ARLINGTON – Maybe he was just waiting for his parents to arrive.
While Alejandro Osuna went hitless in his major league debut on Sunday, the rookie outfielder picked up not only his first major league hit on Monday, but also his second. It accounted for most of the Rangers’ offensive “highlights” in a 2-1 loss to Toronto.
Texas Rangers outfielder Alejandro Osuna poses for a photo with his father Roberto Osuna and mother Lupita Quintero after a baseball game against the Toronto Blue Jays at Globe Life Field on Monday, May 26, 2025.(Smiley N. Pool / Staff Photographer)
Actually, if only some of the veterans had the same approach as the 22-year-old, who was playing in front of his parents, his sister, his twin brother and his girlfriend at Globe Life Field, maybe the Rangers wouldn’t have found themselves on the losing end for the seventh time in the last eight games.
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The Rangers called up 22-year-old outfielder Alejandro Osuna on Saturday.
Today, against the Blue Jays at Globe Life Field, he gets his first major league hit with his family in attendance #AllForTX (via @Rangers)pic.twitter.com/Iw40m48hHv
— SportsDay Rangers (@dmn_rangers) May 26, 2025
After flying out to center field in his first at-bat against strike-throwing Kevin Gausman, Osuna geared up for the splitter and was able to adjust his swing to line one just off the strike zone into left field for a single.
“I was watching a lot of video of him,” Osuna, his hair popping out of the Mexican flag head band still on his head, said after the game. “I knew that splitter was his best pitch and I told myself to sit on that splitter. I was just trying to do that. I knew I needed to go the opposite way because that‘s a really easy pitch to roll over to first base.”
It should have been a rally-fueling single, but that‘s another story. Or the same old one for the Rangers’ offense. Osuna’s single followed a soft single by Jonah Heim, which gave the Rangers two on and no outs. But Adolis García struck out on consecutive pitches below the zone and the rally proceeded to fizzle.
With two outs in the seventh, Gausman challenged him with consecutive fastballs up in the zone. After taking the first for a strike, he lined the next to left field for a hit. Would have stolen second, too, but García struck out on the pitch on which he ran.
For Osuna, the first two games of his big league career have followed the path of his eye-opening spring training, in which his joy for the game and his energy seemed to bring a real spark.
“All my family was like ‘Hey, how do you feel? Are you nervous?’ And I said: ‘No, I feel normal, I’m relaxed. I trust myself.’ My mom was crying. My brother said ‘I was more nervous than you.’ That was funny because he’s my twin and we used to play together and he said ‘Brother, that‘s our dream. You are doing it. I’m very happy for you’.”
The Rangers didn’t intend to bring Osuna up this quickly from Triple-A, but circumstances changed when Joc Pederson fractured his hand and the offense was badly in need of a spark.
Now? Now, he’s got a chance to make his stay much more permanent.
“Performance will govern it,” President of Baseball Operations Chris Young said of the long-term situation for Osuna. “But he’s got an opportunity now to perform his way into more opportunity.”
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