2024 Team Previews: Texas Rangers
Going through all 30 teams, looking back at 2023 and ahead to the 2024 season through a fantasy baseball lens.
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Rangers Intro
The World Series champs! It was a pretty interesting season for the Rangers. They made big moves to add Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer, and ended up having neither of those players have much at all to do with their World Series championship. And now they won’t have either guy for the majority of the 2024 season either! This is not a pitching staff that you would expect to come from a reigning World Series champ.
They did their damage offensively in 2024, coming in third in the league in runs scored and posting a .790 team OPS. Their output was a little front-heavy. They slashed .274/.341/.460 in the first half and then just .247/.331/.442 in the second half, but they put together a good enough run in the playoffs to get them a ring.
Personally, your boy has never been in the great state of Texas. I’ve never been much of a traveler, and I’m especially disinclined to it now with these three kids! When you have books and a high-speed Internet connection and grass like mine, why do you need to ever go anywhere? But yeah, if there was a state I’d like to check out someday it would probably be Texas. What I’m actually hoping comes from this Substack is that I end up with like thousands of readers who really like me and live in MLB cities and offer to house and feed me and my family so we can all get to some of these stadiums on the cheap. Comment below to offer your services! But don’t worry, no intention on taking anybody up on an offer for at least five years when these boys of mine can actually distinguish between a fastball and a curveball. Also, my wife will absolutely never go for taking our family into a stranger’s house. Women, amirite??
There’s also this “That’s Texas” song by Cody Johnson that I enjoy.
That’s Texas, home of George Strait the king
Ain’t no such thing as chili with beans
So are you telling me that I’m some Yankee lib for putting beans in my chili? I kind of thought beans were in the definition of a chili, although I suppose maybe a chili’s only requirement would be, you know, a chili pepper - which I don’t even put in my chili… so I guess I am a Yankee lib. Damn.
Hitters
Corey Seager
Age: 29
Pos: SS
Seager was massively hyped up for 2023 with the shift change rules, and he did not disappoint. He had a massive year and led the Rangers offense to be one of the league’s best units for most of the year. The line:
536 PA, 88 R, 33 HR, 96 RBI, 2 SB, .325/.388/.621, 1.009 OPS
He was one of just four players with an OPS above 1.00. He hit 33 homers and drove in 96 despite missing significant time. Marcus Semien led the team with 752 PAs, and Adolis Garcia was down at 632 - so Seager possibly missed out on 100 PAs, which would likely have turned into around five more homers 20 more RBI. He really could have gone for a 100-38-115 line, which would have been just ridiculous.
The batting average was elite as well, meaning the only thing he came up short of first-round value in was the steals. His 2.3% SB Attempt% rate was among the league’s lowest, so there’s almost no chance of him even giving you five steals.
That makes a bigger difference than we might think. Despite the juggernaut season, he was #20 on the player rater. Take away the IL stint and he surely climbs up five or so more spots, and the floor he brings to the game makes him a perfectly justified top 15 pick this year, I just don’t think it’s wise to take him in the first half of the first round.
I don’t think much more needs said about him, but let’s show the plots just to show how good this guy is.
Possibly the most impressive thing about him are his swing decisions.
He put up an 84% zone-swing rate, the highest in the league, but he did that without having a high chase rate. That seems like an almost impossible thing to do - but that is just how good this guy is at pitch selection.
February update: Seager had hernia surgery this off-season and seems questionable for Opening Day. The news is much more optimistic than pessimistic, and it’s a low risk of reduced performance, but it’s not out of the question that he misses a couple of weeks and starts a bit slow as he gets ramped up.
The projection systems all have Seager 4th at SS behind Witt Jr., Turner, and Lindor. This injury thing solidifies that. If you’re in a point league he can get a little closer to those guys because the lack of steals doesn’t hurt as much, but to me it’s clear he’s the #4 SS at best this year for roto leagues.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Trea Turner, Francisco Lindor
Projections not updated since the injury news.
JA: 600 PA, 98 R, 32 HR, 86 RBI, 3 SB, .285/.360/.536, .896 OPS
BatX: 589 PA, 87 R, 33 HR, 98 RBI, 1 SB, .298/.372/.558, .930 OPS
Marcus Semien
Age: 33
Pos: 2B
The man of steel!
2021-2023 MLB PA Leaders
Semien 2,200
Freeman 2,133
Olson 2,092
Guerrero Jr. 2,086
Riley 2,070
That has led to a 338 runs, 100 homers, 285 RBI, and 54 steals to go with a .263 batting average since 2021. Breaking it down by year:
2021: .265/.334/.538, .873 OPS, 20.2% K%, 9.1% BB%, 45 HR, 15 SB
2022: .248/.304/.429, .733 OPS, 16.6% K%, 7.3% BB%, 26 HR, 25 SB
2023: .276/.348/.478, .826 OPS, 14.6% K%, 9.6% BB%, 29 HR, 14 SB
So the HR+SB has been nice, although it has taken absolute max playing time to get there. The SB attempt rate fell to 9% last year and he was caught on three of 17 attempts.
I would think that will fall a bit more this year as he approaches his mid-thirties. The power is also a little bit more questionable because he relies so much on pulling the ball, it’s just a thinner margin and I think one of these years he’s going to turn into a 15-20 homer guy.
It’s a lot of contact, but it’s not often very loud.
He gets the ball in the air, which is good for extra bases but bad for the BABIP which has been below .275 the last two seasons.
Anyways, there’s no reason to think Semien can’t lead off 150+ times again this year in a very good offense, so he’ll continue to be a guy that stuffs the stat sheet, I just think there’s some added risk now with his age, declining steals, and lack of raw power.
My model is really not a fan of him right now, putting him as the #7 2B, but Steamer is more optimistic putting him behind only Betts and Albies. So keep that in mind with the projection you see below.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Ozzie Albies, Jose Altuve
JA: 692 PA, 99 R, 24 HR, 76 RBI, 11 SB, .257/.326/.433, .758 OPS
BatX: 691 PA, 96 R, 28 HR, 91 RBI, 18 SB, .264/.333/.472, .805 OPS
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