Texas Rangers Manager Bochy Pushing Right Buttons Without Corey Seager
The Texas Rangers have been without Corey Seager for the entirety of their current road trip.
They’re 4-1 so far going into Wednesday afternoon’s series finale at the Kansas City Royals.
That’s not to say the Rangers prefer life sans their star shortstop, who opened the season on fire before being lost to a hamstring strain. No, it just means that others have stepped up in Seager’s place and Bruce Bochy has done a masterful job pushing the managerial buttons.
Bochy has used both Josh Smith and Ezequiel Durán at short in the series against the Houston Astros and Royals. Smith, Durán and Travis Jankowski have hit in Seager’s customary second spot in the order.
It seems whatever Bochy tries, well, works.
“I don’t know if I feel like I’m scrambling,” Bochy told radio station 105.3 The Fan. “We’ve made some adjustments. You saw Jankowski in the two-hole so that gives you a different lineup without Corey. We’ve used Smitty (Smith) there and he can put pressure on them with his speed, so it’s a little different style of baseball.”
Seager, hitting.359 at the time of his injury on April 11, could be out for about a month. His loss is obviously huge, but it hasn’t impacted the results on the field. Overall, the Ranger are 4-2 without Seager.
Texas (11-6) took two of three at the defending World Series champions and goes into Wednesday in position to sweep the Royals. Regardless of the outcome for the third game in Kansas City, the Rangers have won both series and sit first place in the American League West.
“It’s up to me to adapt the lineup,” Bochy added. “There’s no getting around it. It’s not the same lineup without Corey Seager. He was swinging the bat as well as anyone in baseball and I can’t wait for him to get back. But meanwhile I do think we have to scramble a little bit and find ways to score runs.”
The Rangers did so Tuesday night, beating the Royals 12-2. Texas sends Martín Pérez (2-1. 2.87) for the series finale opposite of Brady Singer (1-0, 4.91) for Kansas City.
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