Texas Rangers will make the playoffs
It’s been a rough season for the Rangers. Texas was 13-20 at one point and has hovered a few games below the .500 mark for most of the season.
Despite that, the Rangers have the fifth-best run differential in the American League. Five teams sit between Texas and the Tampa Bay Rays, who currently occupy the American League’s second Wild Card spot. But the Seattle Mariners are the only one of those teams who does not have a negative run differential, and they’re at exactly even.
Some luck (or bad luck) has contributed to the current standings. Case in point, the Rangers have a 6-14 record in one-run games. Those five other teams, meanwhile, are 55-37.
Even acknowledging the bad luck, making the playoffs seems tough. Texas would have to hold off every team behind them (which is most of the American League) jump all five of those teams ahead of them and, of course, catch the Rays.
But despite all of that, only two games separate the Rangers from the second Wild Card spot. That’s quite a reasonable target for Texas, which has posted the American League’s best combined record over the 2015 and 2016 seasons, to overcome.
Expect it to happen.