u/GOtexas1

I was planning on bringing my wife and our 3 and 1 year old to the game in Sacramento tomorrow, but I ended up selling the tickets.

Being bad is one thing. I can deal with a bad team. What I’m having a harder time with is just how boring this team is to watch. It feels like they have no identity and, honestly, not much passion or energy.

I don’t want to lump everyone into that because guys like Zeke and Osuna bring some energy and are fun to watch. But overall, I just couldn’t justify getting the whole family out to the game to watch this product.

It’s a lot of effort with two little kids, and at this point I’d rather just stay home. I hate saying that because I love going to Rangers games, but this team has gotten to the point where I don’t really feel like I’m missing much by not watching.

The problem is multifaceted. Justin Viele, how does he still have a job? His hitters have underperformed across multiple teams and multiple seasons now. And Chris Young, yes, he helped bring a World Series to Texas, but this organization cannot keep living in the past forever. The offense has been historically bad for nearly three straight seasons, and the front office has done little to meaningfully address it. Instead of aggressively fixing glaring issues, they have continued to patch holes and hope for internal improvement while the lineup continues to regress. To make matters worse, the farm system is in rough shape.

Ray Davis, you own a team in a massive market and the fanbase shows up year after year with top 10 attendance. If fans are spending like a top 10 franchise, ownership needs to spend like one too, or sell the team.

And finally, the players, especially the position players. At the end of the day, you are the ones on the field. Yes, coaching and roster construction matter, but there also needs to be urgency, passion, and energy. Only a tiny fraction of people on earth get the opportunity to play a kid’s game for a living. If you traded places with the average person tomorrow, they would take that lifestyle in a heartbeat.

This has become brutal to watch

Certain pitchers are completely broken right now and it’s making the game borderline unplayable in some matchups.

Guys like Noah Schultz, Michael King, and Josh Hader (just to name a few) all have the same issues:

First issue — pitch types like Hader’s two seam:
When this pitch is thrown, the hitter is forced into contact swings only. It’s almost impossible to generate good exit velos, even with good timing. Everything just dies off the bat.

Second issue — location warping:
The pitch doesn’t actually end up where it visually shows it’s going. The ball “warps” or shifts late, making it nearly impossible to square up. You can have good PCI placement and timing and still get weak contact because the location isn’t accurate.

SDS, please fix your game.