Dear Texas Rangers,
So, you’re probably feeling pretty good about yourself right about now, huh? Let’s face it, nobody expected you guys to still be hanging around the top of the AL West this late in the year. That’s a great accomplishment and you should be proud. However, I regret to inform you that this is where your breakout season is going to get busted. I hope you enjoyed it while it lasted.
I’m sure your coming to town to face the Angels hoping to erase much of the 4.5 game lead that they have on you in the division. Considering that you have defeated the Halos seven out of nine times this year, you probably even think that you can pull it off. What you didn’t count on was running into one of the hottest teams in baseball at exactly the wrong time.
This just isn’t the same Angel team that you were beating up on earlier in the season. That bullpen you were exploiting back in May finally has its act together. Our slumping starting pitchers that you took advantage of in early July are starting to come around. Oh, and did I mention that our offense has evolved into run-producing, base-stealing, homer-crushing juggernaut that your smoke and mirrors rotation has zero chance of holding down. This won’t be like previous years where Vladimir Guerrero has dismantled your team all by himself. Now he’s back and belting homers and has a whole team of mashers backing him up. It’s almost kind of cute that you think you even have a chance of hanging with the big boys, really.
Winning in the early parts of the season is completely different from winning late in the season with a division title up for grabs. Your crew of youngsters might have loads of talent and potential but they have exactly zero experience playing in the pennant race pressure cooker that the Angels play and thrive in EVERY SINGLE YEAR. Heck, your entire franchise hasn’t even played a meaningful post-All-Star break game this entire century when half your roster was still trying to figure out who they were going to ask to the junior prom.
I’m not trying to make you feel bad or anything, Texas. It is just important to be a realist about things. Five years running now the Angels have whooped your butt. The sooner you come to accept that you are the Angels’ bitch, the happier you will be with your stock in life which is to be a perennial also-ran in the American League West. Maybe you’ll get lucky and win the Wild Card every once in awhile, but I’m afraid the division title just isn’t going to happen, especially this year. Make your peace with it.
Argue all you want but the statistical evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the Angels continuing to own you and by the end of this weekend that will just be a cold hard fact. That’s just the way it is now and probably always will be. So give it all you got in Anaheim these next three games, but when you come out like the losers you clearly are, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Regards,
Monkey With a Halo