The Dodgers won 15-2 on Tuesday night. Los Angeles showed incredible power in the sixth inning, scoring seven runs while hitting four home runs in one inning. Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Teoscar Hernandez and even Jason Heyward all hit home runs in the sixth inning to lead the Dodgers to their 42nd win of the season. The Dodgers aren’t currently playing the best in the National League, but they are still in a very solid position right now as one of the few teams in the National League with a winning percentage above .500.
That’s exactly what the Dodgers are doing. The Dodgers will have a night where they overwhelm their opponents and score runs. It won’t be the first night like this for the Dodgers, and it won’t be the last. That being said, I’m not going to talk about the Dodgers. Instead, it’s time to talk about some other teams. One of them is the team that got beat by Los Angeles on Tuesday. The team that won the World Series the last time. Texas Rangers They suffered their biggest one-sided defeat of the season and are now at 31-35, but it’s clear they’re off to a shaky start when it comes to defending their title.
This was definitely a game changer for the Rangers, as their win-loss record had never been below .500 during their 90-win season last year, and the closest they had come to that mark was at 4-4. The Rangers won their next game and never looked back when it came to staying at .500. For a while, it looked like the Rangers were going to get back on track, as they were actually leading the division for a few days in early May. However, the Rangers never got more than a game behind the second-place Mariners. It was also a pretty bad time for Houston, going from first place on May 10 to 3.5 games behind on May 25, going 2-12.
The Rangers could rely on the fact that the Mariners have not been doing that well. But that has changed recently. Seattle is 7-3 in their last 10 games, while Texas is 4-6, dropping them to 6.5 games back in the standings. The Mariners may not have the best record in the American League right now, but they arguably have the largest division lead in the American League at the moment. Meanwhile, the Rangers are currently closer to the Angels than they are to the Mariners. Needless to say, Texas’ maiden voyage as World Series champions will be Things aren’t going according to plan.
I don’t want to just talk about the Rangers, I want to talk about the team they beat in the 2023 World Series. Arizona DiamondbacksRemember when I said there are only a handful of teams in the National League right now that are over .500? That doesn’t include the team that won the National League pennant last year. They’re 32-35, which is about the same record as the Rangers. The Diamondbacks also have something in common with the Rangers in that they’re more like a declining franchise (in this case the Rockies) than they are a division leader.
The Diamondbacks started June 7-3 and look to be on their way back to a .500+ record after finishing May 3-7. They’ve been mired in the mud for most of this season, but even the projected win-loss record and Pythagorean win-loss record (both 33-34) suggest the Diamondbacks are where they should be at this point in the season. The same goes for the Rangers, who have a 33-33 record for their projected methodology.
FanGraphs didn’t consider either team to be a favorite to return to the World Series, but with each day that both teams spend in neutral, that chance is clearly fading. Just before the season began, FanGraphs playoff odds projected the Rangers to return to earth this season, with a 38% chance of returning to the postseason and just a 2% chance of winning back-to-back World Series titles. The Diamondbacks had brighter odds, with a 51% chance of making the postseason and a 2.5% chance of hoisting the trophy at season’s end, but both teams were clearly considered outsiders going into this season. And that’s no surprise, as no one would have expected these two teams to meet in the World Series last season.
No wonder their chances have dwindled since then. The Rangers now have just a 17 percent chance of returning to the playoffs, and just under 1 percent chance of winning back-to-back championships. Arizona’s chances of making the playoffs have dropped to 34 percent, and its chances of making the World Series have dropped by almost a percentage point. If they were considered outsiders before the season started, with less than 100 games left, they’re even further from insiders.
So what were the problems in 2024 for the two teams that made it to the 2023 World Series? While it’s a bit shortsighted to blame one player for a team’s failure, it’s safe to say that both teams will be hoping that a certain impact player will eventually return to form. 2023 NL Rookie of the Year Corbin Carroll led the Diamondbacks in fWAR (5.4) last season but has struggled so far this season with just 0.5 fWAR and a 78 wRC+. He hit a triple in Arizona’s 9-4 win over the Angels on Tuesday, but Such a touching moment As of 2024, such an opportunity is slim to none for Carroll.
Meanwhile, Adoris Garcia’s batting performance has completely stalled. Garcia started the season well, slashing .292/.347/.585 with a .396 wOBA, eight home runs and a wRC+ of 158 in the first month. Since May 1, he’s slashed .152/.207/.288 with a .216 wOBA, five home runs andSomehow), with a wRC+ of just 35. Garcia is known, for better or worse (the 2023 postseason) as an inconsistent hitter (his current performance level), but it’s a tough situation to find Garcia in. His inconsistency lends credence to the hope that he’ll eventually start performing well again, but for now, it’s been tough for Rangers fans to watch him at bat these days.
Again, this isn’t a case of pinning the blame on either of them. Arizona’s pitching staff is among the worst in baseball in both ERA-minus (114) and FIP-minus (111), Texas’ offense went from elite in 2023 (team wRC+ of 114, fourth-best in all of baseball in 2023) to below average (current team wRC+ of 95), and Adoris Garcia isn’t the only Rangers hitter to underperform. Both teams will need to raise their level of performance across the board if they want to replicate their improbable run of success in 2023.
Otherwise, both the Rangers and Diamondbacks are in danger of being viewed as one-season wonders and anomalies in the overall history of baseball. The good news for Texas and Arizona fans is that the flags fly forever, so a poor encore performance doesn’t take away from what either team accomplished last season. Still, it’s safe to assume that both teams would love to get back to where they were last season. Both teams are learning that while it’s hard to rise to the top of the sport, it’s even harder to stay there.
