Texas Rangers 2017 offensive stats

The Rangers are sitting at a game under .500 right now, with a +5 run differential, and looking at the numbers, its kind of hard to figure out how that’s the case. The team is 13th in batting average, 11th in OBP, 11th in slugging, and 12th in OPS, and yet is somehow 7th in the league in runs scored.

Combining scoring more runs than one would expect, given the slash line for the team, and putting up a team ERA that is three-quarters of a run better than the team FIP, and the Rangers look like a team that is doing it with smoke and mirrors more than a legitimate .500 team.

In any case, when we peruse the numbers for the hitters, the explanation for why the team slash line numbers are near the bottom of the league is pretty evident...there’s quite a few hitters who are performing solidly, but no one who has been great. On the other hand, there are quite a few players who have, offensively, been disasters, starting with the right side of the infield. Other than Robinson Chirinos, the bench has been non-productive (other than, arguably, Delino DeShields, who has a 702 OPS), and there just hasn’t been the type of great offensive season that the Rangers would need from a couple of their hitters to balance that out.

That said, the silver lining is that three of the four young-ish hitters who are important to the team’s future — Elvis Andrus, Joey Gallo and Nomar Mazara -- are having solid years, while Rougned Odor, the fourth guy in that group, is showing signs of snapping out of his season-long slump.