Rangers weather storm of criticism
Astros’ rival looks silly for prioritizing home games as tragedy unfolds in Houston
Jon Daniels has won more than1,000 games as Rangers general manager, but he was never going to win the battle of hurricane Harvey. At least not in a sports world where opinions tend to go wherever the Twitterverse is taking them.
Daniels wanted to do the right thing. And in terms of what makes sense and baseball’s guidebook, he did. But this was one occasion where making a wrong decision for his team would have provided a better look.
With the need to move this week’s Astros-Rangers series out of Houston, the Rangers made a generous offer. Houston president Reid Ryan had a more generous offer in mind. The two sides could not agree, which was why the teams moved their three-game series to Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Fla., where the Rangers defeated the Astros 12-2 in front an announced crowd of 3,485 on Tuesday.
Late last week when it was clear that Harvey could become a major problem for the city of Houston, the two teams considered their options.
“We were told the most recent precedent was Baltimore playing in Tampa as the home team in April 2015,” Daniels said. “We offered to do the same along with Houston getting all the revenues. We also were prepared to play the series anywhere Houston wanted to.”
But Reid Ryan, son of Nolan whose conflict with Daniels needs no rehashing, wanted the swap. Given that the Astros will miss at least a few more home games (they are also playing the Mets in Tampa this weekend), it’s a reasonable request.
From the Rangers’ standpoint, games in Arlington this week would have fundamentally been home games for Houston or at least neutral-site games, given the difficulty in ticket exchanges, sudden walk-up sales, etc. Houston would be allowed its own game presentation along with the obvious home team rule of batting second.
Ryan didn’t care for that offer. “The Rangers wanted all six of our games at their park,” he said. “The fact that the Rangers refused to go home-andhome with us, we had to look at all the options that were out there for us.”
Daniels said it’s silly to suggest his team was refusing to help.
“It wasn’t about gaining an advantage, that’s not close to accurate,” he said. “Ultimately this is all so inconsequential against the backdrop of what the people in South Texas are dealing with.”
That’s really the major point here. If you’re an Astros fan and you think Daniels is not being as charitable as he should be, fine. Likewise, if you’re a Rangers fan and think Ryan should focus more on moving on with the games and dealing with the real human tragedy in his city rather than whining about a baseball schedule.
Daniels preferred to inconvenience the fewest fans and alter the lowest number of games. It needs repeating, though: home-field advantage in baseball is nice if it’s Game 7 of the World Series. Otherwise, it’s a lot more irrelevant than in other sports.
While the Rangers have been better at home this year, the Astros have a far superior road record. Not counting Tuesday’s game, together the Astros and Rangers are 72-58 at home and 71-59 on the road.
The message: Just play the games and move on.
That’s what the Baltimore Orioles did in April 2015 after riots made playing an early-season series against Tampa Bay untenable. So they moved the games to Tropicana Field and switched another series to Camden Yards.
As manager Buck Showalter said, “White pants, grey pants, it’s still baseball between the lines.”
There are other precedents. The G20 Summit in Toronto in 2010 forced a Blue Jays home series to be moved to Philadelphia.
If Ryan and Daniels couldn’t agree on their plans, they should have flipped a coin and lived with the results. As much as loyal fans need baseball right now, we don’t need silly baseball fights.