The Playoffs are back in Arlington.

          Game 1: Texas Rangers at Toronto Blue Jays October 8th, 2:30 p.m. (CST)

        Game 2: Texas Rangers at Toronto Blue Jays October 9th, 11:30 am (CST)

                  Game 3: Toronto Blue Jays at Texas Rangers October 11th, 7:00.  (CST) (TBD)

                       Game 4 (If Neccessary): Toronto Blue Jays at Texas Rangers October 12th (TBD)

                      Game 5 (If Necessary): Texas Rangers at Toronto Blue Jays October 14th (TBD)

Playoff baseball is back for the Texas Rangers. 3 years after losing a one game playoff against the Baltimore Orioles 5-1 the Rangers are back in the playoffs. This will be their first playoff series since the World Series back in 2011. They enter the AL Playoffs as the number 3 seed and open against the number 2 seed and AL East Champions Toronto Blue Jays. This will be the first playoffs for the Blue Jays since Joe Carters’ famous walkoff home run in game 6 of the 1993 World Series against Mitch Williams and the Philadelphia Phillies. The question of this series is can anyone in the AL field stop or slow down the Jays enough to beat them. Consider this as we come into this series, From August 1st till the end of the season the Jays went 40-18. That of course came after they made the trades for David Price and Troy Tulowitzki. Their run differential in the last two months and one week of October increased from +104 to +221. They led the league in most offensive categories including, home runs, 2b’s, OBP, Slug %, OPS, and BB’s. They also ranked near the bottom in strikeouts and were second in team batting average. They were first in runs by 127 runs. They were the only team with 800+ runs at 891. If you just look at the numbers they should roll through the playoffs right? They have the offense and a good pitching staff so can they be beat. In this post I am going to break down this matchup between the Rangers and Blue Jays and maybe give you some areas in which I think the Rangers can take advantage and possibly be able to win this series.

Texas Rangers- Toronto Blue Jays 2015 Series Recap

The first series between these two teams took place in late June from June 26th-June 28th in Toronto. The Rangers lost two of the three games. The first game they lost 12-2. Nick Martinez started that game against Mark Buerhle. He allowed the first 3 hitters to reach before Edwin Encarnacion hit a grand slam and before there were any outs it was already 4-0. Buerhle pitched 7 innings and got the win, Nick Martinez the loss. That was right around the time Beltre was coming back from his finger injury and Deshields was still on his way back from his hamstring injury. That game marked the end of a 6 game losing streak. The next day Yovanni Gallardo took the mound against Matt Boyd and the Blue Jays and nearly threw a complete game shutout. He pitched into the 9th inning and ended up with the win as the Rangers won 4-0 behind home runs from Robinson Chirinos and Mitch Moreland. Matt Boyd took the loss as he gave up 4 runs in 6.2 innings. The third game saw Chi Chi Gonzalez lose a 3-2 game to Drew Hutchinson and the Jays. It was a game that saw the Jays score 1 run in the 4th and 2 runs in the 5th, the Rangers tried coming back but could never get the tying run across the plate. The Rangers lost two out of three in this series, but not a lot can be gained from looking back at it because Nick Martinez and Mark Buerhle won’t be starting a game, Matt Boyd was traded to Detroit in the David Price trade, Drew Hutchinson will not be starting a game in this series either. It was a close series that the Rangers could have won in Toronto but these are two completly different teams as we go into the playoffs.

The next series took place in Arlington between August 25-27th. I think we can glean more from this series than the previous. First off the Rangers had already completed trades for Cole Hamels, Jake Diekman, Mike Napoli, and Will Venable. The Blue Jays had David Price and Troy Tulowitzki playing as well. So lets take a look back at those three games. The first game was between Derek Holland, who was making his second start since coming back from his shoulder injury, going up against veteran Mark Buerhle. The offense scored 5 runs off of Mark Buerhle and had a 5-4 lead in the 9th, but Tolleson walked two batters, Tulowitzki had a game-tying hit, and Beltre threw wide on a grounder by Josh Donaldson that allowed the winning run to score. It was Tolleson’s last blown save of the season. He got himself in trouble with walks and just couldn’t recover well enough to close out the game. The Jays before that had hit 3 home runs off of Holland who left a few pitches up but otherwise pitched a pretty good game against the Jays. In the second game it was Colby Lewis going up against David Price. The Rangers jumped out to a 2-0, but the game got away from Lewis after that as he allowed a run in the 3rd and 4th and then the bottom dropped out as he allowed 2 more in the 5th and then the Jays scored 6 in the 6th off a grand slam by Edwin Encarnacion, his second against the Rangers this season.The final ended up being 12-4. It was an ugly game that saw the Jays walk 11 times and saw David Price once again pitch well against the Rangers. The third game saw Yovanni Gallardo go up against Marco Estrada in what Jeff Bannister was calling a must win game. This game will be remembered for the inside the park home run that Deshields hit in the 7th inning that extended the lead from 1-0 to 4-0. That was on a misplay by Jose Bautista when he allowed a hard hit ground ball to right to get under his glove and roll all the way to the wall. That takes away from another great performance that Gallardo had against the Jays. He went 5.1 scoreless this time and the bullpen was able to bring it home. Kela, Diekman, Dyson, and Tolleson were able to combine 3.2 innings and only one run allowed. The Rangers were again able to take 1 out of 3 against the Jays.

So to recap the Rangers went 2-4 against the Jays this season. Each series saw them win a close game, lose a blowout, and lose a close game. I think the Rangers should not fear this team. The Jays went 40-18 down the stretch, but the Rangers played great ball as well. From August 1st to the end of the season the Rangers went 38-22 in order to come back from 8 down to clinch the division. As I look back at these two series and look forward to the playoffs the things the Rangers must do better is to attack the strike zone. I feel like in the August series that the pitchers nibbled around the corners trying to throw the perfect pitch and it just led to them walking batters. The Blue Jays led the league in walks and so trying to get them to swing at bad pitches will not work and will just lead to big innings. They must field the ball cleanly. An error by Beltre and walks by Tolleson cost them one of the games in August. There is not a lot of margin of error with this series. If they give the Jays extra outs it could cost them a game or the series. Solo home runs are better than home runs with runners on base. Edwin Encarnacion hitting two grand slams against the Rangers probably eliminated chances that they had to come back in two of the games. When the Jays have runners on base the pitchers must be focused and hitting their targets, they cannot leave pitches hanging in the zone. The Jays have too many great hitters who will hit them out of the park. Finally, the hitters must continue their patient approach that they had in September and October. They wore pitchers out down the stretch and that led to many big innings from the offense. In the August series they had 9 walks in 27 innings and 3 of them were Deshields in the final game of the series. It is not just about taking walks though, but it is about not swinging at the pitchers pitch. Those are things they need to improve on from the two series that the team played in June and August of this season.

Keys to the Series

• The offense for the Blue Jays is high powered, but there is outs in the lineup and the Rangers must take advantage of those. 1-5 is pretty lethal, but the bottom of the order can be had depending on where they hit Troy Tulowitzki. Too often during that final week and change we saw the Rangers pitchers struggle against the bottom of the order for the Astros, Tigers, and Angels. That cannot happen in this series. If Ryan Goins, Russell Martin, Kevin Pillar, and Chris Collabello have big series this will be impossible to win. Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion, Tulo, and Josh Donaldson will have their moments, but the Rangers can win if they keep it to just them. If they shut down the bottom of the order they can almost pick and choose hitters to pitch around or pitch carefully to at the top of the order. The big innings will come when the bottom of the order gets on base and rolls around to the top of the order for them to knock them in.
• The Rangers pitching must keep the ball down. Cole Hamels is really the only strikeout pitcher the Rangers have, so the other guys must keep the ball low and hope that the Jays chase and hit the ball on the ground. Gallardo, Lewis, Holland, or Perez can’t beat them high, so they must keep the ball down in order to minimize their pitch count and hopefully keep the game low scoring.
• The Rangers must not let the crowd in Toronto affect them. It is going to be loud for games 1 and 2 as this is Toronto’s first home playoff games since 1993. They are going to do their best to give the Jays a distinct home field advantage. The Rangers though have been a great road team all season long. They finished 45-36 which tied with St. Louis and Pittsburgh as the second best road records in the league and 3 game behind the Chicago Cubs for the best road record in the league. They have been a great team on the road and that must continue if they hope to advance.
• The Rangers must score early and keep the Jays off the board early. This kind of goes with the point about the home crowd. If the Rangers can put runs on the board in the first few innings and keep the Jays off the board they can take the crowd out of the game and put some pressure on the Jays to have to come back. The Rangers have been great at scoring first so far. The combination of Deshields and Choo at 1,2 and then Fielder and Beltre has led to a run or multiple runs in the first inning numerous times. The Jays can come back and have against the Rangers, but scoring early and often will give them a better chance at winning than having to come from behind.
• The Rangers must be aggressive on the basepaths. That does not necessarily mean always trying to steal bases, but it does mean going 1st to third, taking chances going 2nd to home, stealing a base in the right situations, and just forcing the action. The team has multiple players that can do that, Delino Deshields, Elvis Andrus, Roughned Odor, and Shin Soo Choo. These are the guys that the team will be looking to as the agressors on the basepaths. Russell Martin has caught 44% of runners attempting to steal, but that doesn’t mean the Rangers should not test him. Test him and try to keep the defense on their toes, whether it be bunt hit attempts or forcing the outfielders to make accurate throws. They cannot sit back and wait on the home run to come. If they do that then they are dead in the water.
• Finally, my X-factor in this series for the Rangers is Josh Hamilton. He just recently began playing again after his knee surgery on September 11th. He seems to be getting his timing back as he hit two home runs in the game Saturday against the Angels. He can be a difference maker at the bottom of the order. He is likely to hit 6th for the Rangers and play left field. He can be a guy that can change a game with one swing of the bat. We have seen him multiple times win games for the Rangers this season and now that we are in the playoffs hopefully he can provide the same timely hitting. It would be quite the story if he can lead the Rangers past the Jays and out of the first round. It won’t be easy but nothing in Josh Hamilton’s life has been. If he has a good series I like the Rangers chances, because he gives them one more hitter that can lengthen the lineup and make it harder for the Jays pitchers.

My Prediction

The Rangers have fought hard all year to get here. They were 9 games down in May when everyone counted them out, they were 8 games back in August when everyone counted them out, and they lost game 161 11-10 and everyone counted them out as the division winner. Each time they came back and made a statement. On Sunday in game 162 they finally clinched the AL West for the first time since 2011. It has been a long hard road to get here in this series against the Blue Jays. So who do I think will win this series? I think the Blue Jays will win in 4 games. I hope that I am wrong, but down the stretch I saw too many inconsistencies with the starting staff. The bullpen will be rested which is a positive, but will the starters be able to give them a lead. I am not sure about that. Too much firepower from the Jays for me to pick the Rangers. I will say this though that the winner of this series is my pick to make it to the World Series from the AL. I think this series follows the trend of the season series between these two teams. I feel like the Jays will win a blowout at some point, the Rangers will lose a close game, the Rangers will win a close game that the bullpen closes out, and Jays will win a tossup game. It will be a fun series. The exciting part is that unlike the Jays almost everyone on this Rangers team will be back next season. Cole Hamels is still under contract till 2018, Beltre has one more year, and Yu Darvish is expected back next season. There also is multiple prospects like Nomar Mazara, Lewis Brinson, and Joey Gallo who will be ready to break through next season and challenge for full time spots. The future looks bright for the Rangers. The present though has them in the playoffs with a chance to win their third AL Pennant in 6 years.