I'm growing tired watching the Rangers lose with Napoli, a huge offensive weapon, sitting on the bench. Today's game (Sat.) is a good sign of not only what Napoli himself can do, but his effect on the other guys around him. The offense is just better with him in there, period. So I propose they keep rolling with this lineup for awhile - Moreland in LF, Murphy in CF, and Napoli at 1B. Borbon on the bench.

I realize they are giving up some outfield defense at both LF and CF, but at the moment I think it's important to maximize the offensive output to give them the best chance of winning.

What do you guys think?

He's being used correctly. If he played against more right handed pitchers, the pretty line would get noticeably worse

He attempted a steal today..... i say we try him in CF. lol. but yes. seriously under utilized soley bc we dont want to hurt MYs feelings. unfortunately MYs play as of late justifies his prescence more and more. As much as we all love Mitch at first maybe we need to consider napoli our 1st baseman, Mitch our RF and MY our DH. and i think til Hambone returns it needs to stay that way. we can all agree we all shudder a little when MY is in the field.

vs. Left 223 421 72 122 21 0 30 65 68 117 8 5 .290 .394 .553 .947
vs. Right 492 1171 184 278 61 4 67 195 143 354 13 8 .237 .330 .468 .79

Those are Napoli's career splits. The OPS falls off dramatically from around .950 to just under. 800, but if you look closely, while the average against righties is significantly lower, the power numbers, both doubles (21/61) and homers (30/67) are much higher against righties. So you are likely to see a significant offensive improvement by letting him play 5 days a week instead of 3.

... of course he has more counting stats against righties. He's had 800 more plate appearances against righties

Heh heh - yeah that's a good point. I'd argue that a .240 - .260 hitter playing everyday with 30 home run power and the ability to put up a .800+ OPS is infinitely more valuable to this team right now than a guy who can run down fly balls in deep center but not much else. I also would argue that you also need to figure in the difference in playing in Arlington v. LAA half the games... I don't think it's a stretch to say that LAA has more of pitcher friendly park than not, while Texas is definitely one of the top 5 best parks for hitters. My point is that even those low numbers against righties would come up some.

The funny thing is that after I posted the first thing above, Borbon came in as a defensive replacement and blew my argument by singling with men on base, driving in a run!

Honestly, I think it's hard to argue that he would not be a productive player if given the chance to play everyday, (possibly a 30/100 guy in this lineup). His problem is how he affects the rest of the defense when he plays...when he DHs (assuming MY plays 1B that day) or plays 1B, to avoid taking Mitch's bat out of the lineup you move him to RF, Nellie to LF, and eventually Murph to CF. It's a domino effect of degrading defense, and doing that day in and day out will ultimately cost the team runs and eventually wins. Therefore Wash and company have to figure out whether or not the significant drop-off in defense is worth the increase in offense between Borbon and Napoli. It seems that until Borbon completely falls off the face of the earth, or Napoli starts hitting like Hambone, they are just going to continue to go with the current setup, where they each get 3-4 games a week, and ride it until Josh gets back.

Why don't they give Napoli a shot at long inning relief?

I think on major question needs to be answered before anything could really be "set in stone" per se.... Its gotten to a point where its obvious (not just to us, but mgmt, and even many baseball columists) that we might have a major concern w CF. So the question is, do we prefer to give someone internally a shot i.e. Gentry (we have minimal options now w beltre's suspension, and our inability to sign Martin yet...) or.... if we are super hell bent that hambone's not playing CF (due to his injury history ive actually gotten on board with this) do we need ro make a trade for a CF. and if so, lets kill two birds with one stone? is there any realistic trade possibilities out there for a decent CF and either a starter or ultra reliable bullpen arm?

speaking of... lets get crazy and get byrd and zambrano from the cubs. Byrd might cost us but Zambrano might only cost a bucket of balls and esteban german....

Nah. I'd rather just see Neil Ramirez up here than Zambrano, if they nave need of another starter before Hunter returns. Now, when the summer comes, then they need to try to find a good good - a real difference maker. Gotta be someone better than Zambrano, though. I think Zambrano's best days are long behind him. I do like the idea of Byrd, though.

oh of course! i just figured he'd be the only pitcher we could get from the cubs without having to sell the farm. Zambrano is about as risk vs reward as it gets. i just simply wonder though if a change of scenery amongst our latin player affluence could get him to enjoying the game again and putting out double digit W and single digit losses. He's completely mental... sucks. cuz despite popular belief he's still got very good stuff..... when he wants too

The most pertinent problem with Zambrano is the $18 million yearly salary.

I'd like to think Napoli could retire as a Texas Ranger. He's one of those type of players
that fits in the 'wheel of things'.

We should bring in Zambrano for his bat, hat dude can hit!

the man can hit. wonder if zambrano could play CF?..... who needs Byrd then?! ha