Manager Wants Slumping Texas Rangers to 'Get Back'

The Texas Rangers are on a three-game losing streak and on the verge of getting swept for the first time this month.

Have the Texas Rangers lost a little of who they are lately?

Seems that way to manager Bruce Bochy after Saturday’s 6-1 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers at Globe Life Field. The Rangers struck out a season-high 18 times – the most since 2019 – and managed just four hits.

“We just didn’t do much offensively,” Bochy said, according to MLB.com. “I mean, a lot of swings and misses [Saturday]. We’ve got to do a little better job of putting the ball in play. I think we had 18 strikeouts today? That’s probably not going to work, as you saw. We need to flush this and come back and bounce back. We’ll get back to who we are, and it’s doing some little things there like maybe putting it in play.”

The Rangers are in a low spot, having lost three straight, including the first two against Milwaukee. Texas saw its series winning streak end at five and needs a win Sunday behind Max Scherzer to avoid a sweep. The five-run losing margin was the largest since a 7-1 setback at the San Diego Padres on July 28.

That Padres series at the end of last month was also the Rangers’ last three-game losing skid. The Rangers have lost as many as four in a row just once this season – April 24-27 – and haven’t been swept in a series since San Diego did it.

Texas also hasn’t been swept at home this season.

Milwaukee limited the Rangers on Saturday to just four singles, snapping the club’s run of 81 straight games with an extra-base hit that began on May 16. That was the third-longest such streak in franchise history. Texas has been held without an extra-base hit at home just three times in 2023.

“You have to find a way to beat good pitching and score runs,” Bochy said.

Still, the Rangers are 12-5 in August and 72-51 overall, which is tied for the third-best 123-game start in franchise history. The Rangers were 73-50 in 1999 and 2016, and also 72-51 in 2012.

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