Category: Sports News

Texas Rangers lineup for April 24, 2026 against the A’s: starting pitchers are Nathan Eovaldi for the Rangers and Luis Severino for the A’s.

We begin an exciting and no doubt action-packed series against the maybe, eventually Las Vegas A’s tonight. Alejandro Osuna is playing again. I know y’all like him and so I figured you’d be happy.

The lineup:

Nimmo — RF

Pederson — DH

Seager — SS

Burger — 1B

Jung — 3B

Carter — CF

Higashioka — C

Smith — 2B

Osuna — LF

7:05 p.m. Central start time. The Rangers are -140 favorites.

So, we ended up getting some interesting nuggets of news from the pregame press conference that Walt Weiss has before every home game. There’s one bit of concerning news, one bit of hopeful news and then something that seems obvious but it’s good to hear confirmed.

Let’s start with the concerning news, shall we:

Michael Harris II won’t start on Friday after all

There was a bit of an injury scare for Michael Harris II after he had to exit Thursday’s win over the Nationals during the seventh inning as a precautionary move. At first, it seemed like the “All Clear” was here after Harris said that he “expected” to play on Friday and then he was listed in today’s lineup as well.

Unfortunately, they’ve scratched him from today’s lineup and are now listing him as being “day-to-day” with the left quad tightness. You don’t want to expect the worst but when you consider the injury luck that this team has had to deal with in recent years, I think we’re all hoping to the baseball gods above that Money Mike’s quad doesn’t act up on him any further.

Raisel Iglesias could be back ASAP

Now granted, this doesn’t mean that Iglesias’ IL stint is going to be shorter than 14 days but apparently Weiss and the Braves training staff are encouraged with how he’s feeling so far. Weiss did state that Iglesias hasn’t started throwing yet but they aren’t expecting this to be a lengthy IL stint. Again, just like Harris, we’re all hoping that this is strictly just a two-week rest period for Iglesias and that there aren’t any setbacks between now and his anticipated return from the IL. For now, things are looking up in that department and the bullpen won’t have to hold down the fort for any longer than expected during Iglesias’ absence.

JR Ritchie will stick around for a bit

Didier Fuentes received the call-up but went right back down after his short outing on Wednesday night. JR Ritchie was called up instead and ended up delivering a very creditable debut performance in helping the Braves pick up the series win. Clearly the Braves’ brass liked what they saw, since Weiss told the media that Ritchie will be sticking around with the big league ballclub and he now has an opportunity to pitch his way into staying in the rotation.

Obviously, it’d be a pretty huge development if Ritchie ended up being ready for The Show already. It would also bring up some questions about where he’d fit in with the rotation once guys like Spencer Strider and Spencer Schwellenbach make their eventual returns from injury. It’s a good problem to have though, as you can never have too much pitching and having a talented young arm like Ritchie’s around would certainly be a positive for the Braves going forward.

Maybe the Giants won’t have such a bad season? That’s certainly on the table. Not just because they humiliated the Los Angeles Dodgers this week, but because they really have been playing slightly better over the past couple of weeks (8-6 since April 7th). And, yes, that’s because some of the key contributors have started to contribute and some surprises have emerged, but there are two key players who will be critical throughout the summer.

Jung Hoo Lee has temporarily hit his way out of the “bust” conversation concerning his free agency by hitting .320/.340/.440 over his last 14 games and 53 PA. It looks even better in a smaller sample, but the point is that for two seasons now he’s basically been an afterthought and the organization never had a contingency for that outcome. They dropped a massive deal on him because they hoped after a year or two of adjusting to the big leagues that he’d blossom into, well, basically a Luis Arraez type — high contact guy who could create traffic on the basepaths.

Lee started off last season on fire, with 43 hits in his first 36 games (151 PA). That triple slash of .312/.364/.507 (.871 OPS) was All-Star reserve-worthy, but the .251/.315/.374 (.690 OPS) he hit the rest of the way (114 games, 466 PA) should’ve had him looking for a minor league deal with an invite to Spring Training in the offseason. His current full season line is basically equivalent to those final 466 and so it’s probably safer to assume that this is who Jung Hoo Lee is. But, if the Giants are going anywhere this season, they’ll need him to hit beyond that and closer to what he’s doing now.

Is there any hope of that beyond fanatical wishcasting? Yes!

Crack into that 466 plate appearances block of Jung Hoo Lee’s 2025 and you get something much more relief-inducing: one massive cold streak. There was a 46-game stretch (193 PA) where Lee was among the worst in the sport: .182/.269/.300. There were 6 doubles, 4 triples, a couple of homers, a trio of stolen bases, and 18 walks against just 17 strikeouts in there, but overall, pretty gnarly and, of course, substantial. But from July 2nd until the end of the season (68 games, 273 PA), he was a much more respectable .298/.348/.425 (.773 OPS). If you split it again and just look at his second half, that OPS does drop to about .758, which is now bordering on “not what you paid for,” though still, compared to the rest of the Giants’ typical lineup, not terrible.

So, there is reason to believe that Jung Hoo Lee has the tools to compete in the major leagues. In theory, one thing that JHL does that Arraez can’t do is hit for more power. That plus his ability to at least appear average in the outfield creates a balance in the lineup that otherwise doesn’t exist in his absence. The Giants don’t have anyone of his profile they could plug into right field, as much as we all wish it was Grant McCray. Hopefully, the flashes we have seen and are seeing right now are the things he can build on for the next time the league adjusts to him rather than the brief burp of momentary readjustment on his behalf.

Another strong point in his favor is that against 95+ mph fastballs, he’s hitting .286. He’s right there with the team leaders in that category:

Christian Koss (lol): 1-for-1 (1.000), 6/18 = 95+ (33%)
Daniel Susac: 3-for-4 (.750), 15/85 = 95+ (17.6%)
Jared Oliva: 1-for-2 (.500), 4/27 = 95+ (14.8%)
Jerar Encarnacion: 2-for-5 (.400), 29/119 = 95+ (24.4%)
Luis Arraez: 7-for-18 (.389), 101/391 = 95+ (25.8%)
Heliot Ramos: 9-for-24 (.375), 120/390 = 95+ (30.8%)
Drew Gilbert: 2-for-7 (.286), 28/106 = 95+ (26.4%)
Jung Hoo Lee: 6-for-21 (.286), 72/368 = 95+ (19.6%)
Below .200: Willy Adames (.182), Harrison Bader & Rafael Devers (.154), Casey Schmitt (.125), Patrick Bailey (.111), Matt Chapman (.071), Will Brenan (.000).

So, obviously, the Giants will need Adames, Devers, Chapman, and Heliot Ramos to hit, too, but the point is that having Arraez and Lee also in there does lengthen the lineup and make it more dynamic. The problem is that Lee has been bad enough for long enough that there’s certainly some doubt. And then there’s his injury track record, which is the big thing hanging around the other key player the Giants will need to be perform if the team is going to be good this season.

Landen Roupp is just like Jung Hoo Lee in terms of what he brings to the starting rotation. He lengthens it and makes it more dynamic. After he handled the Dodgers, I wondered if his combination of red ass and pitch repertoire made him the team’s new Ryan Vogelsong — a comparison I felt was apt given Vogelsong’s role as the organization’s roving pitching instructor. But then people pointed out that he doesn’t give up home runs, so, maybe he’s more like Matt Cain? Well, hmm. Maybe there is no 1:1 comparison out there just yet, at least in terms of Giants history.

Today, Roupp’s curveball leads the National League in Run Value (+4), tied with the Angels’ Jose Soriano and Pittsburgh’s Braxton Ashcraft. It’s got a 33% Whiff rate on it and just a 4.8% Hard Hit rate. From a Pitching+ perspective (104), he’s right there with Tyler Glasnow (105) and Tyler Mahle (104). Reminder of Pitching+ (emphasis mine — also, remember that 100 is league average):

Pitching+ is one of three models that, along with Stuff+ and Location+, attempts to look at the process underlying a pitcher’s performance in order to remove some of the noise that can be present when looking at on-field results. […]

Stuff+ looks only at the physical characteristics of a pitch. Important features include, but are not limited to, release point, velocity, vertical and horizontal movement, and spin rate. A pitcher’s secondary pitches are defined based on their primary fastball — with “primary” defined by usage in an outing — and so are judged by velocity and movement differentials along with raw velocity and movement numbers. 

Location+ is a count- and pitch type-adjusted judge of a pitcher’s ability to put pitches in the right place. No velocity, movement, or any other physical characteristics are included in the statistic. A breaking ball should go to different parts of the strike zone in 2-0 and 1-2 counts, and Location+ captures that phenomenon. Stringer-based command statistics that attempt to judge what a pitcher was intending to do with each pitch do not add predictive value to those models, so Location+ only looks at actual locations and implicitly assumes the intent is generally the same across the league in certain counts with certain pitches.

He is a big league pitcher and an above average one by every measure. He is also a late bloomer, having turned 27 last September. There are only 30 right-handed pitchers since 1975 to make 26 or more major league starts and throw 160 or fewer innings before their age-27 season and Roupp is #5 on that list at 157 IP in 26 starts prior to 2026. I think it’s instructive insofar as our hopes and dreams here. Is there a historical comparison to be had?

Trent Thornton leads the list with 160 innings, and that’s in large part from 154 IP and 29 starts made for the Blue Jays in 2019, his age-25 season. He had a 4.84 ERA and 4.59 FIP and would make just 6 starts combined in 2020 and 2021. He made one start in 2023 and that was that: he was a reliever the rest of his career. Adbert Alzolay started 27 games before 27 and most of those came in 2021, his age-26 season (21 starts). After 2021, he never started again. Glen Otto made 33 starts for the Rangers in 2021 and 2022 combined and hasn’t pitched since 2023, when he was used as a reliever in 10.2 major league innings. Jharel Cotton started 29 games between his age-24 & 25 seasons but that was it for him as a starting pitcher despite pitching two more major league seasons (2021 and 2022). More recent examples are Hayden Birdsong (ahem), the Athletics’ Joey Estes, and the White Sox’s Shane Smith. Roupp is basically better than this field, so there’s not really a good comp to be had.

I think we all know why, too: injury! He’s missed time from injury in every year of his pro career with two concerning ones cropping up last year (right elbow inflammation in July and knee inflammation in August). It’s a lot to ask of this #3 starter to get to 180 innings and maybe even 160 innings, but that’s the sort of contribution the team will need from him if 2026 is going to be memorable. Taking his above average performance as a given (which is risky, I admit), the more innings from the starting staff means less work for the bullpen. The Giants’ 837 innings from their rotation last year was just 17th in MLB. The top 10 teams all had winning records, and so figure it’ll take somewhere in the 860s to crack that list.

Every fan has their pet player who they think will be the key to the team’s success in a given season, and that’s fine — sorry to those who thought Bryce Eldridge might be a central figure in this post — but here are two players who the Giants simply can’t play well without. They might be able to get buy with some 0-for-4s from Jung Hoo Lee (who, to be clear, has had a lot of them), but his mere presence in the lineup can sometimes be enough to setup the other guys. Roupp, on the other hand, might be able to have a bad turn through the rotation if the other arms have done well, but otherwise, the Giants need Roupp to be as consistent as a peak Matt Cain or Ryan Vogelsong and simply shove when put in front of an opponent.

And yes, obviously, these two straws can only stir a drink that’s been made. If Logan Webb, Robbie Ray, Willy Adames, Luis Arraez, and (long sigh) Rafael Devers don’t approximate their career norms and with the extraordinary caveat of general good health on the roster, then there’s no lineup for Jung Hoo Lee to lengthen or dynamize and no pitching staff for Landen Roupp to prop up.

But without either of these players, the Giants won’t be going far.

Good afternoon everyone, it’s time to dive back into the mailbag and answer some of your questions. Remember to send in your questions for our weekly call by e-mail to pinstripealleyblog [at] gmail [dot] com.

Cisforcookie asks:Is Grichuk the odd man out when Volpe returns with Rosario and Cabby both “able” to play in the OF?

He’s in the hot seat, that’s for sure. Randal Grichuk hasn’t delivered in his limited time on the field thus far, failing to make much of a difference in the Yankees’ “lefty killer” lineup that they’ve deployed more recently when faced with a southpaw starter. His Statcast page shows a hitter who is getting a little unlucky on the field, with high percentages of barreled balls and an average exit velo of 90 mph, but that means very little when the sample size is as small as it has been for Grichuk and the actual results are what they are. Being the last-minute addition to the roster and failing to provide a reason to consistently get more chances gives the Yankees an easy out if they so choose.

However, Grichuk is far from the only struggling Yankee in a limited role. J.C. Escarra hasn’t held down the backup catcher role well either, and Paul Goldschmidt is a backup whose main value appears to be a mentorship role more than anything else (more on him in a minute). On top of that, while Amed Rosario and José Caballero “technically” qualify as outfielder options, I’m sure the team would be a lot more comfortable with a tried and true regular outfielder serving as the backup. Similarly, while Ben Rice takes the lion’s share of starts at first and deserves them all with how hot his bat has been this year, but the team hasn’t tested his versatility behind the plate yet. The choice likely comes down to whether they like their chances with Rice serving as a backup catcher or one of the infielders covering a corner, and I’m 50-50 on which one of those is the route they’ll take. It’d be an easier one to make if Rice had played catcher at all this year, as I lean towards letting Grichuk ride things out a bit longer and sending Escarra down, but perhaps the team would rather their budding star not take on the wear and tear that the position holds. The clock is ticking though, and I imagine it’ll be between one of those two when the time comes to go to the chopping block.

ReadingYankee asks:It feels a bit early in the season to look at these division rankings and say this is how it is going to be. I mean, it’s not even 30 games. However, do these numbers really just represent who is good now and who no longer is, despite what we all predicted to be the case? (I.E. Phillies and Mets) Are we really looking at the division races right now in the way they will play out by the end of the summer? Or do these current rankings tend to change a whole lot from this point in the season? What tends to be the case from this point forward?

There’s plenty of time for variance, and the leaders in several divisions will likely flip-flop throughout the summer as teams get hot and start to break away from this conglomerate we’re seeing currently. That being said, the one thing you want to avoid is an ice-cold April, because it’s very easy to get buried and never catch all the way back up. Taking a look at last year’s standings on this date, it was clear to see that some teams like the Twins (9-16 at the time), Braves (10-14), and Orioles (10-14) were in far worse straits than anticipated, and those teams all ended up out of the playoff picture entirely. That’s without even touching the teams we knew were bad and turned out terrible, like last year’s White Sox and Rockies, but the Mets and Phillies treading water in the territory that those teams were in currently is a terrible sign.

Boston, Kansas City, and Houston all look like they belong in that similar category, though Houston is besieged by injuries while the other two are just plain playing bad. There’s the occasional team that can pull themselves out of an early tailspin, a la the 2019 Nats, but even setting their miraculous rise aside the odds of surviving being nearly double-digits games behind by the end of the first month are dire. The exceptions are few and far between, and it’s far easier to blow a big lead than surpass a monumental deficit with so many other teams chasing in-between.

The idiot that said, “Harper is coming” asks: Paul Goldschmidt and Ryan McMahon are doing their best to test the “batting average is not an important statistic” theory, each posting an identical .125 BA as of 4/23. McMahon is obviously going to get the longer leash of the two, but how long a leash are we talking? Should they at least be searching the market now to set up for a later deal? Is there any chance Lombard might be in their plans down the road this season? Is Rosario just gonna be the main guy?

McMahon is finding his footing at third again, looking more and more like the sharp defensive wizard that the team acquired him to be. That alone can carry him far, as long as the offense at least nominally improves. Goldschmidt is the tougher tell, because his limited role in the offense is two-fold: on one hand, it means less if he’s struggling if he isn’t expected to play a significant amount of games, but on the other hand it means it’s going to be even harder for him to get out from under the slump. Goldschmidt started 2025 off on the right foot, but as he ceded playing time he lost more and more from his bat, and it hasn’t looked any better now in 2026. It’s all well and good that he’s a mentor to Rice, and the first baseman has certainly looked a lot more comfortable at the position with the former MVP now actively assisting his development as opposed to competing with him for the starting gig, but how far can a player on the active roster drift into coach status before the team has to make a decision to benefit the overall roster?

We talked last week about where Lombard’s ETA stands, so I won’t dwell on the topic too long, but that isn’t an imminent decision forcing a roster crunch. At best, if Lombard stands out that well all season and the deadline acquisitions the Yankees could make don’t look appealing enough, I could see the move being made, but that’s a lot of qualifiers that have to occur for a bat that’s still in Double-A and yet to see Triple-A. Rosario has impressed in his role and earned a bit more starting time than I imagine the Yankees envisioned for him out of the gate, so trusting in him seems like the short-term solution while they monitor McMahon and the platoons that they’ve built into this lineup. If we’re still talking about McMahon as an automatic out by this time in May, then the conversation drifts towards shaking things up, but if he can pull himself back into the 80-range wRC+ hitter he’s been for most of his career that’ll play.