Adrian Beltre threw his head back and sighed.
“F——, guys.”
He had been in the clubhouse for about sixty seconds, and already he was surrounded. He threw his hands up in exasperation, then smiled politely and nodded at each of the huddle of reporters, addressing some by name. It would be a fool’s errand to ascertain which of the greetings he meant more. With Adrian Beltre, it’s always a little of both: the scold and the scamp, the jester and the King. The perpetual gleeful child, and the 38-year-old future Hall of Famer who—after earning five Gold Gloves, four Silver Sluggers, four All-Star appearances, six top-ten MVP finishes, 3,048 hits, and 462 home runs—has just one elusive eidolon left to trap: a World Series ring.
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Make no mistake: for all the batter’s box dancing, head-touching, baseline-ignoring, and batter’s circle dragging, there is a febrile phlogiston churning inside Beltre’s 5’11” hearth. He wants to win. He wants it bad. And he wants it now before his body does what all bodies eventually do. Last year, he tweaked his calf the week before reporting to Spring Training, and the various injuries hampered him all season. This year, he took it a little easier.
“I’m good,” he says, then re-phrases: “I’m scary good. I did less running distance. More sprints. I came in a little lighter. When you age…it’s better to be lighter. There are some things I need to understand now that I am 38, almost 39. I want to make sure I’m one hundred percent mentally and physically ready to go.”
One hundred percent. A healthy Beltre would go a long ways towards making the Rangers a better team in 2018.
But it’s no secret that he can’t do it alone.
“There’s a lot of free agents out there… Arrieta, Cobb, J.D. Martinez… a *lot* of free agents”
Adrian Beltre talks about the Rangers’ offseason, and how he feels about the 2018 squad. pic.twitter.com/0hR8hBsqeg
— Levi Weaver (@ThreeTwoEephus) February 19, 2018
“Oh yeah, one hundred percent.”
There’s that phrase again. This time in regards to the idea that he would have handled the Rangers roster differently if he were the General Manager. There are precious few players who can say such a thing without seeming like they are in open revolt. In fact, the list might consist of only one jester and one King. Yes, he would have signed more players. Sign all the players. Sign every last free agent if it means he has a shot at a ring before his body betrays him once and for all.
But that’s not what happened. Could Mike Minor be great? Maybe. Does Doug Fister have another good year left? Maybe. Will Matt Bush make a successful transition to the rotation? Maybe. Can Matt More rediscover his pre-Giants form? Maybe. Will Martin Perez be ready for Opening Day? Maybe. Will Cole Hamels right his aging ship from a year ago? Maybe.
Did we just ask valid questions about literally every member of a six-man rotation? Yes.
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The General Manager will always get the brunt of the blame for any offseason, and that scrutiny is magnified when your local legend and folk hero is careening towards a finish line and begging for one more shot to win. But Beltre knows that Daniels doesn’t make these decisions alone. He works with the budget he is given by ownership. Beltre acknowledges that while he would have done it differently, he appreciates the way Daniels has communicated the team’s vision.
“He has been honest with me,” Beltre acknowledges. “Since the end of last year, we have talked and exchanged some ideas. He let me know the way they were going this year. There was no promise this year we were going into the free agent market to (sign) the top free agents. He let me know it was going to be a little different. Did I want to hear that? Probably not.”
Is he disappointed?
“I wouldn’t call it disappointment, because I already knew what was going on,” the veteran answers. “I mean, I would like to be …more satisfied. Put it that way, in the sense of putting a better team in our ballclub. It’s not that the team (isn’t good), but we could add some other pieces. Again, especially knowing the free agents that are out there, there are a lot of free agents that we can add. I would have gotten some of those guys.”
“But (…) I can’t sit out here and start complaining,” he mitigates. “This is my eighth year here, and every year but one we were competing and had a good team to win. It’s been what they promised me, so I’ve got no complaints.”
“I want to have the best team …but I don’t have to pay those checks.”
Interesting he should bring that up, actually. What if he did? Beltre has allowed the team to get creative with his contracts in the past. Would he be open to some kind of contract re-negotiation if it meant the Rangers could sign a top-tier pitcher?
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“If it gives me a chance to win, yeah, one hundred percent.”
Would he play for one dollar?
He pauses.
“Are they going to pay back sometime?” He laughs “…they have to pay later.”
Teams have done crazier things.
—
Adrian Beltre is not alone in the boat. At the helm is Jeff Banister, who took the Rangers to AL West division titles in 2015 and 2016, his first two years with the team. Last year’s results notwithstanding, the team left camp with legitimate hope for a third consecutive pennant. Is it different this year, with a more frugal approach from the front office?
“If you’ll remember back then, our most consistent pitcher was Wandy Rodriguez,” the manager says, referring to his first season with Texas. “We lost Yu Darvish in Spring Training, we lost Derek Holland on Opening Day. We lost Ryan Rua on Opening Day. We had an Adrian Beltre who was a little banged up coming out of Spring Training, right?”
He’s correct. No one expected the Rangers to win the division in 2015, especially after Darvish’s injury. But the underdogs scrapped back, eventually acquiring Cole Hamels, Jake Diekman, and Sam Dyson at the trade deadline and overcoming an underachieving Astros squad. This is not the first time Banister has started Spring Training looking up.
“So where my mindset is… I love to lay my head down and dream, but what I do know is there’s a group of guys out on that field right now, a group of guys that will show up for an opening day meeting tomorrow (the first official day of full-squad workouts). You want to know where my focus is at? Every single one of those guys. And preparing the best we have to go forward to play. The day that I get caught up worrying about—and I get it—what we don’t have? I’m not serving those players correctly. I’m just bullheaded enough to believe that there’s a group of guys in that room right now who have an opportunity to shock everybody (…) If I worry about the landscape of free agency, I’m not serving those guys correctly.”
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Is that Adrian Beltre serving them incorrectly by bringing it up?
“That’s not what I’m saying!” Banister vehemently insists, both palms facing forward in a “stop sign” pose. “Don’t put those words in my mouth! He has the right to do that. He’s earned that. I get that. It’s all about the quest. There are two different perspectives here. All I’m saying is that I can’t get caught up in that, because I’ve got a group of players and coaches over there, and I need to help them get prepared. No. I’m not saying that. Adrian has earned the right to communicate and talk about all of that. Believe me. It’s necessary. It is.”
—
“I’m with the Texas Rangers,” Beltre tells us. The speculation of him being traded in a non-contending season is not breaking news to him, but he once again tiptoes the line, finding honesty in the razor-thin margins between the party line and controversial negativity.
“In the perfect world, I want to be here. I want to win the World Series this year, and I want to keep playing. I would like to stay here, but that’s beyond my control. So as of right now, I don’t think about any other team. I’ve been here eight years and they’ve been nothing but good to me. The fans have been unbelievable, and there’s not reason for me to think about any other team right now.”
“My situation doesn’t matter for this team right now,” Beltre says. As a standalone quote, that might sound like a player who feels undervalued. But this has always been Adrian Beltre, putting the team ahead of himself. The rest of the quote provides context: “Our goal is to get ready for the season and have best the team, healthy and ready to compete in a really strong division. We have to think about that. I’m not thinking about my situation.”
But of course, the questions continue unabated about his situation. He will be 39 years old this year. No one ever questions his effort, but bodies—even those who are at one hundred percent—have a tendency to bark back a little more every year. The message gets clearer from hamstrings and calves and backs and thumbs who have told their captain time and again that they would like a break.
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“Yeah, I’m excited,” he answers. “I mean it’s bittersweet because I like to be back here with the guys, just… the whole baseball thing. But at the same time, vacation is over. So you don’t get to see your kids as much, and going back to the routine every day, when the kids are in school and you’re over here working, and it starts getting harder.”
He declines to give an answer about whether he will play in 2019. After all, it’s his first day in Spring Training 2018. F——, guys.
I ask him if it would make that decision easier if he won a World Series this year, whether that be here or elsewhere.
“Yes, no doubt.”
But for once, not one hundred percent.
