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The Texas Rangers' Best Hitter

If you look at the wRC+ leaderboard at FanGraphs today, you'll see two Texas Rangers placed in the top 10.

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Placing 7th at 142, Josh Hamilton is probably no surprise. It may be a surprise that he's second on his own team, though.

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What might also be a surprise is that Adrian Beltre is not the other Ranger in the top 10, ranking 12th at 136.

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Hamilton has an MVP, and Beltre could win an MVP in the Not Mike Trout category this year, but the best hitter so far on the 2012 Texas Rangers has been fourth outfielder extraordinaire David Murphy, sitting just ahead of Hamilton at 143.

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It helps that Murphy has faced lefties in fewer than even a fifth of his plate appearances, and it helps even more that he's managed a .401 wOBA against them in the mean time. There's definitely some luck in there, and 66 PA is not even close to enough PA to start thinking Murphy has suddenly developed a reverse split. Regardless of whether you expect it to continue, though, Murphy has been stunningly incredible for the Rangers this season. He's been a solid-to-above-average player over his time in Texas -- and even that has been a pleasant surprise -- but in this year he has managed to turn in something that will look more like an All-Star to elite player.

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The Rangers missed out on a 6.75 ERA from Eric Gagne to get him, unfortunately.

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Photographs by jamesbrandon, jdtornow, phlezk, flygraphix, mcdlttx, tomasland, and literalbarrage used in background montage under Creative Commons. Thank you.