Remember Kyle Blanks?
It seems like ages ago when he was a possible help to a struggling, sputtering offense before he hit the disabled list with a cyst on his back side.
Now, he is set to return from the disabled list very soon, possibly on Sunday against the Royals but more likely on Tuesday in Oakland, according to The Dallas Morning News.
Blanks was supposed to head to Arizona to get some work in before returning to the Rangers, but now with the Rangers' current injury situation, he's reportedly being fast tracked back to the bigs. Adrian Beltre's injury has taken the only threatening right-handed bat out of the Rangers lineup and really forced Jeff Banister to get creative with his lineup and breaking up the abundance of lefties in the lineup. Josh Hamilton's injury is opening a spot up in left field. Guess what? Blanks fills both of those voids.
No, Blanks isn't Beltre at the plate, but he does offer a pretty legitimate threat of game-changing power, and he'd be a nice option for the short term in the middle of the Rangers' order. And he's probably better defensively as a first baseman, but he can handle himself in left field.
In 15 games this year with the Rangers, Blanks is batting .322 with a .907 OPS. He has four doubles and three homers with six RBIs in that small 15-game sample.
