Texas Rangers’ sweep of MLB-best Milwaukee Brewers shows their playoff hopes are legitimate

Texas Rangers’ sweep of MLB-best Milwaukee Brewers shows their playoff hopes are legitimate

This rag tag bunch of little rascals, this feel-good story, this cute little spunky team is no longer cute and spunky cuz they just swept the best team in baseball. You are Locked On Rangers, your daily Texas Rangers podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. You are locked on the Texas Rangers, the first and best daily Rangers podcast. I’m Bryce Patrick, a crippling addicted Texas Rangers fan, covering the team for 12 seasons, including all seven as the founder and host of this podcast. Thank you all so much for making Lockdown Rangers your first listen every single day. If not already, can follow me on Twitter, Bryce Patrick. You can follow the show, Lockdown Rangers. Hit subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and on YouTube, where the best way you can help grow the show is to comment nearly any single thing below. Now, on today’s show, we’re talking about your Texas Rangers sweeping the best team in baseball, something nobody’s done since the very beginning of this season. We’re going to talk about Jake Ber’s incredible day, why I absolutely love watching Mel Kelly work, and of course, it’s the end of the season, so we’re going to be doing doing a little bit of scoreboard watching. But before we get into all of that, today’s episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Download the app today. Now, the Rangers do it again. The comeback kids, despite being down two nothing, just two batters in, this Texas Rangers scrappy little rascal Rangers team said, “Hey, what what if we just come back and sweep the best team in baseball?” That’s exactly what these guys did. Something that has not happened since the very first series of the year. Now, the Brewers haven’t been the best team in baseball all year. We we all pretty much that that was a slam dunk answer of oh it’s the Dodgers that spent a billion dollars after winning a World Series and brought in all all these new guys that surely we’re going to make them run away with you know not just not just 100 not just winning the the division not just 100 wins 120 15 162 and0 that’s totally on the table. The last time that we had discourse or the last time that we had a sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers, it led to a discourse about torpedo bats because the Yankees hit so many home runs off of Nester Cortez that were like, “Oh, are the bats cked? Is this illegal?” And then since April, we have not talked about torpedo bats at all. That’s how long it’s been. Gosh, the torpedo bat discourse feels like 18 billion years ago. But it has been a long time since that and a long time since anybody has swept the Brewers. Heck, there haven’t been a lot of series where the Brewers have even gotten beaten, let alone swept. And when the Brewers head to this final game with their ace on the hill, Freddy Peralta, who was writing a I believe 29ining scoreless streak heading into this one, he had only allowed a combined two runs in his previous seven starts heading into this one. He he he made that scoreless inning streak go all the way up to 30 before he faced the bat of Jake Burgerer. And the Rangers were already down in this one. I was able to go to the game. Shout out game time for great ticket. great deal on tickets going to the game with my dad who uh got me this really lovely new Rangers hat and we weren’t even to our seats. We were ironically getting a couple of burgers before we got to our seats when the Rangers or before Jake Burgerer got there. Thankfully we were we were able to see the burger home run in person. But those first two we were just barely in the stadium and then boom Bryce Dang homer, boom, Jackson Cheerio homer. Oh my gosh. Well, uh, we we sure picked a game to go to, and it was absolutely incredible. It’s it’s also honestly kind of the best of both worlds for me as a Bryce Tang truther because Bryce Tang spells the name Bryce correctly like I do, with an I. He’s not one of those heretics out there spelling it with a Y like Mr. Harper out there in Philadelphia. or Lord forbid the former Brewers pitcher Bryce um whose name I’ve already forgotten his his last name because he spelled his first name Bryce Wilson, excuse me, former first round draft pick of Atlanta who spells his name B R Y S E an abomination to all of mankind. But the Rangers did not care that they were down to nothing. Merryill Kelly did not care that he was down two nothing cuz the Rangers had themselves an afternoon game and uh like everybody else has been saying they had themselves a couple of smashburgers. A two homer day for Jake Burgerer. The most impressive thing, the most unberlike thing actually was Jake Burgerer also working a walk. Just his 12th walk of the year. This man does not walk at all. All he does is mash baseballs. and he has been doing that to an insane degree in the second half. Now, he’s missed a lot of time in this second half. He’s only played in 17 games since the All-Star break. Heck, he’s only started in 12 of those games. 53 played appearances. In that time span, this man has five home runs in 53 played appearances. That that’s a homer. Basically, one out of every 10 played appearances is a homer for Jake Burgerer. And he’s also hitting 347 with an on base of 396 cuz he has worked four of those 12 walks on the season in these 17 games and he’s slugging 714. Let me say that again. He is slugging 714. That is an 1111 ops. Make a wish. I wish Jake Burger was on my team. Oh, that wish already came true cuz this man has been raking in this second half. It’s kind of insane that he wasn’t starting all these games. A lot of platoon with Rowdy Tles. I I think those days are are very much over. We are going to see a lot of Jake Burgerer between now and the end of the season. And you want to look at September so far this this month. Eight games for him. Four home runs in this month. Eight RBI’s in 1119 OPS. You look at August. I mean it was he was hitting 420. He had a lot more hits in the month of August and more home runs in this month. I mean the guy has just been mashing. And these are two huge homers. I mean he drives in three runs. He scores three runs. He scored two of those runs of driving himself in. Then he also worked well in this one where he would end up coming around to score. And this was just a big big game for Jake Burgerer who the Rangers desperately need. I mean you you go and you look at his baseball and uh well there there’s a lot of blue at the bottom the strikeouts the the chase the swing and miss um the walk percentage it’s not great. They also don’t love his fielding which I I disagree with. I think Jake Ber is a fantastic field though as we saw in the final play of this game. Him grabbing a a very soft line drive that could have so easily fallen in for a hit in the final batter of this game that Phil Mton was able to retire. But I mean his bat speed, I mean his hard hit percentage, his expected slugging percentage, which is about 60 points higher than his actual slugging percentage. I mean his actual slugging percentage is pretty solid at 449. He’s got 16 home runs now on the season. might end up getting to that 20 homer plateau. I didn’t think that anybody on this team was going to make it to the 20 homer plateau besides Cory Seager, Wyatt Langford who have already done it. Maybe Doles Garcia comes back and he he’s only two away, so maybe Doles Garcia ends up getting to that 20 homer plateau, but but Jake Burgerer, have yourself a freaking day. It wasn’t just him offensively. Alejandra Ozuna reaching base a couple of times, Cody Freeman reaching base on a hit. Uh Rody Tles driving in a run in a a pinch hit ground out situation and the Rangers getting the go-ahead run in this one in in that uh two-run third inning on a go-ahead buck that was called out by Jock Peterson. The only reason that it was allowed to happen is because Jock Peterson reached base on what was looked like just such an easy routine ground ball double play. But Jack Peterson gets on his horse. Big boy hustling out what ends up being just a fieldielder’s choice. Freddy Peralta box maybe twice. It could have been called twice. And Jock Peterson says, “Nope. Nope. I saw that. A go-ahead buck.” I mean, seeing a go-ahead buck in person just chef’s kiss. Chef’s kiss. This whole game, I mean, I headed into this game feeling like this game’s gravy. This game is absolutely just gravy. I mean, the Rangers have already won a series against the toughest team in in baseball, the best team in baseball. You got Melro Kelly out there on the hill, so you feel good about your chances, but you’re going up against Freddy Peralta, who is a fantastic pitcher, and the Rangers dropped five runs on him. And they run his pitch count all the way up to 113. I could not believe that Freddy Peralta was still out there after giving up that second homer to Jake Burger. He was at, I believe, like 96 pitches at that point. You think, okay, well, he’s already given up his second homer of the game to the same guy. May maybe we go ahead and pull him in this one. He upped his erra from 250 to 269 in this one because the Rangers were able to score across five runners in this one and they weren’t even getting that many hits. They were 1 for seven with runners in scoring position, but they were able to do the little things like, you know, Jock Peterson’s speed freaking out Freddy Peralta into into uh bing. Maybe that’s not what it was. Maybe it was just Freddy Peralta being in his own head, but they they were able to, you know, get a run home when they had the bases loaded and won out with Ratty Tles pinch hitting there. Um, I maybe would have rather seen Zeke Durant in that situation, but hey, Rowdy Tles gets the job done. We’ll see how many more of these pinch hitting appearances that we’ll get for Rdy Tles. He’s just been in kind of a skid at this point. And with both Jock Peterson and Jake Berger on heaters, I I don’t know how much we will end up seeing Rody Tles down the stretch, but he did his job in this one. Michael Helman reaching base and scoring a run in this one. And heck, I got to give I got to give love to Josh Smith, who I’ve been pretty critical of. I mean, he has one of the worst second half OPS’s in all of baseball, but this is a great game for him. And Bruce Bochi, I guess, knows and has confidence in him, like, hey, this is my leadoff guy. I know what he can do when he’s right. And maybe he’s about to break out into a skid where he starts getting right. Reaches base twice, including once ahead of Jake Burgerer for that homer, making it a two-run homer. Also reaches base later on with a walk where he ends up scoring. The Rangers able to get a run home later on in this game to get that insurance run to give themselves just that much more of a cushion, a three-run cushion heading into that ninth inning where I thought we might see a sixout save from Shawn Armstrong. We didn’t, but we did see a very strong pitching performance from Mel Kelly and from everyone in this bullpen. Talk about that and more right after this. This show is brought to you by 5Hour Energy. It’s time to fuel up with 5-hour energy transfusion. 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Tee up that trip. Visit 5hin.com for rules and entry. No purchase necessary. Excludes master tournament. Ends October 31st, 2025. This show is also brought to you by FanDuel. The NFL season is here and ready to make sure you’re ready for kickoff and a can’tmiss offer. Right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use all across the app. They’ve got all kinds of different odds on uh World Series champions. They’ve got odds on uh football. They’ve got odds on baseball. They’ve got odds on the division. Right now, Rangers at plus 1,000 to win the AOS. Astros favorite at minus 120. Mariners at plus 115. Rangers just uh two and a half games back in this AL West chase. So, if you’re ready to play, download the FanDuel app now by visiting fan.com to get started. That’s fandal.com to place your first $5 bet. Shout out to the Everyday Making Lock Ranger your first listen every single day. On tomorrow’s show, I’ll be back and previewing this series against the New York Mets and Jacob Deg Grom’s first start back at City Field since leaving those New York Metropolitans and becoming a World Series champion with the 2023 Texas Rangers. Now, this was a great game pitched not by Jacob Deg Gro, what we’ll hopefully see a great game pitched on Friday for Jacob Deg Grom. What I’m really hoping for that Friday game is that we see a continuation of a trend that we we saw a lot of when Jacob Deg Grom was in New York of Jacob Deg Grom pitching brilliantly, beautifully, incredibly, and the Mets not scoring a lot of runs. I’m hoping that trend continues except it’ll be him on the other side. I’m not hoping that the trend of his own team not giving him run support continues because we’ve had some problems with that here and he definitely had a lot of problems with the Mets. But with Jacob Deg Gro on the hill, I’d imagine we are not going to see a lot of runs for those New York Mets who are uh riding a three-game losing streak at least at this point. I think it might be four and they might end up being uh mopped in Philadelphia against those Phillies. But this was not Jay Deg Grande. This was Mel Kelly day. And despite being down 200 to the first batters he faced with a couple of homers after he went up 02 on both those hitters, that that’s the other thing that was deeply frustrating. And um we’ve seen a lot from this Rangers squad of giving up O2 homers. And the reason that happens, the reason the Rangers have given up more 02 homers, zero balls, two strike homers, and then anybody else in baseball is because well, when when you do that, it’s usually because you don’t have the best stuff. And Mel Kelly, despite being an incredible pitcher, I I really do love watching Mel Kelly pitch. He doesn’t have the best stuff. He is just a pitcher, a doctor, a surgeon, if you will, slicing and dicing up with precision and accuracy in all of his pitches and his pitch sequencing. And also has a little bit of that Nathan Eavaldiism. Eavo’s got a little bit more what I would call call better raw stuff. But I mean, Mel Kelly has got, I believe, 117 different types of pitches. I mean, he’s got three different types of fast balls that he uses um pretty frequently. He’s also got a curveball. also got a slider. He’s also got a change up. He’s got sinker cutter, forcing fast ball, curveball, slider, change up. I It’s a lot of pitches coming at you in a lot of different ways. And when you throw an O2 pitch right over the middle of the plate, that that’s going to be smacked, especially when they’re as good a hitter as as Bryce Tang, he goes up 02 on Jackson Trio, isn’t able to put him away, throws a couple of balls, and then there’s a change of that. That’s not a bad pitch that Jackson Trio just mashes. And then Christian Yelled, who uh had a a really bad day after this one. He hit a ball 110.8 mph, 403 feet. And uh thankfully, Michael Helman, the Mayo man, steps up in a huge way. A 970 expected batting average on that line out for Christian Yelich. And then he proceeded to strike out the final three plate appearances of his day. So Mel Kelly goes down two nothing. And just like the rest of this offense says, “All right, I I don’t need to panic. I do not need to panic. These guys have got me. These bats have been hot. And I don’t care that I’m up against Freddy Peralta. These bats don’t care that they’re up against Freddy Peralta, one of the best pitchers in baseball this year.” They say, “No, it does not matter. I’m just going to lock in and keep throwing strikes.” Now, that’s one of the best things about Mel Kelly is that this man, despite that one game, I believe it was his second start with the Rangers where he had a a season high five walks. Uh, this man does not walk people. He didn’t walk anybody in this one, goes five and two/3, allows 10 hits, strikes out six, and gives up just three runs. But he attacks hitters. He goes at hitters. He gets ahead early in counts, gets hitters just offkilter. They have already on the defensive because he’s already up 02 pretty quickly in the counts early on in this or late on in this game. He was up to 96% first pitch strike percentage. 96%. I believe he finished the day at 91% because he fell behind to the final two batters that he faced including Reese Hoskins who drove in that final run um after being up 3 0 in the count. Marley just was not trusting his stuff and throwing strikes and this guy just did not get rattled. worked around a lot of traffic. He pitches kind of similar similarly to a lot of these Seattle Mariners pitchers in that the Mariners pitchers at least the the big three the homegrown guys like like Logan Logan Gilbert and also um uh Jose Castillo or Jorge no who am I think Luis Castillo goodness gracious I I am all in my head today but when you pitch a lot in the strike zone the worst case scenario for that is that you give up a lot of hits that that’s the counter side I mean you need to in the strike zone. You need to be throwing quality pitches in the strike zone. But if you’re if you’re walking guys, you’re going to get your pitch count way way up. You’re not going to be able to pitch as deep into games. If you’re throwing more strikes, you’re getting more weak contact or even some singles and occasionally some solo homers, which he said, you know, sometimes you’re going to give up some solo homers. Those solo homers aren’t going to beat us. The two three-run homers that you give up because you walked two guys ahead of them, those those will beat you. But a couple of solo shots here and there will not beat you. And Mel Kelly worked so aggressively in this one. I mean 93 pitches in this one. He went five and two/3s and he he nearly made it through that sixth inning. But because he was getting behind himself, that is what drove him from this game. And and shout out to Hobie Milner. Another another performance where he he steps up backto-back games. comes into a spot where the starters work himself into a jam and he works a really really nice play against Bryce Terraang. A ball that was hit just right to him just oh look what I found. Look what I found. It’s the ball. You’re out. Boom. Done. Situation remedied. Danger averted. Crisis averted. Mel Kelly is able to finish the day despite giving up those 10 hits. Where the Rangers allowed 11 hits, they only had six hits themselves, scoring six runs. They also worked five walks where the Rangers only pitchers only walked one person. They also struck out 10 in this one including Christian Yelich three times. Uh but this was a phenomenal pitching performance not just from Mel Kelly. This is the why you get this guy. This is why you get this guy. It would have been so easy for this game to be lost by the Rangers. It would have been so easy for any other pitcher say, “Oh, well, I just gave up two runs to the best team in baseball and I’m up against their best starting pitcher who hasn’t allowed a run in 29 innings. This one’s probably over for me.” Melro Kelly said, “Nah. Nah, I got this. I got this, guys. Calm down. It’s fine. We’ve got this.” And you know what? He was absolutely right. And the bullpin behind him said, “Nope. Calm down. It’s fine. We’ve got this. Pitching on back-to-back days. I mean, I believe it was not quite everybody in this one. I think Phil Mton hadn’t pitched in maybe a couple maybe he hadn’t pitched since Monday, but Shawn Armstrong going four outs in this one. Might might have finished off the whole two uh two inning save in this one had he not uh walked a batter. But, I mean, Shawn Armstrong has been just phenomenal this season. Robert Garcia coming in, him working a scoreless inn and getting a strike out and Phil Meton coming in striking out the first batter he faces and then the second batter he faced pops out, flies out, lines out what whatever kind of ball that actually ended up being scored or or ruled, he gets him out and he gets his fourth save of the season. The Rangers end up making it a sweep in this one. four straight wins and for the first time all year they are seven games over 500. This team is in a phenomenal place. Not just settling for that series win against the best team in baseball, but they went for the throat and they said, “No, we are getting every single win we can from here on out and we are not going to be denied October.” But the two teams ahead of them have something else to say about it. some good series elsewhere in this AOS. After this, we’re going to talk about what’s going on in this AOS and how much of a chance do these scrappy little never say die Texas Rangers actually have. All that and more right after this. This show is brought to you by Neutrifull. You’ve probably seen a million ads for hair growth products and thought, “Sure, like that actually works.” There are so many products out there and it’s hard to know which ones are actually going to do anything. That’s why you should give Neutrifol a closer look. Neutrfllor is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand trusted by over 1 and a half million people. And it’s not just hype. 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Jeff Biggs is with you with a locked on Rangers postcast reacting live to all 15 games that are left in this regular season and uh maybe just maybe some postseason games as well. That’ll be in your Locked On Rangers podcast feeds on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Now, this scrappy little never say die cutesy feelgood story little Texas Rangers team just swept the best team in baseball. They have won four straight games, two straight series against teams that are leading their division. And ever since that road trip from heck, ever since the day that the Rangers lost both Marcus Simeon and Evan Carter, um Evan Carter at least for the season, possibly Marcus Simeon for the season, they are 15 and4 since then. 15-4. They have been on fire and they have got well 15 games left. Would it be nice for them to finish with a 15game winning streak? Yeah. Yeah, they that’d be awesome. I I don’t know if that’s um going to happen at all. Probably it’s probably not going to happen, but uh it’s definitely possible. I mean, this Mets team has been abjectly pretty terrible for the last, you know, two months of this season. They’re coming off of a series where where they’ve lost the first three games of this series, but since June 13th, this is a tweet from SMY putting up the worst records in MLB since June 13th. And I don’t know why they picked that date. Probably because it makes the Mets look bad because this is uh the whole point of this is to make the Mets look bad. Um the Mets are are 31 and 45. They they have the fourth worst record in baseball since that point. They are worse than the White Socks by one whole game. The only teams that are worse than them in that span are the Nationals, the Twins, and the Rockies, who are all uh pretty horrible. So, this is this is setting up kind of well for this Texas Ranger squad. Then, they’ll have three on the road against Houston, and then a six-game home series against the Marlins and the Twins, who are both not very good. Marlins are are scrappier and maybe have more life in them, but the Twins are downright horrible. And then they’ll have three games in Cleveland to finish off this regular season against the Guardians. 15 games left. That’s it. That’s it. It’s only 15 games left. And this Rangers squad is is in a good spot. They are two and a half back in the AL West chase. They are uh one and a half games back I believe in this uh this wild this um yeah in this wild card chase. They’re they’re two and a half games back in the West, one and a half in the wild card spot, but they they do not have the tiebreaker against the Mariners. and they are four back of both the top and the second wildcard spot after the Yankees lost and the Red Sox lost yesterday. Yankees got blown out by the Tigers and the Red Sox got walked off. Rles Chapman got walked off by those no longer in Oakland Sacramento West Sacramento A’s. So this Rangers squad is fighting for their lives. They do not have the tiebreaker against the Yankees. So they do have the tiebreaker against the Boston Red Sox. they don’t have against the Mariners. So, what that effectively means is you’re really watching and you’re hoping the Yankees and Mariners lose a whole lot of games because the Rangers want to have a better record than them because they do not have the tiebreaker. So, they need to gain more gains against them than they do against either the Red Sox or the Astros. The Rangers are a game and a half back of the Mariners. They’re two and a half back of the Astros, but basically that that number’s the same because the Rangers, unless they get swept by the Astros, they will have the season tiebreaker. And so you’re kind of rooting for Houston. I hate uh uh m you’re you’re more okay with Houston winning next weekend. Not this weekend, but next weekend in what will be the biggest series left um at that point for the AOS Chase. The Rangers have three against Houston in Houston next week on Monday. And then Houston plays three games against the Mariners that weekend. that will be games that I would be watching closely had I not would I not be blacked out by MLB uh streaming unfortunately but I I will be following as closely as I can on that game day app on my phone that this is just such a tight race and this Rangers squad they have I’ve probably said it a million times a significantly better run differential than both the Blue Jays or both the well they do have a better run differential than the Blue Jays but better run differential than the Astros better run differential than the Mariners like they have just been a significantly better team. Heck, the Guardians, who are now two games behind the Rangers in that chase, they are falling quickly out of it, as are the Royals, who are, you know, two and a half games behind the Rangers, who the Rangers don’t have the tiebreaker against. They’re both have negative run differentials. And it is just this team’s better. They are better, I think, than the Houston Astros, who have been exposed this year a bit. They It’s taken their toll. Winning takes its toll. Not only just these deep postseason runs, but the attrition of losing guys like Carlos Korea, who let walk out the door for nothing. Guys like George Springer, who you let walk out the door for nothing. Carlos Korea, who you had to trade assets away to bring back in on a big big contract with a whole lot of injury issues that uh may or may not present themselves in the next couple years. like that that issue with his foot which is the reason why he backed out of a deal or why the the Giants backed out of a deal with Carlos Korea. I mean even Alex Bregman and probably Valdez is out the door this year which uh I think his catcher who he may or may not have um accidentally beamed in the chest is going to feel fine about Rober walking out that door. But the Astros are vulnerable that they’ve had a lot of injuries including another one to Luis Garcia. You hate to see this for any player getting injured. I I don’t want any Astros players injured. I want them to come back. I want them to be bad because they are bad. I do not want anybody to be injured. And it really breaks my heart for Luis Garcia who missed basically two full years with Tommy John surgery. He came back, he pitched a couple of games and uh he looked pretty good. But then on Tuesday’s game, he left that game early with elbow soreness after fighting back coming back two years with Tommy John surgery. That is just a brutal loss if he ends up going on the IIL. If it is, you know, worst case scenario, either a failed recovery from Tommy John or Lord forbid a second snapped UCL, that is not at all what you want to see. Seattle just swept the St. Louis Cardinals. They had to go to extra innings to do it last night. Thomas Saji tried his best to provide some heroics. He had a couple of uh I believe go-ahead R at least RBI singles in that series. Former Rangers prospect Thomas Saji who they traded for Jordan Montgomery brings flags fly forever. Shout out to Thomas Saji. Hope you are doing well out there in Kansas City. Such a or not Kansas City St. Louis. Those Missouri City they’re they’re all blurred together in my head. But the Mariners just took three out of three. They have been writing a fivegame winning streak at this point despite falling into the gutter getting swept by the Rays and just looking terrible. It had a 20game stretch stretch where they were five and 15. Now they are kind of coming out of it. They’ve got four games this weekend against the Angels. I believe that is still in Seattle. So, uh, Angels, hey Angels, you want to you want to do something fun? You want to do something real fun? They’re riding a two-game winning streak. They’ve got some hot bats and um they they’ve got some pitchers who can occasionally do some things. At least go go take two may heck maybe take maybe take three games in Seattle. That would be incredibly fun to watch these scrappy little Angels just ruined the season of the Seattle Mariners who have time and time and time again. We’ve seen the last several years just trip on their own shoes and feet. And the fact that they’re even in this position, the fact that they haven’t buried the Rangers, who have not had a great season, they’re seven games above 500 for the first time all year. Rangers haven’t been seven games below 500 or above 500 until today after sweeping these Milwaukee Brewers. And uh the Mariners had such a high lead. They had such a big lead in the ALS that they let the Astros run them down and catch them. And while the Astros have been tripping over their shoes as well, I mean, the Astros are four- six in their last 10. They’re um four and seven in their last 11. And the Mariners could have run away with this division by now. They they have all the talent in the world to do so. And I’m very surprised that they didn’t. Or maybe I’m not because that’s just kind of what it’s been like. But but this is this is definitely a team that the Rangers can catch. And uh I really hope my ideal situation is that the Rangers fight their way to win the AO West and that there are no other AO West teams in the postseason because I really I don’t want to deal with the stress of playing the Houston Astros in a postseason series again. I’ve done that once. I swear it nearly killed me. I I’d be fine with the Rangers playing the Mariners because if they lose the Mariners, I I don’t know that many annoying Mariners fans that are going to let me have it for years and years and years to come. Um that is not the case with those stinking Houston Astros there. Um but the Rangers have not played the Mariners well. And the way it stacks up is unless the Rangers go on some crazy run, neither the Blue Jays or the Tigers just fall off a cliff, the Rangers are not going to end up with a buy in the first round. So even if they win the AOS, they will be playing whoever is in that third wild card spot because right now it stacks up. the first two w that first wild card game between the top two wild card teams is gonna be Yankees Red Sox at this point which would be just delicious as a neutral. And then the other series right now is slated to be Astros Mariners. So even if the Astros fall out of the postseason picture, which I’m really hoping they do, that would be just delightful. and say the Mariners end up winning the AL West and the Rangers get that third wild card spot. Then it’s the Rangers playing three games in Seattle to keep their postseason hopes alive, which I don’t know if you’ve watched any of the games in Seattle this year. They have not gone particularly well for this Rangers team for the last it feels like forever that the Rangers have always played really terribly in Seattle. But hey, if the Rangers make this postseason, uh, we we saw how good they were feeling about their vibes heading into that three-game series in Tampa Bay in 2023 after losing the final day of the season against the Seattle Mariners to lose the AO West and then have to play in that wildcard series. And what do they do but go on a run and win the World Series? If this Rangers team gets there and they start getting healthier, they start not having to rely on these little rascals who are scrappy but maybe not quite as hyper talented players as you know the multi-million dollar multi-time all-star multi-time World Series MVP winner in Cory Seager and the ALCS winner and multi-time gold glover multi all-star star player in Garcia and the multi-time all-star and World Series champion in Marcus Simeon. If they get in there and start getting these reinforcements back and keep that scrappy underdog mentality that these young little rascals have instilled in them that allowed them to sweep the Milwaukee Brewers, this team is about to be a problem. And for the first time this season, it’s not for the Texas Ranger fans, it’s for everybody else in this league. That’s going to do it for today’s show. Thank you’all so much for listening and subscribing. And until next time, don’t forget to enjoy Texas Rangers playoff chase baseball.

The Texas Rangers swept the series vs the Milwaukee Brewers thanks to Jake Burger and their scrappy rookies Michael Helman, Cody Freeman and Alejandro Osuna. With key injuries to stars like Corey Seager, Marcus Semien and Adolis Garcia the rookies have stepped up and provided a massive and much needed spark to a Rangers team that looked dead in the water.

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