Texas Rangers Building to Repeat World Series Win: 'We Can Be Better'
NASHVILLE — What motivates a World Series champion? For one, the Texas Rangers would love to run it back and do something that hasn't been done in 23 years.
Rangers general manager Chris Young, however, knows what Rangers fans know: The team blew a mind-blowing amount of saves during the regular season, leaving a lot of wins off the table. That ended up allowing the Houston Astros to sneak ahead of them on tiebreakers for the American League West title.
Of course, the Rangers got their revenge with an ALCS win over the Astros.
The Rangers front office is out to improve a roster that won the 2023 World Series.
Young believes the Rangers can be much better in 2024, whether that ends with consecutive titles for the first time since the New York Yankees won three consecutive World Series from 1998-2000.
"There’s a lot of luck that goes into [winning a World Series], there’s injuries, there’s health, so I don't take for granted all of those things that have to come together to have the season that we just had, but that said, I believe we can be better," Young said at the MLB Winter Meetings at the Gaylord Opryland Resort.
"There’s a lot of ways we can improve," he continued. "Certainly, it’s well-documented the number of games that we didn’t complete or finish. I think that’s some low-hanging fruit in terms of areas we can improve. I think we can play even better baseball. We have a great core group coming back, and I’m excited about the ability to add to that and hopefully field an even better team."
Of course, a team doesn't have to be perfect to win a World Series, Young pointed out, but he believes with a few additional pitchers, the Rangers roster has a chance to improve on 90 wins. Their 33 blown saves in 2023 were the third most in the league, and their 48% save percentage was tied with the Rockies for worst in the majors.
Manager Bruce Bochy agreed with Young.
"The goal is to get the best group of players together to give this team the best chance to win. I think we did a phenomenal job of that last year," Bochy said. "I think we’ve done it over the last several years in terms of building up to this, and now we do have a great core group assembled. How do we enhance that and make them as good as possible while recognizing that no team is truly perfect?"
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