Texas Rangers: Rougned Odor
With his .204/.252/.397 line, Rougned Odor delivered the Texas Rangers arguably the worst 30-homer season in MLB history. With 162 strikeouts to go against only 32 walks, Odor’s 30 home runs and 75 RBI combined to give him a season worth -0.2 WAR and an OPS+ of 65. It’s hard to get much worse than that.
Odor still swings at everything — over the past two years, he has swung at nearly 80 percent of all pitches thrown his way. The second baseman is still only 24, so there could be some room for growth as a hitter. He actually walked nearly five percent of the time in 2017, but continues to chase too many pitches out of the strike zone. Some bad luck was involved in sucking his batting average down near the Mendoza Line, but Odor wasted plenty of swings on bad pitches last year.
The Rangers have to hope that the signs of maturation Odor has shown at the plate in Spring Training can carry into the regular season. Odor is a famously fiery personality on the field, and that aggression colors his approach at the plate too much. One example for him to try and model his growth on would be Orioles second baseman Jonathan Schoop, who finally mastered the strike zone last year and made the All-Star Game.
No one expects Rougned Odor to begin walking 80 times a year. That will never be the type of player he is. He does not have to sacrifice his aggressiveness on pitches in the strike zone to be a better hitter. This is still a player with immense potential, and the Rangers need him to stay focused and have a big year.