The Texas Rangers entered the 2025 season with high hopes looking to contend for the American League West. Their pitching staff delivered as they had MLB best 3.47 ERA and would keep the team in games even when the bats couldn’t produce.
The offense was a big disappointment for the Rangers as they dragged the team down in games that they should have won. Their slash line as a team was .234/..302/.381 which had them rank as 26 out of 30 MLB teams. The time when the lineup struggled the most was when they had the chances to grab runs home.
Struggles with RISP
The biggest indicator of Texas’s offensive struggles were its inability to bring runners in when they were in scoring position. These led to potential wins being turning into frustrating losses.
Diving into the numbers, the Rangers’ .243 batting average with runners in scoring position placed them 26th out of 30 MLB teams, well below the league average of .255. Their on-base percentage (OBP) in these high-leverage spots was a lackluster .316, and their slugging percentage (SLG) came in at .387, resulting in an OPS of .703—again, 26th in the majors and trailing the league mark of .745.
When they did make contact, they were not collecting too many extra base hits with only 38 home runs that ranks bottom 10 in the league. They were better with doubles collecting 65 coming in at 15th place. That doesn’t mean too much as the team struggled to bring those guys in. Due to these the Rangers only scored 476 runs in 1476 plate appearance ranking 23rd in the league.
Putting it in perspective
The top two teams in RISP were the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Toronto Blue Jays who just faced off in the World Series. The Dodgers boasted a slash line of .277/.362/.475 and the Blue Jays’s was .292/.361/.449. Both of them also were top three in least amount of strikeouts with runners in scoring position.
The Rangers by contrast struck out 327 times which ranked 12th least. This was the risk that the team took when they constructed their lineup in the offseason before the 2025 season. They brought some sluggers and focused on a power first lineup, but they had significant swing and miss dangers.
Compared to their AL West rival the Houston Astros were not much better than the Rangers coming in at 22nd in the league in RISP. However, they found a way to scratch and claw their way closer to postseason contention than the Rangers and their offense had more life.
Looking Ahead
The Rangers have made some adjustments to their roster by letting Adolis Garcia and Jonah Heim walk and trading Marcus Semien for Brandon Nimmo. Hopefully these changes can lead to better results on the field for the team and show that they have seen the problem and addressed it.
