Takeaways from Texas Rangers Spring Training: Starting Pitching

With the baseball season now on hiatus, we'll take a look back at what went well at Rangers spring training.

Life without baseball is difficult, especially when there's no visible end date. Whether it be June or July, the baseball season will [hopefully] start eventually. When it does, we will be more than ready.

One thing we can do during this time is look back at what happened in Surprise when the Rangers were there. In the span of the few weeks the Rangers were able to have spring training, we got a chance to get our eyes on the revamped starting rotation. With the shrewd moves Rangers GM Jon Daniels made, he took two stellar starters from a season ago, added three quality pitchers via trade and free agency, and built a formidable rotation.

On paper, a rotation of Mike Minor, Lance Lynn, Corey Kluber, Kyle Gibson, and Jordan Lyles looks like one of the better rotations the Rangers have had in a long time going into a season. Having three pitchers that are potential Cy Young candidates along with two quality starters at the back of the rotation is a major upgrade over where the Rangers have been in years.

Of course, we speculated about this throughout the offseason. We knew it looked good on paper, but how did it look in action?

The answer is simple: very good. 

Starting with the incumbents, both Minor and Lynn showed the same kind of stuff they had a season ago. Lynn's fastballs were there, along with his ability to get swings and misses with the curveball. Lynn's focus throughout the spring was to mix up his pitches a little better, especially with that curveball being such a dangerous pitch. After all, spring training is the time to experiment with pitch usage and sequencing.

Lance Lynn threw his cutter 560 times and his curveball 325 times.

In the 885 times he threw those pitches he didn't allow a single barrel. Both produced a 0.0 Barrel%. @Rangers pic.twitter.com/w2iobQCMtI

— Michael Simione (@SPStreamer) December 5, 2019

With Mike Minor, who was my favorite to start Opening Day, looked like the All Star and Cy Young candidate he was in 2019. In the two starts he made in spring training, threw 7 2/3 scoreless innings with a 0.52 WHIP. It's just spring training, but those are signs of a pitcher ready to get the season started. 

Of course, lots of eyes were going to be on Corey Kluber. He's a two-time Cy Young winner coming off an injury-plagued season. He was also not sharp in his seven starts before the injuries in 2019, going 2-3 with a 5.80 ERA and a 1.65 WHIP. The Rangers pounced on the "buy-low" Kluber stock and swapped Delino Deshields and Emmanuel Clase for him. The question then became if Kluber could be who he was in 2018 or if the short glimpse of 2019 was the new normal.

In his two spring starts, Kluber pitched seven innings, allowed three runs (3.86 ERA), four hits, struck out six and walked four. Those numbers aren't eye-popping, but as we know even from Minor's stellar numbers, is numbers aren't everything in spring training. 

This was the first chance Kluber got to pitch in game action since May of last year. Did his pitches have movement? How was his velocity? Was his breaking ball as sharp as before? Did he fix his delivery issues?

The answers to those questions were well more on the positive side. Kluber's fastballs were sitting in the low-90's, usually topping out at 92 mph. His pitches had plenty of movement and his breaking ball looked as sharp as it did before. While he did get hit hard a couple of times, his pitches were there. It was a small sample size, but with what we were able to see, everything was definitely on the positive side.

Kyle Gibson was pretty stellar as well. He was ahead of club expectations in terms of his health, allowing him to get into games sooner than expected. He pitched five scoreless innings in Cactus League action, showing good command and movement on his pitches. 

We know already that if Gibson is healthy, he's a very quality pitcher to have as the fourth starter. With what he showed in game action and live BP's, he could be the actual steal of the offseason. 

Jordan Lyles got roughed up in game action (eight earned runs in 6 1/3 innings), but he was experimenting with pitches as well. He spoke earlier in camp about wanting to mix in his changeup more and it hurt him a bit in spring training action. As stated earlier, spring training is the time to work out with things and experiment to see what may or may not work. Lyles wanted to find a third pitch to go with this fastball/breaking ball combo. The changeup didn't play out in two Cactus League starts. 

Obviously, the one of the biggest concerns for this hiatus is how it affects the pitchers. They were getting stretched out and now have to pretty much shut it down. At the moment, they can still use team facilities to work out individually, however it is likely that privilege will go away as well. Pitchers will then have to ramp things up again in a likely abbreviated second spring training when the time comes. Health, not performance, will then be the largest concern for the starting staff. 

It's a unique situation that all 30 clubs will have to deal with. It's not exclusive to the Rangers. When things do pick back up, the silver lining is the starting staff as a whole gave a lot of reasons to believe in the moves Jon Daniels made to improve the rotation. 

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