally, that will happen to Cody Bradford,
03:15because when you're not throwing 95 to 99 to 117 miles an hour,
03:20it is hard to hit your stuff.
03:22But we have seen pitchers succeed and thrive
03:27while they are not throwing 95 miles an hour.
03:29They're averaging 90.4 miles per hour
03:33on their four-seam fastball, which Cody Bradford is.
03:37But you've got to have a very, very good command
03:40of the strike zone.
03:41You've got to have multiple pitches,
03:43and they've got to set up each other well.
03:45And so far this season, Cody Bradford has done that very, very well.
03:49He's always had a pretty darn good changeup.
03:51The curveball has been much improved this year.
03:54He's throwing it a little bit slower than he did last year.
03:56Last year, it was averaging around 82 miles an hour.
03:59Now it's down to about 75 in the mid-70s,
04:02as low as 72 and a half miles an hour tonight.
04:05And the slider has also been pretty effective,
04:08was very effective in this one.
04:10Cody Bradford got 17 whiffs in this one.
04:13Seven of them off the fastball, six of them off the changeup,
04:16none off the curveball.
04:17That is more of a called strike kind of pitch for this guy.
04:19And out of five swings on the slider tonight,
04:24four of them were whiffs.
04:27That is a fantastic outing for the young Aledo native,
04:32who has been phenomenal in all three starts this season.
04:36I know this is coming against the A's,
04:38a team that swings and misses a lot
04:40and doesn't hit a lot of balls hard
04:42and just doesn't do a whole lot of things super duper well.
04:45But the other starts that he had this season,
04:48he had a really good start against the Cubs.
04:50And then he had a phenomenal start against the Astros,
04:55a team that likes to remind you that they've been to seven straight ALCSs.
05:00Some of those were even legitimate.
05:02But Cody Bradford doing this against the A's
05:04is just more of the norm for him.
05:06A 140 ERA for him so far this season.
05:10His fastball has been elite.
05:12His breaking ball has been significantly better
05:15and helps everything else play off of each other.
05:17He is not walking guys.
05:19He is getting guys to expand the zone.
05:21And he is painting the corners with that fastball,
05:26with that change up.
05:27And I'm telling you, the greatness of Jonah Heim as a pitch
05:31framer was on full display tonight.
05:34A little bit of an extended zone.
05:36And you give a guy like Cody Bradford a little bit
05:39an inch or two off the plate, maybe even half an inch.
05:42And he will carve all night long.
05:47We saw it a lot with Martin Perez in his 2022 season.
05:51He was just phenomenal all year long.
05:53Granted, it didn't really last in 2023.
05:56But he's looking back to himself.
05:57And we've seen pitchers like that, usually lefties,
06:00the ones without the most elite stuff,
06:02if they can hit their spots at a good rate,
06:04and usually if they have a really good change up
06:06to neutralize those righties, those
06:08are the ones that can thrive.
06:10Now, I wish that Cody Bradford would perform
06:13whatever magic miracles we saw from Cole Reagans in the 2022
06:19to 2023 offseason and just magically find about five miles
06:23an hour on his four-seam fastball.
06:25But that wasn't the case with Cody Bradford.
06:28But he is still painting.
06:29He is still effective.
06:30I mean, the guy has a 0.47 whip for his first two starts.
06:36He had a 0.47 whip, less than half of a base runner per inning.
06:44That's nuts.
06:46That's amazing.
06:47And there have been so many pitching prospects
06:50that have not panned out over the many, many moons.
06:54I could go on and on and on about how much
06:56I had hopes for Cody Buchel, Wilmer Font, guys
07:00like Justin Grimm, Luke Jackson, Roman Mendes.
07:04I mean, you can even go all the way back to 2015,
07:08where there was significant hopes on Jake Thompson or Chi
07:12Chi Gonzalez, or maybe eventually someone
07:15a little lower down the list.
07:16Maybe Andrew Faulkner would end up working out,
07:19or Jared Eickhoff, RIP those hopes and dreams.
07:22Or maybe Yohander Mendes would end up making it.
07:26Alas, that has not really worked out.
07:29Or you go all the way to the 2019 Rangers top prospects
07:33list, and you can look up guys like Joe Palumbo,
07:35or hopes for Cole Reagans, Taylor Hearn, Cole Wynn.
07:41Some of those hopes are still hanging on by a thread.
07:46But Cody Bradford, don't look too down.
07:48Don't look too quickly now.
07:49Don't spook him.
07:50But right now, he's giving the Rangers the best
07:54hope they've had at a young starting pitcher.
07:56I tweeted this out last September
07:59through three innings of a start against the Cleveland
08:01Guardians, where he was absolutely painting.
08:03I said, I've seen enough.
08:05Give this man a spot in the rotation next year.
08:07I don't care.
08:07I don't care what happens.
08:08This is the Rangers' next homegrown starter.
08:11And then I believe the next six, or seven,
08:13or 30 base runners reached in a row,
08:17and Bradford didn't make it through that fourth inning.
08:19But the signs were there.
08:21And this year, with the altar stuff,
08:22with the improved curveball, with the slider that
08:24looks better, both of them at different velocities
08:27than they were last year, all of that
08:29playing up with the changeup in the fastball that was already
08:32there and the command that was already there,
08:35it's giving a lot of hope.
08:37And at this point, I know it's only been three starts,
08:41but he is not going to be the first pitcher of these Rangers'
08:45initial five in their rotation to move the bullpen.
08:49He just can't be.
08:50He literally cannot be.
08:53Now, Michael Lorenzen isn't rejoining this rotation
08:56tomorrow, but he is not going to push Cody Bradford out
09:01of this pen.
09:02I think that whenever Lorenzen does end up coming back,
09:05he had another rehab start, his final rehab start.
09:08Today, he looked fine.
09:11Don't look at the numbers.
09:12The results don't matter as much as how he was feeling.
09:15He was feeling fine.
09:17I'm thinking next week, at some point in this 17-game
09:19and 17-day stretch, we'll see Michael Lorenzen
09:21in this rotation.
09:24And at that point, the Rangers are going to have a tough
09:27choice to make.
09:28But after these three starts, if you're
09:31looking at who is moving to the bullpen
09:33and you want to keep winning games,
09:36you are going to keep starting Cody Bradford every fifth day
09:40or sixth day or as often as you can freaking start him,
09:43because this guy, so far this season,
09:45looks absolutely sensational.
09:49Coming up, we're going to talk about Wyatt Lingford finally
09:51getting a day off.
09:53We're going to talk about why I'm really not concerned,
09:55and anyone showing concerns over this 22-year-old kid
09:59is really, really jumping the gun.
10:02And a positive update about Max Schroeder and his development
10:05coming back from the injured list,
10:06right after this word from our sponsors.
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12:13Shout out to the everydayers for making Lockdown Rangers
12:15your first listen every single day.
12:16I'll be back on Friday's show doing a mailbag,
12:19answering all of your questions about the first week
12:22and a half, nearly two weeks of this season.
12:25Now when the Rangers unveiled their lineup
12:27for this Wednesday night game, the first thing I noticed
12:30was, oh, that's interesting.
12:32There is no Wyatt Langford in this lineup.
12:35And in yesterday's show, I was talking a little bit
12:38about, I guess, this morning show, Wednesday morning show.
12:41I was talking about how I've started to see Wyatt Langford
12:44get a little bit out of his approach.
12:46The first time I've really seen it,
12:47it was really just one at bat.
12:49And it was the last at bat of the game on Tuesday night.
12:53He took a ball one above the zone, a slider.
12:57And then there was a sweeper just outside the zone,
13:00away from him, from a righty.
13:02And he tried to pull that and was expanding the zone
13:05on a pitch that I'm pretty darn sure
13:07he knew was out of the zone.
13:08And just getting a little antsy.
13:10Because right now, it's not been the best start
13:14to Wyatt Langford's career at the plate.
13:17He has yet to homer in his first 11 games.
13:20He only has a couple of extra base hits.
13:21Both those came in the first series of the season.
13:24He's not hitting the ball nearly as hard
13:26as he was the first week or so.
13:28And it's been just a little bit of a struggle.
13:32But with all of that said, he's still
13:34hitting .261 with a .314 on base percentage and a .640 OPS
13:40with four walks to 10 strikeouts and 51 plate appearances.
13:45Solid numbers, not anything horrible or terrible
13:48by any means, but not quite the super-duper,
13:52elite, amazing, unbelievable, ungodly spring training
13:55performance that he had.
13:57So the Rangers sat him down against a tough righty
13:59in Ross Stripling and put about as many lefty bats
14:02as they could get there in the lineup.
14:04And it ended up working out because the Rangers
14:05scored six runs, were able to get the win,
14:07and make it fairly comfortable for the pitching staff
14:12outside of a home run late by Yair Rodriguez
14:15and just a little bit of trouble from Jake Latz.
14:18Not too much, but just enough to make
14:21you sweat the good amount.
14:23But Wyatt Langford's start to the season
14:25is not any cause for concern.
14:28Like I saw on Twitter, maybe this
14:30is just me blowing up one person's tweet of freaking out
14:33about Wyatt Langford and saying the Rangers are actually
14:36having soft contact because it's just Wyatt Langford hitting
14:39balls into the ground and this rookie hasn't hit a home run
14:42in his first 11 games, so he must be a scrub.
14:44And maybe that's me freaking out about nothing.
14:47It probably is.
14:48But still, I feel like it's worth noting
14:50that I'm pretty sure Wyatt Langford will be the first person
14:53to tell you that he's not hitting super well this season.
14:56I guarantee you that.
14:57I also guarantee you that there is nobody working harder
15:00about getting Wyatt Langford back on track
15:02and hitting his first big league home run and then his second
15:04and his third and his fourth, hopefully in succession,
15:07maybe even all in one game if we're getting a little greedy
15:09and ahead of ourselves.
15:10But this is not something to worry about for this kid.
15:13I mean, you go back and look at the insane route
15:16that he took to the big leagues of not being a highly touted
15:20kid recruited out of high school,
15:23out of Trenton, Florida, having four plate appearances
15:27as a freshman, bursting onto the scene as a sophomore,
15:30and absolutely crushing it as a junior,
15:32getting drafted fourth overall and taking about five whole
15:36minutes until he made the big leagues.
15:39Goes into his first big league spring training camp
15:41without a guaranteed roster spot and just has the best spring
15:44I think I've ever seen someone have in a Texas
15:47Framers uniform.
15:48And oh, by the way, he had 200 minor league plate appearances.
15:52I was watching a little bit of the Orioles game
15:54because Jackson Holiday, the unfortunate consensus
15:58top one prospect in baseball, unfortunate because it's not
16:02White Langford, Evan Carter.
16:03I have my own disagreement there,
16:05but still a fantastic prospect who is 20 years old
16:08and already in the big leagues.
16:10And the Orioles broadcaster talking about how insane
16:12it is that the Jackson Holiday made it to the big leagues
16:14and so few plate appearances.
16:16They're saying, oh, you know, it hasn't been since guys
16:19like Ronald Acuna Jr. or Juan Soto
16:21that someone has made it to the big leagues
16:22with this few plate appearances.
16:24And while it is true that Juan Soto made to the big leagues
16:27pretty quickly and Jackson Holiday made to the big leagues
16:29pretty quickly, you really don't have to go back that far
16:32to Juan Soto to see someone with this few of minor league plate
16:35appearances make it to the big leagues.
16:36You got to go back all the way to opening day
16:41because White Langford had 200 minor league plate appearances.
16:46Jackson Holiday had 727, which is nuts.
16:49Juan Soto had 512.
16:52Now, granted, Juan Soto was 19 when he made his major league
16:55debut, Jackson Holiday was 20, and White Langford was 22.
17:01And White Langford had a couple of years, actually,
17:03three years of college, two of those years where he played.
17:06Jackson Holiday was drafted to high school,
17:08and Juan Soto was signed as a 16-year-old by the Nationals.
17:12But still, it is worth noting for all these guys who,
17:16by the way, Holiday went 0-4 in his big league debut,
17:19had a couple of strikeouts because he's a 20-year-old kid
17:21and the big leagues is very hard.
17:23And White Langford is 22 years old,
17:24and the big leagues are very hard.
17:26And both these guys are very, very impressive
17:28to get up to the big leagues as quickly as they have.
17:31But also, it's the big leagues.
17:34Not everybody is going to have an Evan Carter
17:36first couple of months of their big league career.
17:39That's why it was so marvelous.
17:41That's why it was so phenomenal.
17:43That's why it was so just breathtaking
17:46that Evan Carter jumps into the big leagues.
17:49Even Evan Carter struggled a little bit
17:51the first week of this season.
17:54But for Evan Carter to do what he did
17:56in 20-something games of the regular season,
17:59and what was it, 16, 19 games of the playoffs?
18:03I forget how many at this point.
18:05Maybe it was 15.
18:07I think, yes, 15 games of the playoffs.
18:1216, I don't know. It doesn't matter.
18:14The fact that Evan Carter was able to do that
18:16is the aberration, not the norm.
18:20And again, with all of these trends
18:24that are happening early on this season,
18:26with the Rangers not hitting the ball super hard,
18:28not hitting a whole lot of home runs just yet,
18:30not getting that many extra base hits in general.
18:33We saw quite a few in today's game, thankfully.
18:36Some from Adonis Garcia, from Marcus Simeon,
18:38from Evan Carter, and from Josh Smith as well.
18:42We're starting to see that trend reverse itself a little bit.
18:46But again, like with all these things,
18:48we're 12 games into the season.
18:50So let's put our brakes on.
18:54Let's put our calming down caps on,
18:56because I feel like in general,
18:58there's been a lot of unrest.
19:00I feel it in myself, too.
19:01Just remembering what it's like to pace yourself
19:04for the 162-game marathon that is the regular season.
19:08Because the last meaningful baseball that we had
19:11about six months ago was when the Rangers
19:12won the World Series.
19:13And rightly so,
19:15every single one of those playoff games
19:17is stressful, do or die with every single pitch.
19:20But it's not really the case for the regular season.
19:24And even though it hasn't been the best start,
19:27even Corey Seager is not really getting into the ball
19:31as much as I'm sure he would like.
19:33But again, he's still hitting, what, 341 with an 865 OPS,
19:38which before this game was north of 900.
19:42He had a couple of pitches that I thought
19:44were right down the middle that Corey Seager
19:46normally absolutely drills.
19:47But he did not do that in today's game
19:50against his old friend, Ross Stripling,
19:53former Dodgers teammate.
19:54But again, it's all a small sample size.
19:56His offense is doing the right things.
19:58And a great day at the plate from Dolis Garcia,
20:01who I just talked about in yesterday's show,
20:03being worried about his approach,
20:04getting too swing happy, not taking those walks.
20:06Well, what'd he do?
20:08He went three for three with a couple of doubles and a walk,
20:12because that's Dolis Garcia,
20:15a guy who is a very freaking good hitter,
20:17just like Wyatt Langford and Evan Carter will be.
20:21Coming up, we'll talk about the positive updates
20:23that we got from Max Scherzer,
20:25and a bullpen move that I feel like
20:27is going to happen any minute now,
20:30right after this word from our sponsors.
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20:59The Mavericks tonight, I believe they clinched the division.
21:01The Stars, I believe, if they haven't already,
21:04they are about to clinch their division.
21:06It is going to be a long playoff ride
21:08for hopefully both those Dallas teams.
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21:35Now, the Rangers got some good news
21:37after a bullpen session from Max Scherzer this week.
21:40He threw a 40-pitch bullpen session and is feeling great.
21:45He is feeling amazing.
21:46He is feeling no lingering effects from that back surgery.
21:51The arm feels healthy. The back feels healthy.
21:53The shoulder, elbow, the whole head, shoulders, knees, and toes,
21:56everything is feeling healthy, happy,
21:58and thriving from the late 30s.
22:03I believe 38 or 39-year-old Max Scherzer.
22:06And he is progressing very quickly towards a rehab assignment.
22:10He will probably throw another bullpen next week.
22:13And then after that, it'll be a rehab assignment.
22:15And so Max Scherzer could be back way sooner than anticipated.
22:21He is on a normal buildup like a regular spring training for him.
22:24He is not fast-tracking anything.
22:26He is not trying to do more than his body says that he can do,
22:30but he is still feeling great.
22:33This is a guy who has been one of the least injury-prone pitchers
22:36of our game, of our age.
22:38And he is in his late 30s,
22:41and he's really only had a couple of injury-prone seasons at all,
22:45which is just nuts because I was just talking about it
22:49on the last episode of this show
22:51about how insanely frequent pitcher injuries are
22:55and how everyone's up in arms
22:57because Garrett Cole is hurt this year
22:59or because Spencer Strider is hurt this year.
23:03And I get it, and it sucks for our game.
23:06It really does.
23:07But Max Scherzer having a 16-year career so far
23:11where he's only had a couple of seasons
23:14where he wasn't insanely durable and insanely healthy
23:17and pitching over 170 or over 180 or 200 innings.
23:22I mean, the guy has 2,800 career innings in 16 years.
23:27He debuted in 2008 as a 23-year-old,
23:32and now he's in his age 39 season.
23:35He is turning 40 on July 27th of this year,
23:39so he is 29 years old.
23:43I think maybe when he comes back,
23:45he will become my favorite 39-year-old,
23:47taking that mantle from David Robinson,
23:49who had a really nice night just facing one batter
23:51and getting out of that last inning of work
23:54and getting out of a little bit of a jam.
23:57But still, I am so excited to have Max Scherzer
24:00back in this rotation, having him come back
24:02and be anywhere near the version of himself
24:04that he was last year, which was a .320 ERA pitcher
24:08in eight starts, 45 innings, still striking out
24:11more than a batter per nine,
24:1210.5 Ks per nine last year with the Rangers,
24:15and looked very, very effective.
24:17And if the Rangers can get him back,
24:20I'm assuming around a month is maybe the median time
24:26that he would come back, but the Rangers didn't place him
24:29on the 60-day IL to start the season,
24:31so it means they thought he was going to come back
24:34at least before May 28th or 25th or so.
24:38That's about where the 60-day IL you could get off
24:41as soon as you were put on it at the start of the season.
24:45And so the Rangers were optimistic
24:47that he would return before then.
24:48He might not, but he might.
24:50The initial prognostication was around June.
24:54And if the Rangers can get four months of Scherzer,
24:59heck, if they can get four and a half months of Scherzer,
25:02which is about what they'd be getting if he came back
25:05in mid-May, which seems like the likelihood,
25:10the earliest I think he'd be back is May 10th,
25:12so a month from today.
25:14That feels like the absolute earliest.
25:16If he's already throwing 40 pitches,
25:19then maybe it'll be three weeks.
25:21I have absolutely no idea what Max Scherzer
25:24is going to take to be fully built back up.
25:27I'm not quite good at doing that calendar math
25:30in my head on the fly as I'm recording.
25:32But it is great news for the Rangers.
25:35It's great news that he is progressing.
25:37They're going to have two additions to this rotation that
25:40has already been mostly pretty good.
25:43Dane Dunning has been pretty solid.
25:45Nathan Eovaldi has been fantastic.
25:47Cody Bradford has been exceptional.
25:49And, well, John Gray and Andrew Heaney
25:52have had their rocky moments for sure.
25:56They've shown themselves to be capable back-end starting
25:58rotation members throughout their careers.
26:03But you're not adding Max Scherzer to throw him in the pen.
26:06That's not going to happen.
26:08You didn't sign Michael Lorenzen to start the season in the pen
26:13before you get back Scherzer, before you get back Malley,
26:19before you get back to Grom.
26:21You signed them to start.
26:24Well, in Scherzer's case, you traded for him to start.
26:27But this team is in a very, very good place with their roster,
26:30with this fantastic update.
26:32And another Hurt player who has seemed
26:34to be coming back a little bit, well,
26:37right around when we thought, still about a week away,
26:39I think, for Nathaniel Lowe, but a nice night for him
26:42on the broadcast in the booth doing play-by-play.
26:45Nathaniel Lowe, who has apparently
26:47been bugging Dave Raymond about doing
26:49play-by-play for at least a couple of years, it seems like.
26:53It's been a while that he has had the bug to not only
26:55be on the broadcast, but do an inning of play-by-play.
26:58He did so tonight and was absolutely delightful
27:00on the broadcast.
27:01Shout out to Nathaniel Lowe.
27:02Hope he gets back soon.
27:04He was running the bases and taking some swings this week
27:07and felt pretty good coming back from that oblique strain.
27:10So that is good news for the Rangers lineup that is, well,
27:13it is depleted, but it is still scoring
27:16about six runs a game, which if you've
27:18got a depleted offense down two all-star caliber players,
27:22have Corey Steger, who is, I don't think,
27:24quite fully healthy, but still hitting 340
27:28and still getting Jonah Heim fully back into form,
27:32which, by the way, he had some pretty darn good at-bats.
27:35And this one, I was also a little worried
27:36about the quality of Jonah Heim's
27:37at-bats to start the season.
27:39But hey, it seems like everybody is figuring things out
27:42at the right time, and that is an encouraging thing
27:45for this Rangers squad that is only getting healthier
27:48and only getting better.
27:49And by the way, despite all the weeping and wailing
27:52and gnashing of teeth at the Rangers,
27:54still only being two games above 500 at this point,
27:57they're still first in the AL West.
27:59And don't look at the Astros, but look at the Astros,
28:02if you want to laugh a little bit,
28:03and what they've done these last couple of games
28:07they have lost against the Kansas City Royals.
28:10But the Rangers, not everything is going perfectly,
28:13especially for this pen.
28:14They have had some issues.
28:16And so far, the last man, lowest man
28:19on the totem pole so far this season has been
28:21Erie Rodriguez.
28:22He's got an ERA of 635.
28:25And while he hasn't been horrific,
28:27he hasn't quite been that consistent guy
28:30that we saw in spring training.
28:32And because he has a minor league option this year,
28:36I would imagine that maybe even by, maybe not tonight,
28:40maybe after this game against the A's,
28:43he will be optioned, he's probably gonna be
28:45the first guy optioned to AAA
28:48because he has those options.
28:49Jonathan Hernandez has been rehabbing
28:51since basically spring training.
28:54He has pitched in four games
28:55for the AAA Round Rock Express,
28:57just one walk in those four innings,
29:00three hits, four strikeouts for him.
29:02He is looking like he is just about ready to come back.
29:04And he has been a little bit more consistent
29:07of a version of Erie Rodriguez
29:09than we have seen from Erie,
29:10as inconsistent as we've seen Hernandez at times.
29:13Last year was an unmitigated disaster for Hernandez,
29:16but we know the stuff is still there.
29:19I think he can still be an elite,
29:21back end of the bullpen kind of guy.
29:23And with Josh Bores on the IL for now,
29:26the Rangers need every single one of those guys
29:28that they can get.
29:29Every single member of that bullpen
29:32needs to be worth his salt,
29:33something that you can throw in a game,
29:35whether you are up 10 runs or down three runs,
29:40or if you're in a tight spot,
29:41if it is a high leverage situation,
29:42or even if you're down a couple runs with this offense,
29:46you always want bullpen guys who can keep you in games
29:48and can keep things from spiraling out of control,
29:50because with this offense, this team is never out of game.
29:53So every single spot in this pen is crucial.
29:57And I think it's not long before we see
29:59Jonathan Hernandez back in this bullpen.
30:03But again, the quality of at-bats for the Rangers
30:05in this one, having some great at-bats
30:08with runners in scoring position,
30:10not doing too much with the long balls,
30:12still a little bit slow on their long ball
30:14start to the season, which is kind of weird,
30:16because this is not a team that plays
30:19in a cold weather environment where it takes some time
30:21to start hitting those home runs.
30:23I think just the slow start to the season
30:25is something you can see with a championship hangover.
30:28They have seen, they have felt the effects
30:30of having these different guys who have had
30:32such long, such a long season last year,
30:35longest season you can possibly have,
30:37playing in literally every single game.
30:39It hasn't really affected Marcus Simien
30:40because he's the insane Ironman,
30:42but Corey Seager is still coming back from a surgery.
30:45You still have your corner infielders on the IL.
30:48Josh Young's gonna be out for a couple of months,
30:50but hey, it's the next man up.
30:51And so far, these next men have been doing fantastic.
30:54Jared Walsh stepping in a couple of walks in this one
30:57and a run scored and has been running the bases
31:00as fast as he can.
31:02I feel like there's been quite a few cents
31:04where he has been pretty aggressive.
31:05Tony Beasley has been pretty aggressive
31:07and it has ended up scoring a run there.
31:09But Josh Smith having some fantastic at-bats so far.
31:13Travis Jankowski having a DH day
31:15and even Lillie Tavares with a multi-hit day in this one.
31:19Everyone is stepping up on this team
31:22and it is only getting better from here.
31:24A pretty encouraging start to the season
31:26despite some of these early bumps we have seen in the road.
31:30Hoping that Wyatt Langford gets the day on
31:33in this finale on Thursday afternoon.
31:36Hoping that he can get off the snide,
31:37get his first Major League home run.
31:39Because this guy adjusts so quickly,
31:41I think the day off will be good for him
31:42just to give him a day to rest his mind
31:45and gum up against this Oakland A's team
31:47and hopefully get himself on the board
31:50and the Rangers can get themselves that series win
31:53that they very much would like to have
31:55against these Oakland A's.
31:57But that's gonna do it for today's show.
31:58Thank you all so much for listening and subscribing
32:00and until next time,
32:02don't forget to enjoy World Series Champion
32:04Texas Rangers Baseball.