Texas Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom throws to the Boston Red Sox during the first inning of a baseball game Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
Julio Cortez/AP Photo/Julio Cortez
ARLINGTON — Perhaps nobody has told the story of this zombie playoff race quite as well as Rangers Sports Network did Tuesday night when their power went out.
Instead of seeing the Rangers’ four-run rally that provided all the necessary offense in a 4-2 win over Boston, the guys in the truck had to scramble to get something up and pulled out their dusty rain-delay theater video.
So, instead of seeing Elias Diaz’s tough two-out at-bat that produced a two-run double or Corey Seager’s two-run opposite-field flare that followed, they got … Jared Sandler and Elvis Andrus boot-scooting and stumbling as racing dots.
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The AL playoff race — it’s basically a silly blooper reel.
Here’s the thing, though: It’s still a race.
Tuesday’s win was their third straight and actually produced a notable shift in the wild card race. Jumped Texas ahead of Toronto by a half game. With 11 games left, the Rangers are still 1 ½ back of Cleveland, which walked off the Chicago White Sox Tuesday, for the final wild card spot and essentially two games back of Houston in the AL West.
The Rangers have been saying it’s a race, regardless of the records, for a month. Lately, they’ve been acting that way, too. The little win streak is nice. And the wins matter most. But there is more to it than that.
Need an example? Joc Pederson, with a broken bone in his hand, vowing to play through the pain and doing everything short of applying leeches to alleviate the swelling in his left hand to allow him to grab a bat with authority again.
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Or Jacob deGrom, whose groin is apparently in a knot, making his start on just four days’ rest and giving the Rangers five deGrom-like innings. Or Seager, the guy with two World Series MVPs on his shelf, finding the right time to produce RBIs in bunches. His two-run single Tuesday gave him multiple RBIs in consecutive games for – astoundingly – just the first time this season. Better late than never.
DeGrom had prepped for the start by making nine or 10 pitches off a mound on Sunday, not even the equivalent of a full bullpen. No use in wasting bullets. But he was determined not to miss the start. He seemed to be just fine for the first two innings, though his velocity was down a tick. IN the third, he gave up a single to Caleb Durbin with one out and No. 9 hitter Nick Sogard caught a 2-2 slider below the zone and hooked it just inside the right-field foul pole.
“I was like, ‘All right, that’s all they get,'” deGrom said. “I was trying to reset there after that and try not to give up anymore. That’s how we have to take it from here on out. One pitch at a time, one at-bat at a time, and win baseball games.
“What do you play this game for? You play to win, go to playoffs, and hopefully win a World Series. That’s the ultimate goal. That was the goal we talked about in spring. And we are here in the playoff race and we’ve got to win every series — probably sweep a couple. We know it’s a tough task.”
There is urgency in the air.
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“We’re in a position to make the playoffs; it doesn’t matter what the record is,” manager Skip Schumaker said Tuesday afternoon. “That’s the goal. If you would have told me in spring training that at this date we had a chance to get into the playoffs, I would have signed up for it.
“A lot of those guys in there have been in the postseason before. And they know what it looks like. They know the fight it takes to get through the last couple of games of the season. They believe.”
Nowhere is the urgency more apparent than in the starting rotation. Or what passes for one these days. It’s more like a rotation-ish. It is a mad scramble.
The Rangers weren’t decided on Tuesday’s starter until Tuesday morning. Weren’t sure about deGrom’s groin, which knocked him out after six shutout, one-hit innings at Seattle last week. They aren’t sure on a starter for Thursday either. Not that they are short of possible options, at least from a numbers standpoint.
There are other issues. Like this: They could choose Cody Bradford, who has been bumped for the time being, largely due to a fastball that, at 88 mph, is below even his modest velocity standards.
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Or this: They could go with Kumar Rocker, who couldn’t nurse a six-run lead through the fifth inning Saturday. He hit the first batter he faced with the big lead, walked the second and was pulled.
Or they could even turn to Nathan Eovaldi, who threw 45 pitches in relief in his first outing in five weeks on Saturday. But, hey, it’s a big game. Eovaldi for 60 pitches is usually a better choice than almost anybody else for 90.
And that’s just through Thursday. Friday is supposed to be Cal Quantrill day and the Rangers’ best second-half starter said his stiff back was somewhat improved on Tuesday, but it’s a long way still to get to Friday.
So how do you manage that in a playoff race? A question worth asking.
“I hate to say it, but it’s almost day-to-day on kind of where we’re at,” Schumaker said. “How many innings can Jacob go? How he recovers after that. Can we build [Eovaldi] up? Same thing with other guys. That question is the same one I have post-game every day. We’re going to try to win the next day, but today is the most important and then we’ll see what happens and go after the next one.”
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The Rangers entered Monday with 59 innings from the rotation in 12 September games. Among the 15 teams still reasonably vying for playoff bids, it ranked No. 11. It’s put more pressure on a beleaguered bullpen in which the daily question seems to be: How quickly can we get Jacob Latz the ball? He pitched his third straight game on Tuesday (although the club was idle Monday) and went 1 2/3 innings for his 30th save of the season and his 13th of more than three outs this year.He’s pitched more than an inning in two of the last three games.
Yeah, the numbers may make it seem like a silly playoff race. But it’s still a race. And Schumaker and the Rangers are reacting with the kind of urgency necessary to leg it out.