Leading Off: Texas Rangers
Can’t rule out the chance that Rougie will come off the IL against his former team (AP)
The Teams
The Yankees enter this series at the new Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas as winners of 5 series in a row, and are 6-0-2 in their last 8 series. Not so bad, is it? They are a half game behind Toronto, but remain just 2 games behind Boston for the division lead. I’m beginning to worry about run differential, as the offense has not shown the ability to put up runs consistently. Thankfully, they are coming up against the Rangers, who are in the basement of the AL West, are riding a 6 game losing streak, and will have to contend with the top of the Yankee rotation.
Do the Rangers, Who Are in Last Place, Do Anything Well?
Thanks for asking.
The Rangers can hit the ball a little bit. They have 4 players who have at least 7 homers. Compare that to 2 Yankees who have more than 5 homers. Like the Yankees, they have 4 players who have an OPS of at least .785, and 4 players with a SLG of at least .440. To continue pulling this thread, the Rangers have 7 players with at least 25 hits, the Yankees have 5 (and one is hurt). The Yankees are not exactly the gold standard of offensive production, and this might say more about them than it says about the Rangers, but the Rangers are not that bad offensively. Their team OPS is only 1 point below that of the Yankees. Hopefully this series goes a long way toward changing that.
Surely They Must Do Something Poorly?
Yes, caption voice, they do.
The Rangers have a team ERA of 4.44, good for 22nd in MLB. Their starters have a combined ERA of 4.74, good for 24th in the league. Their bullpen isn’t bad, with a 3.94 ERA, but it has had to work a lot, pitching the fourth most innings of any bullpen in baseball to this point.
This team is REALLY GOOD at giving up runs. It would be in the best interest of the New York Yankees to capitalize on that.
Watch Out For…
Adolis Garcia. This is not a name you are likely to know, given that he has only played 56 MLB games (32 of them this year) and never played against the Yankees, but the guy can flat out hit. He is doing it all this year, but slugging has been his calling card. He’s already racked up 10 homers and 26 RBI this season, showing impressive power to all fields.
He hits the ball very hard (94th percentile in hard hit rate, 93rd percentile in barrel rate, and 89th percentile in average exit velocity) and his expected batting average, wOBA, and SLG are all above average. He does have some holes offensively (that might explain why he is 28 years old and still a rookie), ranking in the bottom fifth of the league in strikeout rate, walk rate, whiff rate, and chase rate. I say don’t give him anything to hit and hope he swings at some junk.
Pitching Matchups
Game 1: Gerrit Cole vs Jordan Lyles
You don’t need me to explain Gerrit Cole to you. He’s currently working on the lowest ERA and lowest FIP of any Yankees pitcher ever, as we discussed ON OUR NEW PODCAST, and is shaping up to be the greatest free agent signing the Yankees have ever made. Pretty good stuff.
You might need me to explain Jordan Lyles to you. He made his MLB debut with Houston in 2011 at age 20, and has pitched to a career ERA over 5 since then. He’s split his time between starting and relieving (160 starts in 265 career appearances), and frankly has failed to show anything special… ever. Ok, that was a little harsh. He was awesome in 11 starts with Milwaukee in 2019, pitching to a 2.45 ERA. His 4.42 FIP was a bit concerning that year, though.
There’s no way to sugarcoat this part: Lyles has horrible peripherals. He allows a ton of hard contact (bottom 15% of the league in average exit velocity, max exit velocity, hard hit rate, xwOBA, xERA, xSLG, and xBA) and he’s below average in every stat on his Baseball Savant card except fastball spin and curveball spin. I’ve seen bad pitchers that can really spin a breaking ball give the Yankees a hard time before, but I don’t see Lyles joining that list.
Game 2: Jameson Taillon vs Mike Foltynewicz
One way that Jameson Taillon and Jordan Lyles are different is that, as we discussed on our podcast, Jameson Taillon has pretty good peripherals. He strikes a lot of guys out, and his expected stats are good in spite of some hard contact he has allowed. He’s become much more of a fly ball pitcher than he used to be (33% fly ball rate this year versus 20.9% in 2018), and he’s allowing fewer line drives than he used to. Unfortunately, barreled fly balls have a tendency to turn into homers, despite the low league-wide batting average on fly balls. I have to say, though, I have confidence in a guy whose line drive rate is within 1 percentage point of Gerrit Cole’s. Feels like a good guy to emulate.
How about Folty? He’s another Rangers starter who debuted with Houston at a young age (he was 22), but you probably know him from his days in Atlanta. Folty had some good times on the Braves, including 2018 when he finished in the top-10 of the Cy Young Voting and had a 2.85 ERA. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to recapture that magic, and is pitching to a 4.60 ERA and a 5.50 FIP this year. Like Lyles, Folty has bad underlying stats, He allows a ton of hard contact, does not strike guys out, and doesn’t have high spin on his fastball or curveball. He is another guy the Yankees should hit hard. No excuse not to.
Game 3: Corey Kluber vs Wes Benjamin
The Yankees are 5-3 when Kluber starts this year, and they’re 4-0 in his last 4 starts, during which he’s pitched to a 2.39 ERA and struck out more than a batter per inning. On the season, he’s sitting at a 3.48 ERA and a 3.99 FIP. Not quite back to his Cy Young days, but getting there. Baseball Savant is not hugely impressed with him, noting his tendency to walk batters (this came up in Baltimore) and his unimpressive strikeout rate (though it is climbing). Kluber is coming off of two seasons that were cut short due to injury, and is a notoriously slow starter. I think we’ve seen him find his groove over the last couple weeks, and expect him to handle this Rangers lineup well. Also, I’d be remiss if I did not mention that this is the Corey Kluber Revenge Game.
You could be forgiven for not knowing who Wes Benjamin is. I didn’t until last week. His start against the Yankees will be his 13th career game and 3rd career start, as the 27-year old debuted just last August. Fun fact about Wes Benjamin, the Yankees drafted him out of high school but he didn’t sign, and chose to attend the university of Kansas. The Rangers picked him in the 5th round in 2014. Pretty cool.
What’s not cool for Wes Benjamin is that his ERA is 7.36 this year, his FIP is 6.67, and his xwOBA allowed is .412 (actual .378). For context, Aaron Judge’s wOBA is .417, and in 2019 it was .382. So Wes Benjamin allows batted balls that we’d expect to produce something like the results of 2021 Aaron Judge, but hitters have to settle for being 2019 Aaron Judge. Wes Benjamin is not very good.
Game 4: Domingo Germán vs Dane Dunning
Domingo Germán has made 5 starts since returning from the alternate site. The Yankees are 5-0 when he pitches, and he is averaging over 6 innings per start and pitching to a 2.37 ERA. The underlying stats suggest Domingo is getting a little lucky (presumably because his fastball is getting DESTROYED and they don’t think he’s paying for it sufficiently in runs allowed), but he doesn’t walk guys, is good at getting swings at pitches out of the zone, and his a very high spin rate guy. That’ll play.
Dane Dunning is the one starter for the Rangers in this series who is worth worrying about going into it. The 26-year old righty has been in some notable trades in his career, and he can really pitch, so it’s not hard to see why he’d be a valuable commodity. He went from the Nationals to the White Sox in the Lucas Giolito trade, and then went from the White Sox to the Rangers last winter in the Lance Lynn trade. In 7 starts last year, he posted a 3.97 ERA (3.99 FIP) and struck out about a btter per inning. This year his FIP is down to 2.61, presumably because of the extra batter per 9 that he is striking out, and his declining walk rate. He’s pitched to a 4.34 ERA, and is allowing almost 50% more hits per 9 innings than he did last year, but all signs point to him being a serviceable to above average MLB arm. He’s not a super high velocity guy, but he doesn’t allow too much hard contact, and gets enough strikeouts to keep opposing offenses in check.
What Should We Expect?
The Yankees are sending their three best pitchers out in this one, and it would be a shame not to take at least three games from a last place team. You don’t get to play basement dwellers too often, so you better beat them when you have the chance.
Just for fun, let’s enjoy some homers the Yankees have hit in Texas in the past.
Let’s go Yankees.
