How patient are Rangers' fans?
Between 1972 and 1995, the Rangers did not play in a post-season game.
We didn't even have a lot of meaningful September games either!
I'm not saying that everything was bad.
In the early 1990's, the Rangers' farm system boomed with success.
It developed Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Ruben Sierra, Sammy Sosa, Dean Palmer, Kenny Rogers, Rusty Greer, Darren Oliver and Kevin Brown.
They finally won division titles in 1996, 1998 and 1999.
Unfortunately, they ran into the Yankees in the first round, i.e. the same Yankees that won 4 rings in 6 years.
Good Rangers' team. Very bad timing.
Why are we optimistic now?
The answer is the # 1 farm system in baseball.
Add Josh Hamilton's "superstar" status and Michael Young's veteran leadership.
Frankly, I like our chances after so many years of frustration.
"All nine organizations ranked number one by BA this decade have made the playoffs in short order, with an average timetable of two seasons after the honors.
Checking in with the 70 organizations who have ranked somewhere in the top 10 from 2001 to 2007, 62 have made the playoffs since.
The farm systems of six of the eight 2008 playoff teams were in BA's top 10 at least once in the past three years.
Finally, in this decade, 17 organizations have landed in BA's top 10 rankings in consecutive years, as we will learn within the month that Texas will have done.
Of those 17, 16 went on to make the playoffs -- 10 of them doing so within two years.
Top 10 rankings aren't the end game here.
But the correlation, and the trends, are unmistakable."
You can see some of these young players already here: Chris Davis, David Murphy, Taylor Teagarden, Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Ian Kinsler, Elvis Andrus, Matt Harrison, Max Ramirez, etc.
This is a very impressive group of young players.
The key is still pitching. There are several good young prospects but they are still a year or two away.
Therefore, the starting rotation could use Ben Sheets to go along with Kevin Millwood and Vicente Padilla.
The good news is that Sheets has a home in Dallas. The bad news is that he has elbow problems.
What should the Rangers do?
Keep developing young players.
Don't sign Sheets, unless you have an escape clause for injuries.
I like Sheets a lot but he is injury prone.
Stop trading young pitchers like Chris Young (San Diego) and John Danks (White Sox).
It kills me to watch John Danks and Chris Young pitching in the playoffs.
What's the best approach? Keep developing players and bet on winning the old fashioned way.
It worked for Tampa Bay in '08, Colorado and Arizona in '07, the Marlins in '03, the White Sox in '05......it does work!
Yes, I am very optimistic about the Rangers!
I don't expect playing in the post season in 2009. However, I do expect that this young team will hang around until September and give the Angels something to think about.
P.S. Keep an eye on Chris Davis. He looks like a young Mark Texeira.
