Rudy J. Is Leaving
That’s Rudy Jaramillo of the Texas Rangers who is leaving, the Rangers are one of the best offenses in baseball year in year out and routinely finishing among the league leaders in runs scored and home runs. While the players have come and gone through the door, the one constant has always been hitting coach Rudy J.
Jaramillo has spent the last 15 seasons with the Rangers and helped mold young players into batting champions and MVPs, but after a down season for the Rangers offensively, Jaramillo has decided he’s going to end his time in Arlington and test the open market.
During his tenure, Jaramillo has produced four MVPs (Juan Gonzalez twice, Ivan Rodriguez and Alex Rodriguez), a batting champ (Michael Young) and three home run champions (Alex Rodriguez, 2001-03).
Rangers officials met with Jaramillo shortly after the season to extend the one-year offer but to also stipulate that the offense needed to improve. The Rangers ranked seventh in runs scored in the AL in 2009, but ranked 11th of 14 teams in batting average (.260) and 12th in on-base percentage (.320). There have been concerns about the team’s approach, particularly how often the Rangers swung at first pitches and put themselves in unfavorable hitting counts, they had the highest percentage of first-pitch swings in the AL (31.1) last season.
Jaramillo has been in hot demand every year but he has always chosen to stay with the Rangers. I’m not in favor of this departure, in fact I feel as if the Rangers low balled Jaramillo and hid behind a year in which the number might have backed it but the bigger picture shows they finished their best since 2004 and they lost significant time All-Stars hitters like Josh Hamilton, Ian Kinsler, and Michael Young. The Rangers saw no player play over a 146 games and guys like Marlon Byrd, and Elvis Andrus, who played the 146 and 145 games, could use another few years under Jaramillo.
It’s very in early in the Rangers off-season but this is two steps back from this years second place finish in the American League West. Furthermore, for those that want to pin the Rangers three playoff appearances and one playoff win in his 15 years, seriously must have been watching a different ball club when the Rangers where in the outfield the past nine years.
Bad move.



