Langford beginning to showcase power after IL stint 'reset'

ARLINGTON -- Wyatt Langford connected with a slider on the inside of the zone, and immediately broke out into a grin before rounding the bases.

The Rangers’ 22-year-old rookie seemed like he knew at the moment of contact. Langford’s first career grand slam could not have come at a better time. With the Rangers leading by two runs and in desperate need of some insurance, Langford launched one a Statcast-projected 415 feet into the left-field seats, propelling Texas to a 6-0 win over Kansas City on Saturday to secure the series.

“I’d say I knew,” Langford said with a smile. “I got it pretty good.”

It marked the Rangers’ 17th grand slam by a Rangers rookie (last: Josh Jung on April 30, 2023 vs. the Yankees). Langford (22 years, 220 days) is the youngest Ranger to hit a grand slam since Nomar Mazara (21 years, 346 days) on April 7, 2017 vs the A’s.

Langford didn’t hit his first outside-of-the-park homer until his 49th game of the season against the Mets on June 18. He’s now added another in the same week.

The power outage has been shocking for Langford, who has 70-grade power and launched 10 homers in his first 44 professional games in the Minors in 2023. He even once owned the single-season home run record at the University of Florida (though it was broken last season).

While he’s hit the ball hard this season, he’s struggled to do so in the air, often resulting in infield singles and hard-hit outs.

On Tuesday, he finally broke through. Saturday will hopefully break the dam fully open.

Langford has looked more and more like the AL Rookie of the Year candidate that the Rangers expected him to be in recent weeks. The 22-year-old spent three weeks in May on the injured list with a hamstring strain, but was hitting just .224/.295/.293 with one home run, one triple, three doubles and 11 RBIs in 31 games at the time of the injury.

Langford is slashing .313/.361/.522 with two homers, two triples, four doubles and 17 RBIs in the month of June. He entered play on Saturday leading all American League rookies (with at least 50 plate appearances) in RBIs, slugging percentage, extra-base hits and total bases this month.

Rangers manager Bruce Bochy has echoed all season long that the home runs would eventually come for Langford. They had to for a guy with a smooth swing and natural power like that. Now, the Rangers are just seeing the version of Langford they always expected.

“I think there is a reset, probably, that did happen there,” Bochy said of Langford’s injury. “He got a little break, and that gave him a chance to back off a little bit and get some ABs [in Triple-A]. He came back up here and he's a different player. So that happens. You try to look at the silver lining with injuries. It gives them a chance to reset and that happened with him.”

Langford said the injury shutdown probably served him well. It gave him a chance to sit back and watch and absorb everything that was going on around him in the big league clubhouse.

“He's made a little adjustment with this swing, so I think that's really good,” said Josh Smith, who had a homer of his own. “If we're gonna get to where we want to go, I think he's gonna have to get going like he has been. He's just been so good for us recently. It feels like he's got an RBI or two every game. He's a young kid in the league who’s learning, and he's just been awesome.”

Langford said that small adjustment just came from him and the Rangers’ hitting coaches watching old video from his time at Florida to get his swing back to what it looked like at that point.

It’s more than paid off.

“He’s come back strong since that injury,” said Marcus Semien, who went 1-for-4 in the win. “I think that it was a good opportunity for him to just sit and watch. I think the game slowed down for him a little bit. He's going to come up in big situations a lot, as we've seen.

"He's always, at least once a night, in those situations, and he’s getting more and more comfortable. I remember as a rookie just feeling that pressure to come through every single time because everybody's expecting so much from you. He’s finally able to slow the game down.”