Saying that the Texas Rangers were struggling at the plate would probably be an understatement.

Entering play on Tuesday, Texas ranked 29th in Major League Baseball in runs per game (3.1), 29th in on-base percentage (.274), 23rd in slugging percentage (.363), and 25th in WRC+ (84).

Needing some sort of spark, Rangers manager Bruce Bochy decided to shake up the lineup in a way that we haven’t seen since he took the reins in Texas.

Most notably, Bochy shifted his franchise pillars into different spots in the order. A struggling Marcus Semien slid from 1st to 5th, and Corey Seager dropped down a spot to 3rd.

Doing so allowed the hot bats of Josh Smith and Wyatt Langford to move to 1st and 2nd, respectively.

“As far as the last two or three weeks, we’ve changed it a little bit, but this will be how we go,” Bochy said before Tuesday’s game.

“Corey [Seager] in the three hole and Marcus [Semien] in the five hole, two experienced guys at key positions, so I decided to go ahead and do it. Part of it, you wanna get the consistency this offense is going to have and Marcus [Semien] has a lot of experience driving in runs, and I went ahead and did it”.

Bochy’s decision to “go ahead and do it” paid off in a big way as the Rangers exploded for a season-high eight runs in a series-opening victory over the Athletics.

Four Rangers hit home runs as both Smith and Langford went deep in their higher lineup spots, while Semien and Jake Burger delivered in lower slots.

“It worked well, didn’t it?” Bochy said after the game. “That first inning, things went exactly the way we would have wanted it to go, with a couple guys getting on there for Corey. We did a nice job throughout the lineup”.

Certainly, Bochy and the Rangers would like to keep their lineup in the structure that it was, but it remains to be seen whether that will be possible or not.

Seager left yesterday’s game with right hamstring tightness he experienced while running to first base in the 6th inning. The Rangers will get Seager an MRI today to determine the severity of the injury.

Regardless, Texas will hope that this short one-game sample is a sign of what’s to come for an offense that will need to step up moving forward.