What the Texas Rangers must see from Leody Taveras before he returns to MLB roster

In a season dedicated to evaluating players and developing on the fly at baseball’s high level, the early returns suggest the Texas Rangers have struck on a player.

Adolis Garcia has been in the major leagues for four weeks this season, and they’ve been among the best four weeks by any MLB player. Just look at the statistics since he debuted April 13.

He might not be a true center fielder, but if he’s going to keep hitting and keep producing the Rangers will let him continue to play there.

That remains a big if, though the Rangers say the if isn’t as big as it was two weeks ago. They are starting to believe that Garcia, a 28-year-old rookie, has the makings of a long-term piece.

Meanwhile, down at Triple A Round Rock, the player who was supposed to be manning center field finished the first six games of the season with a .190 batting average. Actually, that rates as an improvement for Leody Taveras compared to what he did with the Rangers over 15 games to start the season.

Taveras is improving. He says it and his play says it. All he needed was a simple mechanical tweak to get back on the path to the Rangers’ roster.

Taveras’ challenge

With Garcia in place, though, there’s a fairly sizable roadblock at the end of the path. Then again, the Rangers need another reliable center fielder, more reliable that Eli White has been and able to cover more ground defensively than corner outfielders David Dahl or Joey Gallo can in center.

Ah ha, a path, unless the Rangers decide they would rather have Taveras playing every day than just occasionally from their bench.

Decisions, decisions. But Taveras must get his bat going to even merit consideration.

“We value this guy and we want this guy back,” manager Chris Woodward said. “He’s an impact guy when he’s right. I think he just needs to play. He needs a little more consistency in at-bats and the quality of those at-bats, and we’ll take it from that. I don’t think we’re in any hurry to speed that process up. This guy needs to play.”

When Taveras is right, he’s seeing many pitches each at-bat, hitting for power, causing mayhem on the bases and playing Gold Glove-caliber defense. He simply wasn’t getting on base.

Taveras was sent down with an .087 average (4 for 46), no extra-base hits, three walks and 23 strikeouts. Rangers hitting coach Luis Oritz identified an issue when Taveras was loading his swing.

As he loaded, he coiled and that caused too much movement with his head.

“I’m working on that now,” Taveras said last week. “And even the last three days up there, I was working with Luis and we were almost to the point, but they sent me down because I have to make an adjustment. And now I feel better and think that was the best thing that happened because now I know the reality. It was an easy fix.”

Taveras started five of Round Rock’s first six games and batted only .190 (4 for 21). He struck out eight times, but he collected a double and walked twice.

Triple A manager Kenny Holmberg said he would like to see Taveras try to bunt for hits, utilizing his plus-speed and giving opponents something else to worry about, and also learn how to navigate the outfielder corners a little better defensively.

The defense in center field is so good that even if Taveras can have a long career even if he is just simply average offensively.

And, Holmberg reminded, Taveras doesn’t turn 23 until September.

“I see a guy who can beat you in about five or six different ways every single night,” Holmberg said. “I think it’s easy to forget that this kid is so young. And these guys got to the big leagues relatively quickly and they learned, and the game knocked him on the mat.

“But guess what he’s going to do? He’s going to show up and he’s going to get better, and he’s going to prepare and he’s going to look to find ways to be a better player, a better version of himself every single day.”

What the Rangers need

The Rangers want to see consistency in Taveras’ at-bats, which is something all young players struggle to find. It’s not something that happens overnight, which is why Woodward said Taveras needs to have an extended stretch in the minors where he will play every day.

Taveras knows that hitters can’t control the results once they put a ball in play, but he can control working counts, not chasing pitches and getting the barrel to the ball more frequently.

Woodward is a firm believer that if a hitter is doing the right things at the plate, results will eventually come. Once Taveras reaches that point, he could be on his way back to the majors.

“If the reports are showing that he’s down there having quality at-bats and doing everything that we need to see for him to be successful here, I don’t know why he wouldn’t be,” Woodward said.