I am increasingly thankful when those who cover the Rangers give us something that doesn't involve Sammy Sooser, and with the way some guys have been pitching, we're getting some of that. Tim Cowlishaw thinks that Rob Tejeda has as much or more to offer right now than Brandon McCarthy, and Tejeda gets positive mentions on his performance yesterday from Dave Sessions and Owen Perkins. Sessions also discusses A.J. Murray's welcome return to spring training action and updates the fifth starter race.
Sessions also has a profile on Kenny Lofton and his winning ways.
Evan Grant has a piece on Josh Rupe, who also pitched well yesterday, and relates this promising quote from Ron Washington on him:
Grant also has Washington saying that Laird might hit ninth against lefties, which makes about as much sense as Ian Kinsler doing so. I guess he's just determined to have one of his better hitters (in this case against lefties) bat ninth. This mindset is probably the greatest negative I've seen from Washington yet, which I guess could be much worse.
Despite swearing that he wasn't going to go with the crowd and write a fluff piece on Ron Washington, after a few days at camp Randy Galloway just couldn't resist. Galloway said on his radio show that it was the fact that players kept coming to him unsolicited and telling him how much better things are that drove him to go with the article.
Will Carroll gives his closer health reports, and not surprisingly Eric Gagne gets a red light.
Several pitchers of interest are expected to pitch today, including C.J. Wilson, Edinson Volquez, and Thomas Diamond. Jamey Wright gets the start, and I assume we'll get to hear more about Akonori Otsuka's altered delivery after this one.