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Led by Jordan Montgomery, Rangers’ pitchers continued to flex newfound weapon vs. Angels

Over the two weeks since this group became a family, the Maddux Bunch has recorded 148 strikeouts in 14 August games.

ARLINGTON — Call it the Scherzer Effect. Or the Maddux Method. Or Bochy’s Bunch. But however, you dissect it, this is what you get: A remarkably more dynamic pitching staff.

Gasping to stay afloat in July, the reinvigorated Rangers pitching staff has been at the center of a blazing hot August. On Tuesday, Jordan Montgomery, one of three trade-deadline acquisitions smothered the withering Los Angeles Angels for six innings in a 7-3 win that featured yet another guy driving in five runs. On Monday, it was Marcus Semien.

On Tuesday: Corey Seager. He hit a pair of homers and a bases-loaded single. It was the MLB-high ninth time the Rangers have had a five-RBI game from a player this year. That’s also the last reference to the offense here. It’s always been about the offense in these parts.

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Can we talk about some sexy pitching numbers?

“We’re playing well and doing a lot of things right, right now,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “It starts with pitching. They’re just doing a really nice job and getting us quality starts. The bullpen is doing a great job.”

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OK, he mentioned the offense is getting big hits, too. But we promised.

The pitching turnaround has been astonishing. Yes, general manager Chris Young went out and got Max Scherzer, Montgomery and reliever Chris Stratton. But did anybody really expect, they’d string together a 2.05 ERA through six starts and 10 relief innings? And it was only that high because Stratton allowed a pair of runs in the ninth. The overall rotation ERA for August is 2.19, the best in the majors. Not surprisingly, the Rangers 12-2 in August.

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Scherzer is a three-time Cy Young Award winner. His focus and drive is legendary. To a man, the rest of the starting rotation said his penchant for preparation has “rubbed off” on them. Scherzer worked with pitching coach Mike Maddux, another diligent prep and scouting report guy, in Washington for two years.

Montgomery and Stratton each spent less than half a season with Maddux in St. Louis. Enough time for them to get to know each other, but perhaps not enough time to complete projects. They appear to have picked up right where they left off with one another.

Over his three starts with the Rangers, Montgomery certainly resembles a pitcher comfortable making changes on the fly. He has featured a different pitch in a co-starring role along with his sinker in each game. A cutter in his debut. A changeup in Oakland. On Tuesday, it was the four-seam fastball.

What’s most significant about that: He’s using the sinker less, making him less predictable for hitters. In each of his three starts, he’s thrown it less than 40% of the time. His usage of the pitch had steadily risen all season, topping out at 53.1% in July. He threw it just 26 times in 91 pitches Tuesday (28.6%).

Consider two key outs on Tuesday, a pair of strikeouts to end threats. In the second, he started Chad Wallach with a pair of four-seamers in that perhaps opened up the inner part of the plate, then he snuck a sinker on the inside corner by him.

In the fifth, he struck out The World’s Best Player™ Shohei Ohtani by getting him to chase a pair of curveballs below the zone early, then followed it up with a sinker at the bottom of the zone for a called third strike.

“That lineup is really good at hitting what I really do best,” Montgomery said. “Typically, I would throw a lot of sinkers down and away, but that’s what they like, so I had to start more often with fastballs in and then go soft away.”

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It led to nine strikeouts for Montgomery, which is about on par for the Rangers this month. Counting the three strikeouts by Josh Sborz and Aroldis Chapman over the seventh and eight and the Rangers had 12 for the night.

As a staff, they are wielding the strikeout as a weapon like never before. Over the two weeks since this group became a family, the Maddux Bunch has recorded 148 strikeouts in 14 August games. It sounds like a lot because it is. According to Baseball-Reference, it is the highest single-season 14-game stretch in team history.

Perhaps more importantly, the nexus between strikeouts and walks continues to widen. It is 5.69 strikeouts per walk in August. Free bases had been a particularly troubling development during July. In July, on the way to the sixth-worst ERA in baseball (5.12), the rotation had the worst strikeout-to-walk rate (1.59) in the majors. Spotting the difference is easy.

“I’m seeing a lot of strikes,” Bochy said. “We’re staying away from the walks. If you look at July we walked a lot more batters. We’re attacking the zone a lot better. They’re pitching with a lot of confidence. When you get Max Scherzer on your staff, that’s going to make you better. But each guy we’ve thrown out there, we’ve seen the competitiveness. They are going to give us a chance to win.”

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And the Rangers have capitalized on that regularly.

Twitter: @Evan_P_Grant

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