Who Can Rebuild the Rangers?

I�m not going to pull any punches�this team is bad. Really bad. The only question now is how to rebuild this team. With the topic already being thrown around in the middle of May, rebuilding seems like the one thing that could make this season interesting for the rest of the season. I�ve already covered who I think should be traded in a previous article.

The only Rangers-related trade rumor I have seen floating around in the last few days is that the Padres may need a third baseman and may be interested in Mike Lowell of the Red Sox, Troy Glaus of the Blue Jays and Hank Blalock of your Texas Rangers. San Diego doesn�t seem to have much on the farm except an over-achieving CF in Cedric Hunter that spent last season in the Arizona Rookie League (Hunter is now in Low-A ball), and a LF with great tools in Will Venable who is a 24-year old that has just made it to AA this season. Of course, maybe we should be gun shy about approaching another trade with the Padres. The last trade we made with the Friars isn�t working out so well. Both Glaus and Lowell are performing very well so far this season, and Blalock actually has respectable numbers.

The real question here is not whether the Rangers should blow it up and start over, the question is�are Jon Daniels and Ron Washington the right people to head the reconstruction effort? Rebuilding a team is only as successful the initial trades made in the rebuilding effort. Jon Daniels definitely has a hit-and-miss record in his short tenure as the General Manager and Ron Washington has just gotten his feet wet as a Major League manager. Could Daniels maximize value in trades involving Mark Teixeira, Hank Blalock, Akinori Otsuka and others? Can the scouting department finally find some gems that are attainable in trades?

I�m not sure that Daniels is the right person to lead the rebuild, but I�m not sure the Rangers have a better option. The Amateur draft is just a little over three weeks away and the prep work and scouting is well underway. Washington on the other hand, might be the perfect manager to lead a bunch of kids and develop them. Washington seems to have a nurturing personality that might lend itself well to continue the effort to change the culture of this team. Regardless, as the interest in this season fades, the interest for die-hard Ranger fans, should just be beginning.

Comments

[horsedooty]

and they lose again!





yo soy Horsedooty!

[horsedooty]

WRT who can rebuild this team...JD built this one and look how good he did. I don't trust either one Hicks or Daniels as far as I can throw them.





yo soy Horsedooty!

[JDolla$]

Good for you for calling attention to this important concern. JD gets a big, fat F for his trades - and for his poor decisions in the off-season. I cringed as I watched name after name disappear from the free agent list, and we basically got nothing. There were some quality hitters that we REALLY could use, but we had to go on the cheap. This is from a team that spends $250 million on one player. Idiocy. Our lack of depth is showing now that we have some injuries, and our AAA team is gutted. No way out. And, to make matters worse, we all can have a good cry over the fact that this could be our roster right now:





Sledge - CF

Young - SS

Tex - IB

A. Gonzalez - DH

Blalock - 3B

Sosa - RF

Kinsler - 2B

Mench - LF

Laird - C





Rotation: Young, Millwood, Padilla, Tejeda, Danks

Bullpen: Franky, Benoit, Coco, Gagne

[Lisa Gray]

and the stros fans think purpura is bad???!!!





wanna swap ensberg and blalock?

[Fai Mao]

Unfortunately the savior for the Texas Rangers is about 18 months away.





Tom Hicks needs to sell the team to George W. Bush and GWB needs to hire Doug Melvin as GM from Milwaukee.