Clifford Burton says:

The Rangers would be fools to give up on Mitch Moreland. To me, he’s a decided improvement over Justin Smoak who–though I like him–was a bit too passive at the plate for a middle of the order hitter when the Rangers had him. And Mitch is also an improvement over Chris Davis who–to me–(until recently anyway), has always been too aggressive and easy to fool with off-speed pitches. I like all three of them long term, but at this point in their progression Double M is the most polished of the three.

As for Mitch’s inability to hit left handed pitchers, do you remember Paul O’Neill? When he was playing left field for the Reds during the mid 80′s he didn’t hit lefties well at all. So Pete Rose usually sat him against southpaws. But Buck Schowalter had the good sense to play Paul against all pitching–and the result was the second coming of Will Clark whenever Paul came to the plate with men in scoring position. Paul O’Neill became a total monster in clutch situations from that point on–calling to mind Eddie Murray, Roberto Clemente and the aforementioned Will Clark whose performances in clutch situations were legendary…

As far as I’m concerned Nolan Ryan made a mistake bringing notorious all or nothing .240 hitter Mike Napoli to the Rangers–not only because it figured to alienate Mike Young, but because it also figured to subtract playing time from Mitch Moreland who will NEVER become proficient against lefties until he gets reps against them. This isn’t nuclear physics–or merely baseball sense–it’s plain old common sense. But it remains to be seen how much of it Ron Washington has when it comes to doling out playing time to Mitch–whose power totals would resemble former Ranger first baseman Justin Smoak’s more closely if he played everyday…

That’s my slant on things.
What’s yours??

Clifford Burton
Santa Monica