In the modern baseball world where team’s refuse to spend in free agency, the Texas Rangers just proved those team’s wrong and bought a championship. The Rangers went from losing 100 games in 2021 to a World Series in 2023 because of the players that they added to the team in that time period.
Ray Davis, the Texas Rangers owner, has admirably shown an extreme willingness to spend his money on players. This is a breath of fresh air, as there have been a lot of teams that are cheap and unwilling to pay their home-grown stars.
The Miami Marlins infamously did this in the 2017-2018 offseason as they traded away their entire outfield of Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, and Marcell Ozuna. Stanton just won MVP with the Marlins in 2017 and Yelich would win MVP the year after with the Milwaukee Brewers.
These are good players; the Marlins just did not want to pay any of them. In the 2020-2021 offseason the Cleveland Guardians, or Indians at the time, traded away star shortstop Francisco Lindor to the New York Mets because they were also unwilling to sign him to a large contract too.
Lindor was a staple of Cleveland’s baseball club and has been a top five shortstop since he joined the majors. Cleveland’s owner was cheap and did not want to extend Lindor, who would have brought the star power that Cleveland is missing.
The same offseason, the Colorado Rockies traded the face of their franchise, Nolan Arenado, away to the St. Louis Cardinals. It is a similar circumstance to Cleveland, as Colorado did not want to pay Arenado, despite the fact that he was the best third baseman in the history of their franchise.
The Texas Rangers have proved all these teams wrong by spending big in free agency and being rewarded for it with a championship. Both Corey Seager and Marcus Semien were large free agent additions to the Texas Rangers in the 2021-2022 offseason.
It is only fitting that both Seager and Semien played a large part in the Rangers postseason success. Seager even won World Series MVP, which shows how important his contributions were to the team. The Rangers also added pitchers Jon Gray and Andrew Heaney to their roster, which provided pitching depth.
The MLB needs more owners like Mets’ Steve Cohen, Padres’ Peter Seidler, and the Dodgers’ Mark Walter. These owners, along with the Texas Rangers, understand that players should be paid what they are worth and signing the best players available is a good idea.
Buying a championship does not work every time, as the ownership group has the choose the correct players. For example, the Los Angeles Angels signed Anthony Rendon to a large contract, and he has been underperforming all through that contract.
Errors can be made while buying a championship, but the Rangers success should be an encouraging sign. The Texas Rangers winning the World Series is proof to all the teams across the league that buying a championship can work.