The Rangers’ route to the AL West title got a lot cleaner heading into the All-Star break, and it has everything to do with the Athletics falling apart at exactly the wrong time.
Oakland’s latest skid has basically knocked it out of the postseason picture. The club has lost nine straight and 13 of its last 14, a collapse that has turned what was once a crowded division race into something more manageable for Texas.
The A’s are now 8 games back of the Rangers in the AL West and sit at 41-55, with a -106 run differential. They’re also 6.5 games behind the Mariners and Twins for the final wild-card spot.
That leaves the division looking more like a three-team fight now, with the Rangers, Mariners and Astros all chasing a possible crown and a playoff berth as the league pauses for All-Star weekend.
The A’s slide has been ugly enough to all but remove them from the conversation, and their pitching problems have finally caught up with them. They were hanging around by outslugging their flaws for a while, but once the offense stopped covering for the staff, the bottom dropped out. Their recent stretch in Sacramento has gone 4-9 over the last 13 games, and they’ve been even worse away from home, losing 10 of their last 12 on the road.
That kind of collapse also points toward a seller’s deadline. The Athletics will likely be shopping veterans such as Luis Severino and possibly Shea Langeliers, and the Rangers would have interest in both. Right-handed pitching and catching are both areas of need for Texas, and Langeliers in particular fits the profile of a player they’d rather have on their side than see 12 times a year.
Langeliers has put together a strong first half, with 21 homers, 46 RBIs and a 3.1 bWAR. He’ll start for the American League in the All-Star Game this week. He is also a noted Ranger killer.
Severino is owed $22 million with a player’s option in 2027, while Langeliers will hit arbitration after this season.
The bigger picture is simple: the Athletics don’t have the pitching to keep pace with the rest of the division, and they’re not in a position to buy help at the deadline. Their free fall into the break has effectively ended their shot at contending, and it has made the Rangers’ path back to October a little clearer.
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Isiah Kiner-Falefa is the tougher fit. Texas has a roster crunch coming as Corey Seager returns, and the club does not appear to have much room for another utility-type reunion just for the sake of familiarity. Add in the fact that Boston has played its way back into the playoff conversation, and even the idea of a deadline deal there gets murkier by the day. [Read more 🡒]
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For a fan base that already has to sort through the usual maze of local TV, cable, satellite and over-the-air options, the timing adds one more layer of confusion in the middle of the season. The good news is that the broader broadcast setup is staying the same, but the streaming side of the equation is now in flux, and the details of how smoothly that handoff works will matter to anyone who has been watching that way all year. [Read more 🡒]
Rangers Depth Move Raises Bigger Questions After Sudden Austin Voth Exit
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Instead, the move leaves another open question around the Rangers pitching inventory and what comes next for a pitcher who has spent parts of eight seasons in the majors. Voths path has already taken him from multiple big league stops to overseas, and now his sudden exit from Round Rock suggests there may be more going on behind the scenes than a simple roster shuffle. [Read more 🡒]