PrevSearchNext Ian Kinsler and a what-if.

The Rangers traded Michael Young to Philadelphia on December 9, 2012.

Two days later, Richard Durrett reported that Texas had approached Ian Kinsler with the idea of a shift from second base to first, asking the veteran for his input on a possible position switch. It was driven less by any concern over Kinsler’s defense than by an effort to find a way to get Jurickson Profar into the lineup.

“[The discussion was] more about how would you feel about playing first base,” Kinsler said. “It’s not like a direct ‘You’re going to first.’ My feeling is whatever I need (to do) to help this team win. Honestly, if they believe putting me at first base is going to field a better team, I’m all for it. Bottom line is I signed a long-term extension to win a championship. If they think me at first is going to help us win a championship, I’m all for it.”

Kinsler had signed that extension eight months earlier, four days into the 2012 season. Five years at $75 million, covering 2013 through 2017, with a club option for 2018.

On the day Kinsler signed the deal, Profar had played five games above Low Class A.

Profar went on to have a 2012 season that started at Frisco and ended in Arlington — with him stranded on first after he’d singled the other way to load the bases in the ninth inning of the 5-1 Wild Card Game loss to Baltimore — culminated with coronation by Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, and MLB.com as the game’s number one prospect.

Jon Daniels has called the 2012 club the one he felt best about under his term, at least in terms of the roster. Certainly not the results. Disappointing end to the season.

Josh Hamilton left for the Angels. Mike Napoli left. Koji Uehara and Mike Adams left. So did Scott Feldman and Ryan Dempster and Mark Lowe.

Young was traded.

The team was reshaping, in part by necessity and in part by choice.

In the Durrett article, it was speculated that a Kinsler shift to first base would result in Mitch Moreland “get[ting] some at-bats as the designated hitter at times or play[ing] first against certain right-handed pitchers.”

Three weeks later, Durrett reported that Texas would go to camp with Kinsler remaining at second base. “The more we’ve talked about it both internally and with Ian,” Daniels told Durrett, “it didn’t seem like something we wanted to force. You can make a good case for it, but we believe in Mitch Moreland.”

(Daniels would later tell ESPN: “We presented it as, ‘We would like you to do this,’ and we left it up to him.”)

Ken Rosenthal (Fox Sports) reported that “[neither a move to first base or the outfield] would thrill Kinsler, friends say.” (Jeff Wilson [Fort Worth Star-Telegram] had reported, though, that there had been no talks with Kinsler about a move to left field.)

Daniels added a couple days later: “When we originally approached [Kinsler], it surprised me at first how open he was to it. He came out and said his preference [was] not to move, but [he] want[ed] to do what’s best [for] the team. He’s had some time to think about it and we’ve had some time to think about it. We’re not saying it’s definitely not happening, but . . . [o]dds are it probably won’t.”

It didn’t.

Kinsler was the Rangers’ everyday second baseman in 2013.

His final Rangers at-bat was in Game 163, when he doubled to left in the eighth inning off Tampa Bay’s David Price, bringing Elvis Andrus up as the tying run with a Wild Card Game berth on the line. There was one out. Alex Rios was on deck.

Andrus, who had singled his previous time up, bunted. Strange. Price threw him out, and Kinsler moved from scoring position to slightly better scoring position, when his run in what was then a 4-2 game wasn’t the most important one.

Rios then grounded out to shortstop, stranding Kinsler at third.

The Rays tacked on a run in the top of the ninth, and Texas went quietly in the bottom, losing 5-2.

Nelson Cruz and Colby Lewis and David Murphy and Joe Nathan and Matt Garza and Lance Berkman and Jason Frasor and A.J. Pierzynski and Geovany Soto were free agents.

The roster was heavily right-handed, and Joey Gallo and Nomar Mazara were teenagers in Low Class A. Rougned Odor was a teenager who had split his 2013 season between High Class A and AA, but again, Kinsler wasn’t switching positions, and Profar was a step closer, having split his season between AAA (37 games, with numbers equalling his 2012 production the year before in AA) and Texas (85 games, with defensive starts at second, shortstop, third, and left). The young left-handed bats (Odor, Gallo, Mazara) weren’t yet factors when the 2013 season ended.

According to Evan Grant (Dallas Morning News), in fact, Odor had apparently been part of the Rangers’ July 2013 trade with the Cubs for Garza until the Rangers raised concerns about Garza’s elbow diagnostics and Chicago “had to accept [righthander Justin] Grimm instead of Odor” to complete the deal (which sent righthanders C.J. Edwards, Grimm, and player to be named Neil Ramirez and third baseman Mike Olt to the Cubs). Wilson, incidentally, reported that shortstop Luis Sardinas was involved in the deal rather than Grimm at one point.

In any event, Texas wanted to balance its overly right-handed lineup, needed to add power, and didn’t have a natural opening for Profar.

November 20, 2013: Ian Kinsler for Prince Fielder and $30 million.

More balance.

Better power profile.

A spot for Profar.

January 2014: Profar hurts his right shoulder lifting weights. Tendinitis, it was called.

February 17, 2014: Profar cleared in camp to throw.

February 18, 2014: Profar shut down due to ongoing shoulder tendinitis.

February 22, 2014: Baltimore signs Nelson Cruz to a one-year, $8 million pillow deal.

Is it fair to wonder what would have happened if Kinsler had agreed to move to first base before the 2013 season? Perhaps the Fielder trade still happens, but with Profar in the lineup the motivating reasons wouldn’t have been the same. If the trade never happened, when Profar was shut down as camp got underway, there would have at least been the option of sliding Kinsler back to second base.

Would Cruz have been an option to sign at that point, to serve as the club’s DH? The outfield had Alex Rios in right, Leonys Martin in center, and newly signed Shin-Soo Choo in left. Choo had signed in December, and you’d have to think that would have still happened under the scenario that Kinsler-for-Fielder didn’t happen in November, as the team would have been even more heavily right-handed without the trade for Fielder — and in better financial position without that trade.

It would also stand to reason that if Kinsler had moved to first base for the 2013 season, Texas probably would have already traded Moreland, if not that winter leading up to the season then after it, and signed a stopgap DH.

For 2014 maybe that would have been Cruz, if he were willing to accept that role in a one-year deal pushing his market entry back an extra winter. (Or Texas could have made Rios the DH, putting Cruz back in right.)

Though re-signing Cruz would have cost Texas the supplemental first-round pick (30th overall) it used to draft righthander Luis Ortiz, whose AA debut Monday was dazzling. (The Rangers forfeited their own first, which would have been 21st overall, to sign Choo.)

But maybe the club wouldn’t have asked Kinsler to move back to second, Cruz wouldn’t have accepted a DH job, and the Rangers would have gone with Brett Lillibridge or Josh Wilson or Donnie Murphy or Adam Rosales at second base — until turning the job over to Odor, as they ultimately did, assuming they didn’t move the coveted Odor over the winter once it appeared that Profar and Andrus were the long-term middle infield with Kinsler at first base.

Kinsler’s WAR in Detroit, where he’s still playing a solid second base: 5.7 in 2014, 6.0 in 2015, and already 2.1 in 2016.

Fielder’s WAR in Texas: -0.2 in an injury-marred 2014, 1.9 in 2015, and -0.9 in 2016.

And now Texas is imbalanced to the left side, and will be going forward with Odor and Mazara in place, Gallo on the way, and the productive Ian Desmond poised to take his right-handed bat elsewhere in this winter’s very thin free agency market (though I’m unwilling to rule out the possibility that Desmond stays, something that I hope is at least being considered).

Texas wouldn’t have won in 2014 with Kinsler here and Fielder not. That club lost a record number of games to injury (many of which were Fielder’s, granted) and dropped 95 games.

Would the Rangers have been better off with Kinsler in 2015? Fielder’s slash line was a good bit better, Odor was really good in the second half, and Moreland had a very good season, his best. But Kinsler had a terrific year, too.

Whether Texas would have been in a better spot in 2015 without the Kinsler trade may depend on whether he was this team’s first baseman or second baseman, and what the club would have gotten for Odor or Moreland if Kinsler’s presence would have led to one of them being moved.

As for 2016?

Kinsler is on pace to have perhaps his best season.

Fielder, though he’s showing signs of life the last week or so, is on pace to have unquestionably his worst.

And now the team, which is strong and about to get stronger, could use some more right-handed presence.

I miss Ian Kinsler. I figured I would.

I miss that guy, more than ever.