Throughout an introductory press convention for outfielder Brandon Nimmo this week, Rangers president of baseball operations Chris Younger one way or the other expressed each confidence and uncertainty about his latest acquisition. Nimmo, he stated, would deal with proper area for the Rangers in 2026, although he didn’t sound too certain about it.
“We’re not 100% dedicated to [Nimmo in right],” Younger informed reporters on Monday. “I feel it’s doubtless the place he’ll play, however [those are] conversations that we’ll have with Brandon, with [manager] Skip [Schumaker] and with Wyatt [Langford], and actually ensuring that we perceive all features of this and the place they’re most comfy. I do suppose we now have three excellent, gifted, very gifted outfielders. On the outset, I feel it’s doubtless Brandon performs proper, however I feel that’s an additional dialog.”
There are a variety of issues right here. Nimmo, at this section of his profession, is sort of actually finest in left area. His knees are jacked up; his arm is noodle-adjacent. Evan Carter nominally profiles as a middle fielder, however accidents have saved him off the sphere for a lot of the final two seasons; it’s potential a nook may very well be one of the simplest ways to make sure his availability. Langford’s recognized proper area expertise is restricted to a single sport for the 2022 Peninsula Pilots of the collegiate summer time Coastal Plain League.
In my opinion, there’s just one strategy to kind this mess out: Decide to taking part in Langford in heart.
There’s potential draw back right here, after all. Rising his defensive obligations may hinder his offensive improvement, and his expertise in heart has been considerably restricted to this point in his younger profession. But when it really works out, the upside is big. There’s maybe no simpler participant to construct round than a celebrity heart fielder, an essential consideration because the Rangers enter a interval of roster transition, albeit a shorter one wherein they’re nonetheless trying to contend. And from what I’ve seen, Langford is greater than able to dealing with the place.
The thought of Langford as a full-time heart fielder would’ve been unthinkable as just lately as a couple of months in the past. All the general public prospect writers praised Langford’s main league-ready bat within the spring of 2024, however they have been equally skeptical of the state of his glovework. Even Langford’s most optimistic evaluators thought he was destined for left area. Baseball Prospectus famous that “his routes and reactions will not be good at current,” although the publication acknowledged that his plus-plus velocity may portend nicely for his future improvement. On the 20-80 scale, FanGraphs’ lead prospect analyst Eric Longenhagen gave Langford a 30 future worth fielding grade.
You Aren’t a FanGraphs Member
It seems to be such as you aren’t but a FanGraphs Member (or aren’t logged in). We aren’t mad, simply upset.
We get it. You need to learn this text. However earlier than we allow you to get again to it, we might prefer to level out a couple of of the nice the reason why you must change into a Member.
1. Advert Free viewing! We cannot bug you with this advert, or some other.
2. Limitless articles! Non-Members solely get to learn 10 free articles a month. Members by no means get lower off.
3. Darkish mode and Basic mode!
4. Customized participant web page dashboards! Select the participant playing cards you need, within the order you need them.
5. One-click knowledge exports! Export our projections and leaderboards to your private initiatives.
6. Take away the photographs on the house web page! (Truthfully, this does not sound so nice to us, however some folks needed it, and we like to offer our Members what they need.)
7. Much more Steamer projections! We have now handedness, percentile, and context impartial projections out there for Members solely.
8. Get FanGraphs Stroll-Off, a custom-made yr finish assessment! Discover out precisely the way you used FanGraphs this yr, and the way that compares to different Members. Do not be a sufferer of FOMO.
9. A weekly mailbag column, solely for Members.
10. Assist help FanGraphs and our complete workers! Our Members present us with essential sources to enhance the location and ship new options!
We hope you will take into account a Membership at present, for your self or as a present! And we notice this has been an awfully lengthy gross sales pitch, so we have additionally eliminated all the opposite adverts on this article. We did not need to overdo it.
“Although he has the velocity for heart and has performed there somewhat bit, his really feel for the place (and for enjoying outfield protection on the whole) could be very poor,” Eric wrote in February 2024. “He’s merely not comfy on the market, however his pure velocity provides him a shot to be an affect defender if he can discover his footing over time.”
Whereas the bat has been a slight disappointment — he’s been 15% above common in his quick profession, vulnerable to taking a couple of too many pitches whereas posting good-but-not-great energy numbers — the protection, as soon as regarded as the one gap in his profile, has been wonderful.
The Rangers eased Langford into main league motion following his meteoric rise by means of their system — he made the Opening Day roster in 2024, after getting drafted fourth general the earlier June — primarily DHing him for the primary couple months whereas he labored on bettering his protection away from sport motion. Across the summertime, they took off the coaching wheels; from then on, Langford surprisingly graded out as a plus defender in left.
He was even higher in his sophomore marketing campaign. Largely confined to left area as a rookie, he expanded his duties in his second yr, dealing with 45 video games in heart between Carter’s accidents and Leody Taveras’ ineffectiveness. He got here away wanting like one of many higher outfielders within the sport. His +9 FRV (fielding run worth, a Statcast measurement) landed him eleventh amongst all outfielders; his +16 DRS was even higher, tying him for fourth in the identical pattern. He was equally good in each left and heart, placing up +5 Outs Above Common (OAA) at every place.
The extra subtle defensive fashions agreed with these metrics, grouping him alongside the league’s finest ballhawks. A kind of fashions — referred to as Situational Fielding — was created by Vivienne Pelletier, a public analyst who additionally works for an undisclosed main league staff. In contrast to FRV, which is context-neutral, the Situational Fielding mannequin makes use of adjustments in anticipated win chance to credit score (and debit) outfielders for his or her efficiency in high-leverage spots. (Verify the hyperlink above for a extra detailed rationalization.) By Vivienne’s mannequin, Langford ranked because the fourth-best outfielder within the sport, behind solely Ceddanne Rafaela, Pete Crow-Armstrong, and Victor Scott II.
Langford’s foot velocity — 89th percentile in 2025 — was by no means an issue. His points upon promotion, it appeared, have been his route-running capability and jumps. This season, these woes have been squared away. I watched each single play assigned to Langford the place the catch chance was graded by Statcast to be at the very least 5% and fewer than 95%, and the weaknesses have been few and much between. Let’s take a look at some errors first to get a way of what he nonetheless has to work on, starting with a few comfortable liners:
As you may see, he lets each balls drop as an alternative of charging onerous for them. With extra expertise, he’ll acquire extra confidence in his reads and switch these hits into outs.
And like all outfielder, he will be haunted by the weather. Considerably unfairly, he misplaced almost two FRV on a few performs graded at 99% catch chance. The primary one can in all probability be chalked as much as the poor lighting at Sutter Well being Area:
And the second to an excellent vibrant Kansas Metropolis solar:
He additionally, hilariously, misplaced 0.9 FRV on a play the place Sam Haggerty truck-sticked him on a deep fly ball that he was in any other case in place to catch:
You would possibly discover that each one these oopsies occurred whereas Langford was in left. For my cash, heart area is the place Langford is finest suited. His arm isn’t notably sturdy, however he can cowl large swaths of house within the blink of a watch. Additionally, he might need a better time getting right reads in heart, the place he gained’t see the identical sharp hooking or slicing angles off the bat as he does within the corners.
Beneath was my favourite of his catches from final season, a 30% catch chance seize on a ball Corbin Carroll drove 400 toes into the hole. Langford properties in like a heat-seeking missile, making it look simple:
His capability to go gap-to-gap is a key characteristic of his heart area play. Watch him cowl 73 toes in 4.3 seconds to chase down this J.T. Realmuto liner, a ball with only a 40% probability of being caught:
Sorry, Zach McKinstry — that’s not getting down:
And whereas he didn’t give you these comfortable liners from Jarren Duran and Luis Robert Jr. above, he didn’t wrestle with these sort of batted balls in a broader sense. His best-rated catch of the season got here on a Xander Bogaerts line drive with some nasty topspin; the Statcast mannequin gave him only a 5% probability of attending to it, however an insane soar allowed him to slip slightly below the ball to corral it:
He can do it in heart, too. Watch him slide and snag a José Ramírez laser to maintain it from hitting the bottom:
A 115 wRC+ is boring in a nook, however in heart, he begins to appear to be a star, a Julio Rodríguez for the better Dallas-Forth Value metropolitan space. In all chance, Langford’s bat will take a step ahead in his age-24 season; Steamer expects a 124 wRC+ from him in 2026, and ZIPS is much more bullish, projecting him for a .259/.347/.452 slash line with 23 house runs, a 134 OPS+ and 4.8 WAR. If a place change stalls that progress, the Rangers must determine in the event that they’d be higher off transferring him again to left and giving his bat an opportunity to achieve its full potential, however I feel no matter the place he performs within the area, his offense will proceed to enhance.
It’s true that the Rangers are in a little bit of a transitional interval — they employed Schumaker to switch Bruce Bochy as supervisor, non-tendered Adolis García, and traded away Marcus Semien — however they’re additionally solely two years faraway from successful the World Sequence. Their roster as presently constructed continues to be able to contending, and Nimmo stated he “wanted to know that the Rangers have been dedicated to attempting to win a World Sequence” earlier than he agreed to waive his no-trade clause. As Nimmo stated, Younger assured him that “we’d be competing for World Sequence titles, yr in and yr out.” If that certainly is the case, and the Rangers are nonetheless in win-now mode, then it’s time for them to throw warning to the wind and stick Langford in heart, regardless of the developmental threat. He’s their finest choice to man crucial outfield place.