The Texas Rangers have been a terrible road team to this point in the season and will journey up to the Nation’s capital to battle the Washington Nationals in a three-game weekend series starting on Friday. While Texas has one of the worst road records in baseball, they’ll have the extra challenge of facing a Nationals team who have only lost nine home games so far, the second fewest in baseball.
This series will be contested from Friday, June 9, 2017 through Sunday, June 11, 2017 at Nationals Park in Washington, DC. Saturday’s game will be shown on MLB Network for those outside the local broadcast markets.
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Pitching Matchups
The Andrew Cashner signing was one of the more puzzling moves of the offseason, but it looks like the Rangers knew something the rest of baseball did not.
The right-hander gets the start to open the series and brings with him a solid 3.39 ERA in his 10 starts.
Cashner is not one to go too deep in the game. In fact, he’s averaging just 5.2 innings per start, but those have been solid innings. He does allow more base runners than one would like, but does well stranding runners.
Overall, the 30-year old is 2-5 so, despite the strong ERA, he’s not getting the wins. Wins and losses are ultimately more of a team stat than an individual one, but the team is only 4-6 when he toes the rubber.
Another concerning number for Cashner is his strikeout to walk ratio. Cashner is actually walking more batters than he is striking out. As a result, his FIP is more than a run and a half higher than his ERA. He’s getting out of jams, but doing so without striking people out. He’s only struck out 25 in 58.1 innings. Meanwhile, he’s walked 28. He’s been able to keep the hits in check and induce some timely double plays, but if a couple more balls start finding holes, Cashner could struggle, leaving him far too dependent on luck.
To counter Cashner on Friday, the Nationals will look to their perpetually underrated hurler: Tanner Roark.
Roark’s ERA is higher than Cashners’ at 3.95, but his WHIP, K per nine ratio and FIP are all much better. He’s also walking fewer batters.
Overall, the Nationals are 8-4 when Roark is on the mound and have won each of this last three starts with him going at least seven in each, minimizing the exposure of the bullpen.
In his last start, Roark did allow four runs to Oakland, but had given up just one run in the previous two games combined.
The series continues on Saturday with a matchup of a couple southpaws: Martin Perez and Gio Gonzalez.
Gonzalez is coming off the better outing, going six innings and allowing two-runs to the Dodgers while Perez couldn’t make it out of the fourth against the Astros. The two outings paint a rather clear picture of which starter is throwing the ball better right now. Their overall stats also support the Nationals having a nice advantage in the mound as Gonzalez is 5-1 with a 3.03 ERA while Perez is 2-6 with an ERA of 4.64.
Things lean even more in the Nationals’ favor on Sunday with Max Scherzer expected to make the start for Washington.
The ace and reigning Cy Young Award winner is 7-3 with a 2.35 Era and 0.877 WHIP. By many standards, he’s having an even better season than last year. He’s leading the league with 84.1 innings and 114 strikeouts. His ERA+ is 180 and averaging 5.7 strike outs for every walk.
In eight career starts against the Rangers, Scherzer is 4-1 with a 3.67 ERA. He’s also, more recently, made three straight starts allowing one or fewer runs and hasn’t allowed more than three runs to touch the plate since April.
Texas’ starter hasn’t yet been decided for Sunday. Dillon Gee filled the rotation spot last time through, but struggled in the start.
Injury Breakdown
The Rangers finally got Adrian Beltre back a little over a week ago and he’s injured again, leaving Tuesday’s game with an ankle injury.
If Beltre hits the DL, he’ll join Carlos Gomez and Mike Napoli along with a huge collection of arms. Injuries have not been kind to Texas so far. Cole Hamels injury continues to plague the rotation.
Outside of diagnosed injuries, a couple struggling players have really prevented the Rangers from posting a better record. Rougned Odor for one has been bad. He’s hit eight home runs and has never been a high OBP guy, but he’s hitting .204 and getting on base less than a quarter of the time. That’s simply not good enough.
On the mound, Sam Dyson went from being a reliable closer to a bum in seconds. He’s since been designated for assignment and traded, but the ripples throughout the team and the bullpen remain.
As for the Nationals, they just put Jayson Werth on the disabled list, leaving them two outfielders short at the moment. Michael Taylor is finally producing in his umpteenth chance, but now Brian Goodwin and Ryan Raburn will have to fill the gap.
The Nationals certainly still have enough fire power to get by and Trea Turner may finally be heating up. He’s hitting .261 up from .237 after the game on May 25. He’s 17-for-51 since then, a .333 average, and is 12 for his last 33.
Bullpen Blunders
This series features two of the worst four bullpens in baseball according to ERA. The Nationals are No. 29 at 4.99 and the Rangers No. 27 at 4.80.
Texas has improved since jettisoning Sam Dyson. His 1-6 record and 10.80 ERA in 16.2 innings did more damage to this team than anything else. Without him, the rest of the pen has started to take shape. Matt Bush has proven to be a good option in the ninth while Alex Claudio, Tony Barnette and Keone Kela have supported him while Jeremy Jeffress has struggled with command.
For the Nationals, Koda Glover is now in the closer’s role and has just one blow saves in nine chances. His ERA is inflated at 4.34, but that’s mainly due to a five run meltdown in just a third of an innings on June 4. The Nationals still won that game and Glover bounced back for a scoreless ninth to get the save on Tuesday night.
Overall, in 22 games, Glover has given up a run just four times.
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