Since I hit on the Edinson Volquez hokey-pokey last night (you put Volquez in the rotation, you pull him out, you put Volquez back in the rotation and you shake him all about), there's not a whole lot else in Rangerland to hit on this morning...
Evan Grant focuses on the strides made by some Rangers youngsters in this morning's game story...
Nelson Cruz and Robinson Tejeda are guys who are pretty key pieces for the Rangers in 2007. If the Rangers can count on 130 games of solid performance in right field from Cruz next year, and 170-180 innings in the 4.75-5.25 ERA range from Tejeda, that would go a long way towards getting the Rangers back into contention next year. The Rangers don't need those two guys to be stars...they just need them to be okay, to avoid creating a black hole in the lineup or in the rotation. And performances like yesterday's give you some hope that those two can deliver for the Rangers...
Best of all, Buck says Nelson Cruz has the "good face," which is always encouraging. Those who were watching the Rangers broadcast yesterday afternoon may have heard Tom Grieve wondering out loud what "good face" meant, which amused me...
Gerry Fraley has a new "Just Venting" column up, and while the focus is on things not-Rangers -- and I think he's too harsh on Bill Parcells and, in particular, Don Nelson -- I do think it is interesting that he is focusing his Rangers criticism on Buck Showalter, and actually gives one of his "raves" to Jon Daniels for the way he's handled himself this season, contrasting him, and his willingness to take responsibility and deal with the public, with his predecessor's tendency to disappear when things weren't going well.
I think this is particularly interesting because there seemed to be a certain thought process last winter, that Daniels was going to be eaten alive by the D/FW media, that the guys who hated John Hart were going to view Daniels as just his proxy, or a guy who was just Buck Showalter's puppet. Instead, it seems like, at the same time Buck Showalter is increasingly coming under fire, the most vocal critics of the old g.m. -- particularly Randy Galloway and Gerry Fraley -- have been generally positive about Daniels.