Of All the Possible Challengers to the Angels . . . : Could Those Really Be the Rangers in Second? : . . . This Was the Team Voted Least Likely to Succeed

There is something terribly wrong here. Yes . . . no . . . yes, it is--Ranger players in white shorts and T-shirts taking batting practice as the Boston Red Sox, dressed in their elegant grays, look on with quiet amusement.

Does Tom Lasorda know about this, and if so, should he lecture his protege, Bobby Valentine, from the bible of Dodger Blue? Or should he order a gross or two for Al Campanis and the boys?

And get a load of this: Ranger pitchers tossing footballs on the sideline. Not long after they started this little ritual, knuckleballer Charlie Hough was heard to say that although the Ranger pitching staff may have its occasional problems, “we lead the league in third-down conversions.”

It gets worse. Rah-rah signs are posted in the Ranger clubhouse. “Stay Aggressive,” reads one. “Winning Is An Attitude, “ reads another.

On and on it goes until you discover that these harmless lugs, with their pregame softball togs, their Saturday morning cartoon nicknames -- Inky, Wardo, O.B., L.P., Boo, Toby and Geno -- their organization’s sordid history of management bumblings, are in second place, just 7 1/2 games behind the division-leading California Angels.

Have the proper authorities been notified?

This is the team that normally finds its way to the bottom of the American League West standings by, say, June. Game attendance dips into four figures. In the old days , you could hit fungoes into the Arlington Stadium seats and not hit anyone .

Of course, Ranger tradition called for at least one imbecilic trade or oversight a season. Remember Doyle Alexander, Walt Terrell, Ron Darling, Len Barker, Bert Blyleven, Bill Madlock, Rick Honeycutt, Jim Sundberg, Tom Henke, Juan Beniquez, Dave Righetti? That’s right, all former Rangers. “There was a real lack of credibility throughout baseball as far as our organization,” Valentine says.

First baseman Pete O’Brien was playing golf with Terrell and Darling, two of the organization’s most promising pitchers, the day they were traded to the New York Mets for outfielder Lee Mazzilli. So upset was O’Brien, that he briefly questioned whether he was in the right profession. If those knuckleheads in the front office could do this to Terrell and Darling, just think of the possibilities with O’Brien.

O’Brien stayed and suffered through the 1982 season when the Rangers finished sixth, 29 games out of the lead; 1983, when they finished third, 22 games back, despite having led the division by two games at the All-Star break; 1984, when they finished seventh, 14 1/2 back and last season, when Texas ended up in last place again, this time 28 1/2 games behind the Kansas City Royals.

Now, you’d need a court order to evict O’Brien from the Rangers. Though time is running out, his team is in a pennant race and already has won more games than four of the last five Ranger teams. Attendance is up, too, an average of about 7,600 fans, and every time the Rangers play at home they reset their record. Recent local television ratings show Ranger viewership at an all-time high, up 27,500 households compared to 1985. And don’t laugh, but Ranger playoff tickets have been ordered--just in case. Postseason hotel arrangements have been made. Media credentials and seating are being considered.

Now when the Angels glance over their shoulders, they don’t see the Royals, but this strangely assembled Ranger team.

“It’s like a Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid feeling, you know: ‘Who are those guys?’ ” O’Brien said. “There’s no doubt in my mind that we’re going to stay on (the Angels). If they falter, late in September, middle of September, heck, we could overtake them. It’s going to be a lot of fun. It’s going to be fun to see how September develops.”

Said General Manager Tom Grieve: “Raw talent-wise, we’ve got more talent than (the Angels) do.”

And this from third baseman Steve Buechele: “Everybody says we’re the surprise team in the baseball. The only people not surprised by it are the people in this clubhouse.”

Positioned happily in the middle of all this post-adolescent irreverence is Valentine, 36, youngest manager in the major leagues, younger than two of his players, four of his coaches. Young.

Valentine is a mover, a shaker. He was voted sexiest man in the Metroplex. He owns restaurants. He signs autographs until his wrist aches.

Take a drive here and you find the landscape dotted with V-Ball billboards. Bobby V. and big D are becoming tight.

This is Valentine’s first full year as Ranger manager. Grieve, who at 38, is the youngest general manger in the big leagues, hired him to replace Doug Rader 32 games into last season.

Valentine and Grieve were teammates with the Mets. They used to stay up late at night and discuss personnel moves, baseball strategy, management techniques. When Grieve was named general manager in 1984, his first, and really his only, choice to rescue the Rangers was Valentine, who spent his time tending the third base coaches’ box for the Mets.

The Rangers were used to Rader’s fire and brimstone. An imposing man, Rader had the presence of a Calvinist preacher raging against the constant Ranger mistakes. Then Valentine arrived--bubbly, positive, enthusiastic, inventive. He took chances, gambled on youth, revitalized veterans.

The Rangers lost 76 of 129 games.

With that fresh in the minds of many, the Rangers were picked to finish their usual sixth or seventh. They were young, their pitching was suspect and they had tradition on their side.

“There’s no reason for us to win,” Hough said. “If you were to project how we’d do before the season starts, where the teams come in, I wouldn’t think we were predicted anywhere other than last place. And here we are, with what I think, the only team with a legitimate threat to catch the Angels.

“I mean, I go into spring training getting ready to win, but you have to be somewhat realistic, too,” he said. “You go into a season where you’ve got two, three, four, five, six rookie pitchers on your staff. It’s pretty tough to say, ‘Well, we’ll win the pennant.’ Our fourth-place hitter had never played a professional game.”

It doesn’t stop there. Look at this team:

Starting pitchers Ed Correa, Bobby Witt, Jose Guzman and Mike Loynd are rookies. Even with the veteran Hough doing what he can, Ranger starters still have a losing record (46-50) after 137 games this season.

Witt, 4-0 in his last seven starts, is something to see. His fastball has been clocked in the mid- to high 90s and scouts rave about his natural pitching ability. But he has this itsy-bitsy bad habit. He walks people. Or he throws wild pitches. Take your pick, he does either well.

He has walked 121, a Ranger record, and thrown 20 wild pitches, just one shy of the American League record. Those are numbers Hough and his schizophrenic knuckleball could be proud of.

A typical line score for Witt reads something like this: 4 innings pitched, 3 hits, 2 runs, both earned, 6 walks, 9 strikeouts, 1 wild pitch, 100 pitches.

Loynd is a treat, too. He’s sort of a scaled-down version of Boston’s Dennis (Oil Can) Boyd. Loynd can scowl, talk, showboat with the best of them. All this from a guy who spent last season pitching for Florida State University.

By season’s end, the Rangers could possibly find a place in baseball lore. Only five other teams since 1900 have finished first and also led the league in walks allowed. The Rangers have given up 639 after 137 games, which puts them past the 1959 Dodgers, who finished with 614. They still have a ways to go before catching the 1949 New York Yankees and their 812.

If all goes as it should, the Rangers will finish with about 775 walks allowed.

The bullpen is an interesting bunch.

There’s Greg Harris, the Rangers’ leading reliever with 16 saves. He has played for the New York Mets, Cincinnati Reds, Montreal Expos, San Diego Padres and Rangers in not quite six major league seasons.

Mitch Williams, another rookie, had six games of Double-A experience when he earned a job on the roster. His minor league career included leading the entire Texas organization in strikeouts. And walks. So unsure were the Rangers of his control, that they wouldn’t let him throw batting practice to left-handed hitters several years ago in spring training. Now he’s 8-4, has 7 saves and 80 strikeouts in only 86 innings. Williams leads the American League in appearances with 68. That’s a Ranger rookie record, is the third-highest total in team history and the most for a left-hander.

Then there’s Dale Mohorcic, who, at 30, is the oldest player to have made his major league debut with the Rangers. Mohorcic recently tied Mike Marshall’s 12-year-old record of 13 consecutive relief appearances. More impressive is that Mohorcic is even in the major leagues.

Here is a guy who began his professional baseball career by answering a magazine advertisement for a tryout in Victoria, British Columbia. The team, an independent, was named the Victoria Mussels. Using his life savings for the trip, Mohorcic, a catcher then, made the team as a pitcher.

Later, he got a tryout with the Toronto Blue Jays. They made him bring his own catcher. His stay with the Blue Jays didn’t last long. Soon, he found himself requesting tryouts with the Mets, Philadelphia Phillies, Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates. Only the Pirates said yes. And what a bunch of swell guys they were. Mohorcic wasn’t issued a room or bed at the Pirate camp, so he slept on the floor in a teammate’s room.

Mohorcic told the Dallas Morning News that when he was assigned to a Pirate minor league team, Manager Chuck Tanner called him into his office and said: “We’re sending you down, Lefty.”

Mohorcic is right-handed.

The man in charge of Ranger pitching is Tom House. Before he asked his staff to start tossing footballs on the sideline--he contends that it best imitates the proper overhand motion for throwing a baseball--House was best known for catching Hank Aaron’s record-breaking 715th home run in the Atlanta bullpen.

He attended USC, got a degree in marketing and later an MBA, appeared as an extra in “The Graduate,” “Camelot,” “Hogan’s Heroes” and “Rat Patrol.” So naturally, after a so-so pro career, House became a pitching coach.

“All I’ve known from Day 1 is that we’d be competitive,” he said. “When we’re good, we’re good. When we’re bad, we stink.”

Simple enough.

The rest of the Ranger team has its moments. Outfielders Gary Ward, Oddibe McDowell and rookies Pete Incaviglia and Ruben Sierra would make any manager happy.

Incaviglia, fresh from the Oklahoma State University campus, has 23 home runs and 70 runs batted-in, both Ranger rookie records. O’Brien hits for average and power. Shortstop Scott Fletcher, an unexpected pleasure after being acquired from the Chicago White Sox, is batting .311. Third baseman Steve Buechele, only in his second year, has 15 home runs. Designated hitter Larry Parrish has 23 homers. Catcher Don Slaught has added 11 home runs.

The Rangers have overcome assorted baseball plagues.

At various points in the season, they’ve done without Slaught, Darrell Porter and Orlando Mercado, as well as Parrish, pitcher Mike Mason, second baseman Toby Harrah, Incaviglia and Ward. During one game against Kansas City, the Ranger lineup was missing its Nos. 4, 5, 6 and 7 hitters.

The Rangers once lost five games in a row. Then they won 10 of their next 11. After the All-Star break, the Rangers lost seven consecutive games. Here it was--the beginning of the end.

But the Rangers recovered and remain close enough to the Angels to constitute a threat. Not only that, but the Rangers may actually see a profit this season, thanks mainly to an expected attendance increase of 600,000 fans.

“Three reasons,” Hough says. “One, pretty good ballplayers. Two, Bobby Valentine. Three, Tom Grieve. And I don’t know if the order is right.”

Said House: “I can tell you the exact reason why (the Rangers are contenders): Bobby Valentine. I’ve been in the real world and the baseball world over the last 21 years, and Bobby Valentine, in my opinion, is one of the finest human resource managers and developers I’ve ever been exposed to.”

Does that mean he can coach baseball?

“His intuitive grasp of managing people, it just amazes me,” House said. “If you look around the clubhouse (at the signs) ‘You can if you believe, you can,’ without Bobby running the show, this would almost be trite, maybe even a little embarrassing. But with him doing his thing, and being Bobby Valentine and working with his athletes, it is what you see.”

This is Valentine’s view, which is light on credit and heavy on humility:

“I just think I put together a coaching staff that has done an outstanding job, working with the guys. We needed to believe in ourselves and believe in each other.”

That’s that. Valentine says he’s not the one who came back from the injuries, or nursed a baby pitching staff, or made the front-office moves. But he and Grieve decided that the quick fix was no longer an alternative. No more Lee Mazzilli deals. “To go against that would be such a devastating move,” Grieve said.

So here they are, the Rangers, of all teams. Time was, you could count on the Rangers for their annual belly-flop. Back in the bad old days, “we would have started thinking about the postgame (food) spread” even before the final out, Grieve said.

No longer. The Rangers, even in shorts and T-shirts, consider themselves genuine nuisances, able to cause the experience-laden Angels to hear occasional footsteps.

“We haven’t set the world on fire, but neither have the Angels,” Hough said. “We’re not going to win 105 games, but we’re going to give them a battle. If (the Angels) play as well as their roster, on paper, says, they should win. If they don’t, we can beat them.”