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Rangers send J.P Arencibia to minors

MLB, Texas Rangers

ARLINGTON, Texas -- J.P. Arencibia, who had become the regular catcher for Texas Rangers ace Yu Darvish, was optioned to Triple-A Round Rock on Tuesday. The club brought up Chris Gimenez to take his place.

Texas also altered its starting rotation, moving Robbie Ross to the bullpen and inserting Scott Baker into the rotation. In addition, the club determined that Tanner Scheppers will return as a reliever, once he has gone through a few rehab appearances at Double-A Frisco. He's slated to pitch Saturday.

Arencibia just couldn't get it going at the plate and had become the backup to Robinson Chirinos with Geovany Soto still rehabbing from knee surgery.

"You just got to swallow it and know that you've got to accept the job," Arencibia said. "You just go down and work. I think that fortunately for me I got to see Edwin Encarnacion when he got designated and everyone passed on him and he got cleared and came down to Triple-A when I was in Triple-A in 2010, and I saw him go down there, work hard and get back.

"I'm not the first person this has ever happened to, and it's all how you take it. You always get punched in life; it's how you respond. It's part of life, and we'll see what happens."

Arencibia, signed this offseason for $1.8 million to be the backup to Soto, was hitting .133 with one homer and six RBIs in 66 plate appearances.

"The work ethic was there, but I think Robinson had out-played him to this point and was getting the bulk of the time, and it was hard on J.P. to make some of these adjustments and changes he needed to make to be productive [while playing sparingly]," general manager Jon Daniels said. "Maybe this gives him an opportunity to do that."

Manager Ron Washington said he wants Arencibia to get at-bats nearly every day at Triple-A and that the club hasn't given up on recalling him at some point if he improves at the plate.

As for Darvish, the move means he'll get a new catcher. Washington didn't make any announcement about that, but it's likely to be Gimenez. Since Darvish calls so much of his own game, it would allow the young catcher to ease in a bit. Darvish said it "doesn't matter" who catches him.

"You have to make adjustments, and this is something we have to talk about with whoever's catching and make adjustments," Darvish said through an interpreter.

Darvish gave up just five earned runs in 37 innings pitched with Arencibia on the mound, a 1.22 ERA.

The rotation change is aimed at giving Ross a chance to succeed.

"He wasn't as effective as we would have liked him to be right now," Washington said. "We know he can pitch out of the bullpen, so we'll give him a chance to have some success. We haven't totally gotten away from Robbie Ross being a starter, but we've got to get him in a position where he can have some success."

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