The Rangers announced that right-hander Spencer Patton has been outrighted off the 40-man roster and assigned to Triple-A Round Rock. Patton was designated for assignment earlier this week.
Now in his fifth MLB campaign, Patton has a 3.86 ERA and 52.6% grounder rate over seven innings this season, all in April. He then missed just under three weeks on the injured list due to an oblique strain, and was assigned to Triple-A after his activation.
This is Patton’s second stint in Texas, as the 34-year-old broke into the big leagues with the Rangers in 2014-15. An offseason trade to the Cubs saw Patton contribute 21 1/3 innings of 5.48 ball to the 2016 World Series champs, and that was also Patton’s last Major League experience prior to a four-year stretch in Nippon Professional Baseball. Patton performed well with the Yokohama BayStars, as his 3.68 ERA over 205 2/3 relief innings in Japan caught the attention of big league scouts, and eventually led to the Rangers signing Patton to a split contract in February 2021.
The return to the majors was largely successful, as Patton had a 3.83 ERA, 27.9% strikeout rate, and 8.7% walk rate over 42 1/3 frames with Texas last season. However, Patton has seemingly become an odd man out of the bullpen picture for now, though by passing through the waiver wire unclaimed, he’ll remain in the Rangers organization and wait for another call at some point this summer.
