The Texas Rangers have faced lefthanded starting pitchers in their last three games.
That’s kind of unusual. Those three games represent 6.5% of the games the Rangers have had this season against lefthanded starting pitchers, despite representing a hair under 2% of the total games the Rangers have played so far this season.
The Rangers have had 46 games against lefthanded starters this season, and 106 games against righthanded starters. The odds that any given three game stretch from this season for
the Rangers would feature three lefthanded starting pitchers is around 1 in 36, or a little less likely than Danny Jansen hitting a home run in any given plate appearance.
We are conditioned to think of this as being a Bad Thing for the Rangers, due to their seemingly years-long struggles against lefthanded pitchers. That has not been the case in the year of 2026, however. The Rangers have a 768 OPS against lefties this season, compared to a 696 OPS against righthanders.
They have especially excelled against lefties this month, with a .383 wOBA that is first among all major league teams. The Yankees are second, at .382, the A’s are at .366, the Padres at .360, and everyone else is at .351 or lower.
For the season as a whole, the Rangers are fourth in wOBA against lefthanded pitchers, at .337, nine points ahead of Boston and the Reds, who are tied for fifth. What makes this all the more remarkable is that the Rangers were 29th in wOBA against lefties at the end of April, at .263 (just one point ahead of the Phillies, in last), as well as at the end of May, when their .280 wOBA against southpaws was ahead of only Seattle (.276).
Since the beginning of June, though, the Rangers have a .360 wOBA against lefthanders, second best in the majors, behind only the Cubs. For the past three-plus months, the Rangers have been raking against lefties, and lagging (.300 wOBA, 29th in the majors) against righthanders.
Sorry, all that isn’t really on topic, but I got interested in the numbers and went down a rabbit trail.
What matters if that the Rangers are facing a righthanded starting pitcher tonight — Boston Red Sox veteran Sonny Gray. And that means that the Rangers are going to have to figure out what to do at their DH spot against a righthanded pitcher.
A stray comment a few days ago sent me down a separate rabbit trail looking at whether the Rangers DH their backup catchers more often that other teams. I worked on a post on it for a while, looking at how often catchers were DHing for every team in the majors this year, until I got bored about halfway through my research and stopped.
However, in the interest of being eco-conscious, I will share what I wrote about the Rangers’ DH situation in 2026 in that mostly-likely-never-to-be-completed draft post:
(This is the start of the deep dive on the Rangers DH usage from that post. I’m also not updating the data, which was accurate through Sunday, but don’t include the last two games, because I don’t feel like it.)
The Rangers have had a total of seven games started at DH by catchers* this season — three by Elias Diaz, two by Kyle Higashioka, one by Austin Wynns, and one by Danny Jansen.
* I’m not counting Logan O’Hoppe, who had six starts at DH, because he was up to be the righthanded DH rather than be the backup catcher, as evidenced by the fact he has one more inning behind the plate for the Rangers than I do.
Diaz’s three starts all came against lefthanded starters, with two coming in a three game span against the A’s.
Higashioka’s two starts both came against lefthanded starters. One of them was in the 14 K Reid Detmers game, and I’d forgotten how jacked up the Rangers’ lineup was that day:
McCutchen — LF
Foscue — 2B
Nimmo — RF
Burger — 1B
Duran — 3B
Jansen — C
Haggerty — CF
Higashioka — DH
Helman — SS
Wynns’ one start was his final game with the Rangers, and was also, weirdly, not only against the A’s, but against Jacob Lopez, who was also the starter in one of Diaz’s games at DH.
And Jansen’s start was against Eduardo Rodriguez, a lefty.
So this seems to be less of a “the Rangers love starting their backup catcher at DH” situation and more of a “the Rangers’ righthanded bench options are limited.” And we see that manifest itself at the DH position because the Rangers platoon at DH, with Joc Pederson starting at DH against righthanders and whatever righthanded hitter happens to be hanging around and not otherwise in the lineup starting at DH against lefthanders.
We thought that the 2026 Texas Rangers had solved their righthanded bench bat situation with the signing of veteran Andrew McCutchen and the return of kinda-veterany Sam Haggerty. McCutchen was no longer a viable everyday guy but had slashed .267/.353/.389 against lefties for Pittsburgh in 2025, while Haggerty had slashed .318/.376/.435 against lefties for Texas in 2025. Texas seemed to be in okay shape, as McCutchen could DH against lefties, Haggerty could play center field, Pederson and Evan Carter could avoid southpaws, and all figured to be well.
Except McCutchen had just a 602 OPS against lefties in 50 plate appearances before being released in late May, while Haggerty put up a 404 OPS in 36 plate appearances against lefties this year before being released ten days later. Both players, incidentally, were even worse against righthanders.
Justin Foscue became the righthanded bat of choice against lefthanded pitchers. In my mind, he’s the righthanded compliment to Pederson at the DH spot, and it seemed in my mind like he’s been the regular DH against lefthanded pitchers this season.
So it was quite a surprise when I went and looked and saw Justin Foscue has just 11 starts at DH this season.
Only 11 starts at DH for Foscue! Even with him not coming up until May, it seems like there should be many more than that.
Part of it is simply a numbers game…the Rangers have faced only 44 lefty starters this season, so no one was going to rack up a huge number of DH starts against lefties. But still, you’d expect Foscue to have more than 25% of those opportunities.
And Foscue has started most of the time when the Rangers have faced a lefty, starting 34 times against lefthanded pitchers. Its just that most of those starts have been with Foscue playing second base, rather than DH, either because Corey Seager was injured and they needed someone to play in the infield, or Josh Jung was injured and they needed someone to play in the infield, or Ezequiel Duran was playing in the outfield and they needed someone to play in the infield.
Aside from Pederson and Foscue, who have combined to start 105 of 150 games at DH (Pederson also has nine starts at first base and one start in right field), and the seven catcher starts at DH, the Rangers have gotten nine starts apiece at DH from Andrew McCutchen, Wyatt Langford and Brandon Nimmo, six from Logan O’Hoppe, four from Corey Seager, and one from Alejandro Osuna. If everyone is healthy, your playoff lineup probably has Pederson and Foscue platooning at DH, but during the regular season the DH spot against lefthanded pitchers has been kind of a revolving door based on who is healthy and who Skip Schumaker wants to get a half-day off at the DH position.
(We now resume with words typed today.)
The last time the Rangers faced a righthanded pitcher, on Saturday, Joc Pederson was the DH, as he has been in almost every game started by a righthander this year. Pederson ended up leaving the game after being hit in the hand with a pitch. Initial x-rays were negative, but a subsequent follow up revealed a small fracture.
Normally Pederson would go on the injured list while waiting for the swelling to go down and for the fracture to heal. But it is crunch time, the Rangers are in a playoff race, and Pederson has been a significant contributor for the Rangers this season, so the decision was made to give it a few days before a decision was made. Monday’s off day and the string of lefty starters meant that there were four full days between Pederson getting hit and the Rangers having a game that he would normally start.
Pederson has saidthat he is going to try to play through the injury, and was working with the team medical staff to reduce the swelling in his hand enough to allow him to grip a bat properly so he could test his pain tolerance when he swings. This afternoon, when lineups are released, will likely be our first inkling as to how that has gone.
If Pederson is not able to DH, the first option would seem to be Alejandro Osuna, who was called up in place of Cam Cauley the day after Pederson’s injury. Osuna is a lefthanded hitting outfielder, and is someone the Rangers could simply plug in in place of Pederson, should they wish.
Another option would be to put Nicky Lopez into the lineup at second base. Ezequiel Duran has been playing second base against most righthanded pitchers of late, while manning center against lefties. However, with Josh Jung just having returned from his calf injury, and the team cognizant of the time Corey Seager has missed this season, Skip Schumaker could DH one of those infielders and have Duran play third base or shortstop, respectively. Seager has started every game since sitting the finale in Sacramento a month ago, and has been the DH in only one of those games, the finale in Chicago on August 26. Jung has started at third base in all four games since being activated this past Saturday. This may be viewed as an opportunity to get one of those two a partial day off while keeping their bat in the lineup.
The Rangers could also opt to use Justin Foscue or Cody Freeman instead of Lopez as the Pederson replacement, whether at DH or at in infield position so an infielder can DH. Foscue has not hit righthanders well this season, though — he has a .177/.214/.304 slash line with 3 walks against 23 Ks in 84 plate appearances. Freeman, meanwhile, has a 493 OPS against righthanded pitchers, and has been mostly relegated to late inning defensive replacement work over the past week.
I will also note that Kyle Higashioka has been out on a rehab assignment with Round Rock since September 4. Higashioka has only been used at DH, which would suggest that the flexor strain that landed him on the injured list is such that he’s to ready to be used at catcher yet. If Pederson were to go on the injured list, the choices to replace him on the active roster would be Higashioka, who will have to be activated from his rehab assignment by September 24 anyway, or Cauley.
