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Corey Seager To Undergo Appendectomy, Not Ruled Out For Season

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Rangers shortstop Corey Seager has appendicitis and will undergo an appendectomy. President of baseball operations Chris Young relayed the news to reporters, including Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News, saying that Seager will be “out a period of time” but hasn’t been ruled out for the entire year. Per Jeff Wilson of DLLS Sports, infielder Dylan Moore will be added to the roster with outfielder Evan Carter moved to the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man spot.

Though Seager isn’t completely ruled out for the season, it’s obviously a rough blow. Seager is the best player on the team. Despite missing some time due to hamstring strains and only playing in 102 games, he has produced four wins above replacement, in the eyes of FanGraphs. He has 21 home runs, a 13% walk rate, 19.6% strikeout rate, .271/.373/.487 batting line, 137 wRC+ and excellent grades for his shortstop defense.

No club ever wants to lose its best player to an injury but the Rangers are in an especially precarious spot. They have been hovering around .500 for most of the year, currently sporting a 68-67 record. That puts them 4.5 games back of a playoff spot with a month left to go.

They’re not totally knocked out but they’ve taken a few big punches lately. In the past month-plus, they have lost Seager, Carter, Marcus Semien, Nathan Eovaldi, Jake Burger, Sam Haggerty, Chris Martin, Jon Gray and Cole Winn to the injured list. Carter recently suffered a wrist fracture and this transfer means he’s ineligible to return before mid-October. Semien’s foot injury is going to cost him four to six weeks. Eovaldi’s rotator cuff strain is likely season-ending.

The club still has a chance to make a late charge for a postseason spot but doing so without so many key contributors will be tough. There’s also a ticking clock right now due to some granular MLB rules. The Rangers tried to avoid the competitive balance tax this year but reportedly went just over the line when making upgrades to the roster ahead of the trade deadline. They could sneak back under the tax line if a few players are claimed off waivers. However, a player would only be postseason eligible with a new club if claimed prior to September 1st. Since waivers are a 48-hour process, the Rangers would have to put guys on the wire in the next 24 hours or so, or else they would suddenly have significantly less appeal to other teams.

Merrill Kelly, Tyler Mahle, Danny Coulombe, Hoby Milner, Phil Maton, Shawn Armstrong and Patrick Corbin are all impending free agents. They therefore have no value for the Rangers beyond this year. If the club decides to punt on 2025, they could place some or all of them on waivers. It’s unlikely all of them would get claimed but Kelly definitely would and a few others probably would as well. Adolis García can be retained for 2026 but is a non-tender candidate and could make sense for the wire as well.

Time will tell if Seager’s injury pushes them to make that bold decision. For now, Josh Smith will likely step in for Seager at shortstop, per Wilson. That will leave playing time at second, which will be taken by some combination of Ezequiel Durán, Cody Freeman and Moore.

Moore and the Rangers just signed a minor league deal a few days ago after he had been released by the Mariners. He’s having an awful season, which prompted that release. He has a .193/.263/.359 batting line and 35.7% strikeout rate.

He has been better than that in the past. He came into the year with a career .206/.316/.384 line and 102 wRC+, despite striking out in 29.8% of his plate appearances. He had 104 stolen bases and had played every position except catcher.

Though he hasn’t been good this year, he’s essentially free for the Rangers. Since the Mariners released him, they remain on the hook for the majority of his salary. The Rangers only have to pay him the prorated portion of the league minimum salary for any time he spends on their roster. That amount will be subtracted from what the Mariners pay.

Photo courtesy of Kevin Jairaj, Imagn Images

MLBTR Podcast: A Conversation With Pirates GM Ben Cherington — Also The O’s, Zack Wheeler, And The Rangers

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The latest episode of the MLB Trade Rumors Podcast is now live on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts! Make sure you subscribe as well! You can also use the player at this link to listen, if you don’t use Spotify or Apple for podcasts.

This week, host Darragh McDonald is joined by Pirates general manager Ben Cherington to discuss…

  • What attracted Cherington to a smaller market like Pittsburgh (2:40)
  • Why have the Pirates been so much better at developing pitching than hitting? (5:10)
  • The choice of picking Paul Skenes first overall in 2023 (9:05)
  • The Pirates not having signed a free agent to a multi-year deal in many years (13:45)
  • Is there a sense of urgency for the Pirates to make something happen in the near future? (16:20)
  • The balance of subtracting pitching to add hitting (18:45)
  • What percentage of rumors that make it to the public are based in fact? (22:30)

Plus, Anthony Franco of MLB Trade Rumors joins the show to discuss…

Check out our past episodes!

The podcast intro and outro song “So Long” is provided courtesy of the band Showoff.  Check out their Facebook page here!

Photo courtesy of Charles LeClaire, Imagn Images

Poll: The Rangers And The Waiver Wire

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The Rangers decided to add at this year’s trade deadline and acquired several arms to beef up the pitching staff. Merrill Kelly was the headliner, but the team also swung deals for Danny Coulombe and Phil Maton in an effort to make up for somewhat lacking production from the club’s offense. That strategy, unfortunately, hasn’t worked. The Rangers’ position in the standings hasn’t changed much as they’ve remained stuck around .500, as has been the case for most of the year.

With the start of September just a few days away, a Rangers club that has been on the cusp between contending and retooling all season is now faced with one final point of decision-making: Should they stay the course and hope for a white hot September that pushes them into the postseason? Or should they throw in the towel and try to sneak back under the luxury tax after the club’s deadline trades pushed their projected payroll slightly over the edge?

They have the opportunity to do the latter if they put Kelly, Coulombe, Maton, and other veterans on expiring deals through waivers. If those players get claimed, they’ll move on to the claiming team and the Rangers will be off the hook for the final month of their salary. Aside from those players who were added at the trade deadline, other expiring deals like those of Chris Martin, Patrick Corbin, Shawn Armstrong and Hoby Milner could make sense for the team to make available. Even Adolis Garcia, who remains under club control via arbitration for the 2026 season, could make sense to make available on waivers given his status as a potential non-tender candidate.

Doing so might give the team additional financial flexibility for the offseason as they look ahead to 2026. Ownership preferred to remain under the tax threshold and reset its penalty levels this past offseason. Their deadline push was made with the team’s postseason odds around 40-50%. Those odds have plummeted, with FanGraphs giving them a 7.2% chance and PECOTA pegging them at 9.8%.

Texas would avoid paying roughly one-sixth of the full season salary for any player who gets claimed off waivers. That means parting ways with Kelly (who is making $7MM this year) would save the club around $1.2MM. Cheaper players like Maton ($2MM) would only shave a little over $300K off the team payroll if claimed.

Of course, saving that money doesn’t do much for the club if it isn’t enough to put them under the luxury tax, and there’s no guarantee they’ll be able to shed enough money to do so. The team saw with Jon Gray earlier this month that there’s no guarantee a player will be plucked off waivers just because he’s been placed there.

The Rangers’ next most expensive pending free agent is Tyler Mahle, and he’s only just resumed throwing off the mound as he tries to work his way back from a rotator cuff strain. It’s hard to imagine a team placing what’d be a roughly $2.75MM bet that Mahle would not only be able to make it back by season’s end but also return to his prior levels of efficacy. It’s a similar situation with Martin, who has been out since late July with a calf strain and still isn’t on a rehab assignment (though he’d amount to a less costly $916K gamble).

Looking beyond the financial aspect of Texas’s decision, it’s worth considering the club’s position in the standings. The 67-67 Rangers have gone just 10-14 since the trade deadline and have lost 12 of their last 20 games. They’ll need a winning percentage a lot better than .400 in September if they’re going to have any hope of making the postseason. Still, a playoff berth isn’t entirely out of the question. Texas is currently 4.5 games out of the final AL Wild Card spot, which is held by the Mariners. They’re six games back of the Yankees in the second AL Wild Card spot as well as the Astros for the AL West title. They still play Houston six times and also have three-game sets with the Brewers and Mets. Their other 16 games are against teams with losing records.

Those six games against the Astros in September give the Rangers more control over their destiny than most clubs have by this point on the calendar. Perhaps that’s reason enough to stay the course. After all, it would be disappointing for the organization if a rare healthy season from Jacob deGrom went to waste.

On the other hand, the club’s core of players is facing some health challenges. Evan Carter, Marcus Semien and Nathan Eovaldi have all been shelved with what are very likely season-ending injuries in recent days. The loss of Martin in the bullpen has also been a real blow, and it’s unclear if he’ll make it back to the field before the end of the season.

How do MLBTR readers think the Rangers should handle their situation? Should they place a handful of short-term veterans on waivers to try to duck under the tax line and save money for another run in 2026, or would it be best to keep the team together and try to win this year despite dwindling playoff odds and mounting injury concerns? Have your say in the poll below:

Rangers, Dylan Moore Agree To Minor League Deal

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The Rangers have agreed to a minor league contract with utilityman Dylan Moore, reports Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Moore, a client of Klutch Sports, was recently released by the division-rival Mariners.

Moore now returns to the organization that drafted him a decade ago. Texas selected him in the seventh round in 2015 out of the University of Central Florida. He didn’t advance beyond High-A before being traded to Atlanta a year later. Moore spent time in the Braves’ and Brewers’ systems until finally getting an MLB opportunity in Seattle as a minor league free agent.

It proved to be an adept pickup for the M’s front office. Moore played parts of seven seasons in Seattle and was a capable role player for most of that time. He won a Gold Glove in a utility capacity just last year. Moore bounced around the diamond while generally hitting for power against left-handed pitching. He has never been a high average hitter but showed enough of a well-rounded skillset that Seattle signed him to a three-year, $8.875MM extension in Spring Training 2023.

The first two seasons of that deal went well enough. Moore’s bat has absolutely cratered this year, as he’s hitting .193/.263/.359 across 213 plate appearances. He’s batting .149 with 44 strikeouts in 109 plate appearances with the platoon advantage and has gone a staggering 3-63 (.048) with 36 strikeouts in 41 games since the start of June. Seattle could no longer live with that kind of production, even in a bench capacity, while they fight for a playoff spot.

There’s neither much risk nor a huge ceiling on the deal for Texas. Seattle is on the hook for the rest of Moore’s $3.575MM salary. Texas would only pay him the prorated $760K league minimum for time he spends on the MLB roster. Moore will be a free agent at season’s end. He’ll provide an alternative to Ezequiel Duran and Josh Jung for infield playing time if he gets called up. Texas just lost Marcus Semien to what appears to be a season-ending foot fracture. Moore would be playoff eligible if Texas makes a surprise September run.

Nathan Eovaldi Likely Out For Season Due To Rotator Cuff Strain

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Nathan Eovaldi has a rotator cuff strain and is likely done for the season. President of baseball operations Chris Young relayed the news to reporters, including Kennedi Landry of MLB.com.

The All-Star righty had been listed as the probable starter for tomorrow’s game against the Angels. There was no previous indication he was dealing with an injury. Eovaldi had reeled off seven innings of one-run ball with nine strikeouts against the Guardians on Friday. It’s not clear whether he pitched through discomfort toward the end of that appearance or suffered the injury during a between starts throwing session. In either case, he’s headed for the injured list.

It’s the latest blow in a Rangers season that has unraveled. They bought at the deadline. They’d played at a 16-9 pace in July to pull within a few games of a Wild Card spot. Their impressive run differential and seemingly positive trend convinced the front office to push in prospect capital for Merrill Kelly, Phil Maton and Danny Coulombe. They’ve followed up with their worst month of the season.

Texas has played at a 9-14 pace in August to fall below .500. They swept Cleveland over the weekend, more or less driving a nail into the Guardians’ season, but were shut out in last night’s series opener against the Angels. They’ve also lost Evan Carter (wrist fracture), Marcus Semien (foot fracture) and Eovaldi to what may all be season-ending injuries. Overcoming those hits to erase a 5.5 game postseason deficit in the final month seems very unlikely.

Eovaldi has had a brilliant year when healthy. He carries a career-best 1.73 earned run average while working nearly six inning per start. He has earned a quality start in 14 of his 22 appearances. Eovaldi has fanned 26% of batters faced while showing his typical elite command. The only black marks  have been injuries. He was limited to one appearance in June by elbow inflammation and will miss all of September with the shoulder issue. Eovaldi has turned in a 2.67 ERA or better in every other month.

This was the first season of his three-year, $75MM contract. Texas has both Eovaldi and Jacob deGrom signed for another two guaranteed years. They’ll go into next season with as much upside as any 1-2 punch in MLB. With both pitchers in their mid-late 30s, however, it’s difficult to count on them to stay healthy. That makes it all the more disappointing that the Rangers have seemingly squandered a season of fantastic production from both veterans.

Eovaldi’s injury comes a few days before the Rangers need to decide whether to wave the white flag and place a number of players on waivers. They could try to dump the salaries of a handful of players (Merrill Kelly, most notably) in an effort to get below the $241MM luxury tax line. Players need to be in an organization by September 1 in order to be playoff eligible, so they’d be much likelier to get claimed if their waivers resolve before the end of August. Waivers take 48 hours to process, meaning players need to land on the wire no later than Friday to be playoff eligible with a claiming team. Texas plays two more against the Angels and is off on Thursday before making that call.

Patrick Corbin takes the mound opposite Yusei Kikuchi tonight. They’ll probably run a spot starter or bullpen game tomorrow. Kumar Rocker is on optional assignment but hasn’t pitched in a Triple-A game in nearly three weeks as he irons out mechanical issues. Caleb Boushley pitched 2 2/3 frames in the minors on Sunday. That essentially leaves long man Jacob Latz, who last pitched on Wednesday, as the only option on the 40-man roster for a spot start.

Marcus Semien Out 4-6 Weeks Due To Foot Injury

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August 24: As noted by McFarland (among other reporters), the Rangers revealed today that Semien met with a foot specialist today and was diagnosed with a fractured third metatarsal bone and a Lisfranc sprain in his left foot. Those injuries will leave him out of commission for four to six weeks, effectively ending the veteran’s 2025 campaign for at least the regular season. On the off chance that the Rangers can rally and find themselves in a postseason spot, it’s at least theoretically possible Semien could join the club for the playoff push. Kennedi Landry of MLB.com notes that Semien will not need surgery on his foot at this point.

August 23: The Rangers announced this afternoon that they’ve placed Marcus Semien on the 10-day injured list with a left foot contusion in a move that’s retroactive to August 22. In a corresponding move, outfielder Adolis Garcia was activated from the injured list.

While Semien had been plagued by his ailing foot for a few days at this point, it’s still a moderate surprise to see the veteran head for the shelf. The 34-year-old veteran is arguably one of the most reliable players in the entire sport when it comes to availability. Since his first full season with the A’s back in 2015, Semien has appeared in 93.7% of his teams’ games. Almost all of those missed games came in 2017, when he was limited to 85 games by a sprained wrist. Outside of that season, he’s not appeared in less than 155 games in a 162-game season since becoming a full-time player.

That will now change, as Semien won’t be eligible to come off the IL until August 31. It’s more of a loss for the Rangers than Semien’s 88 wRC+ may make it seem at first glance. Strong defense and baserunning has allowed Semien to put together 2.1 fWAR so far this year in spite of his weak offensive numbers, and Semien has actually hit quite well since breaking an early season slump; while he was one of the worst hitters in baseball over the season’s first two months, since May 30 he’s slashed .270/.338/.464 (122 wRC+) in 311 plate appearances.

Ezequiel Duran and Cody Freeman have gotten reps at second base the past two days while Semien has been out. That duo could continue seeing playing time at the position, though utility man Josh Smith will likely also get reps at the keystone over the next few days. That’s all the more likely now that Garcia is back in the fold. Smith had been playing outfield primarily in recent days while Garcia spent a minimum stint on the injured list due to a sprained ankle. It’s been a tough year for Garcia, who has hit just .224/.266/.388 with a wRC+ of 79 in 116 games, and unlike Semien he hasn’t yet been able to turn his season around over a substantial stretch of time. He’ll be looking to do just that down the stretch this year, as without a strong finish to the season Garcia looks like a very likely non-tender candidate headed into the offseason.

In other Rangers injury news, it seems veteran right-hander Chris Martin shouldn’t be expected to return to the majors anytime soon. Shawn McFarland of the Dallas Morning News wrote this afternoon that Martin was forced to end his live bullpen session early today after the calf strain that’s left him sidelined since late last month flared up. Manager Bruce Bochy called the incident a “little setback” in Martin’s efforts to return to the mound for the Rangers this year, but with September rapidly approaching it’s fair to wonder just how long Martin’s window to return will remain open. Texas would surely love to have him back, as he’s been excellent when healthy this year with a 2.36 ERA in 39 appearances.

Jon Gray Non-Committal About Playing Beyond 2025

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Jon Gray’s season was all but officially ended last week by a diagnosis of thoracic outlet syndrome, and a subsequent placement on the Rangers’ 15-day injured list.  TOS surgery would keep Gray sidelined for a big chunk of the 2026 season and perhaps the entirety of next year, and Gray would be 35 on Opening Day 2027.  The idea of hanging up his glove entirely has apparently at least crossed Gray’s mind, as Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News writes that Gray “responded mostly with a shrug” when asked by reporters Friday if he was going to keep playing beyond this season.

When asked about pitching again in 2025, Gray said “I don’t have any idea about the future.  I guess there is always hope.  But it’s hard to have hope with everything that’s happened.  It’s just become a really frustrating pattern.”  That said, Gray noted that he had some interest in looking to “go out with a good feeling” rather than be somewhat forced out of baseball due to injury.

Given that a TOS surgery hasn’t even been officially planned yet, it is probably too soon to be reading too much into Gray’s immediate reaction, as his emotions are (understandably) raw about this latest major setback to his career.  There is no rush for him to make any big decision about his playing career, and naturally Gray might want to take his time in considering whether or not to walk away from the game entirely.

This major injury adds another layer, however, to what was already looking like a crossroads of an offseason for the right-hander.  Gray is in the final season of his four-year, $56MM contract, and he has pitched only 14 innings this season due to a broken wrist suffered during Spring Training, and then this most recent IL placement.  The Rangers have used Gray out of the bullpen rather than as a starter, and he has struggled to a 7.71 ERA over his six appearances.

The sample size is small enough that it’s hard to make any clear observations from Gray’s 2025 performance, and five homers allowed over his 14 innings obviously skewed his numbers to some extent.  It still clearly wasn’t the type of platform year Gray was hoping for heading into free agency, and if healthy, he would’ve likely been looking at a one-year guarantee from a team hoping he could bounce back.  The TOS surgery could make a two-year deal a possibility, with a minimal salary in the first year and a larger commitment for 2027 when Gray is presumably healthy, yet the overall size of that contract doesn’t figure to be too pricey considering the shaky track record of pitchers returning in good form after thoracic outlet syndrome.

Injuries have been a frequent concern for Gray, as a variety of issues (foot problems, an MCL strain, an oblique strain, blisters, shoulder inflammation, a forearm strain, multiple groin strains in 2024, and his fractured wrist) have led to IL stints over the course of his 11 Major League seasons.  Despite these health woes and the fact that he spent his first seven seasons pitching in the thin air with the Rockies, Gray has a respectable 4.49 ERA, 23.4% strikeout rate, and 7.8% walk rate over 1230 2/3 career innings.

Chosen third overall by Colorado in the 2013 draft, Gray didn’t quite reach the star level associated with such lofty draft status, but he has been a solid rotation member over his career with some flashes of being a frontline starter.  If this is indeed it for Gray, he can look back with pride on a long career that included a World Series ring with Texas in 2023.  (Gray contributed to that title with a 1.59 ERA over 5 2/3 relief innings during the Rangers’ postseason run.)

Grant suggested two other factors that might impact any of Gray’s retirement plans.  Gray has over 10 years of MLB service time — officially crossing that threshold earlier this season — and therefore is already qualified for a full pension.  There is also the widespread expectation that MLB will be facing a work stoppage when the collective bargaining agreement expires after the 2026 season, so if Gray does indeed miss next year while rehabbing, a return to the field could be even further delayed by a lockout.

Astros Sign Craig Kimbrel

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August 22: Houston finalized their one-year deal with Kimbrel this afternoon. They also activated Lance McCullers Jr. from the 15-day injured list to start tonight’s game in Baltimore. They cleared active roster space by optioning rookie Logan VanWey to Triple-A and placing southpaw Bennett Sousa on the 15-day injured list. Brandon Walter, who has been out for a month with elbow inflammation, was moved to the 60-day IL in the necessary 40-man move.

Sousa is dealing with elbow inflammation himself. Manager Joe Espada said Sousa reported discomfort after Tuesday’s appearance and has not progressed as hoped. He’s flying back to Houston for further evaluation while the team continues its road trip (link via Chandler Rome of The Athletic).

August 21: The Astros are in agreement with Craig Kimbrel on a major league contract, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN. The SportsMeter client was just granted his release from a minor league deal with Texas, per Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News. Houston will need to create space on both the active and 40-man rosters.

Kimbrel spent a little more than two months in Triple-A with Texas. He signed in June one day after electing free agency from the Braves. That followed a bizarre sequence in which Kimbrel’s initial team called him up for one day. The nine-time All-Star labored through a scoreless inning in his lone appearance. That remains his only MLB outing this season. Kimbrel has otherwise divided the year between the upper minors affiliates of Atlanta and Texas.

Between the two organizations, Kimbrel carries a flat 3.00 earned run average in 39 minor league innings. He has recorded an excellent 31.5% strikeout percentage but has walked nearly 13% of batters faced. It’s a similar profile as Kimbrel has shown in the big leagues in recent seasons. He had a strikeout rate in the 31-34% range while issuing free passes between 10-13% of the time in both 2023 and ’24. Kimbrel remained effective with the Orioles in the first half of the ’24 season, but he melted down after the All-Star Break (20 earned runs in 17 innings) and has barely gotten an MLB look since then.

While the Triple-A results are solid, Kimbrel’s raw stuff hasn’t been as sharp this year. His fastball has been in the 92-93 MPH range in Triple-A; he averaged less than 92 on the heater in his only big league outing. He’d sat closer to 94 last year and was up to 96 as recently as 2023. He missed enough bats against minor league hitters to intrigue the Astros, whose bullpen has struggled of late.

Only the Rockies, Blue Jays and Nationals have a higher bullpen ERA than Houston does over the past month. The Astros lost Josh Hader for at least the remainder of the regular season to a capsule strain in his shoulder. Bryan Abreu is an elite back-end arm in his own right, and they have a strong left-handed trio of Steven Okert, Bryan King and Bennett Sousa. Abreu is essentially their only reliable righty reliever. Kimbrel’s command makes him a volatile bullpen piece as well, but he has more swing-and-miss upside than Enyel De Los Santos or Shawn Dubin provide in the middle innings.

The signing is expected to become official on Friday. Getting the deal done before September 1 means Kimbrel will be eligible for postseason play if the Astros qualify. He’ll have a little over five weeks of regular season action to convince the front office and coaching staff he’s worth carrying in October. Houston leads the Mariners by 1.5 games in the AL West. They’re 3.5 games clear of the Royals, the top team that is not currently in playoff position.

Image courtesy of Robert Edwards, Imagn Images.

Evan Carter Diagnosed With Fractured Wrist

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4:34pm: Texas officially placed Carter on the 10-day IL and recalled Michael Helman from Triple-A.

1:47pm: Rangers outfielder Evan Carter was plunked by a pitch on his right wrist Thursday, and manager Bruce Bochy told hosts Kevin Hageland and Cory Mageors in a radio spot on 105.3 The Fan today that subsequent imaging revealed a fracture. The team hasn’t confirmed that Carter will miss the remainder of the season, but that certainly seems plausible, given the dwindling number of days on the schedule. The team hasn’t formally announced the injury, a placement on the IL or any corresponding transactions yet but will surely do so prior to tonight’s game.

Carter actually remained in the game after being hit on the wrist. He ran the bases for himself and played several more innings — even tallying a single in his next at-bat — before being lifted later in the game. Alejandro Osuna replaced him late in the game and could see an uptick in playing time with Carter joining Adolis Garcia (sprained ankle) on the injured list. Osuna, Wyatt Langford, Cody Freeman, Josh Smith, Ezequiel Duran and designated hitter Joc Pederson are the other outfield options on the Rangers’ big league roster at the moment (though Pederson has played just one game in the outfield this season).

It’s the latest in an ongoing series of tough-luck injuries for Carter, a former second-round pick and top prospect who’s yet to turn in a full season at the MLB level. He’s previously been plagued by back injuries, which led to a (relatively) minor ablation procedure last October, and he also missed time earlier this season due to a strained quadriceps.

When healthy, Carter has had an up-and-down career. He took the majors by storm late in 2023, debuting with a .306/.413/.635 slash in 75 plate appearances down the stretch before posting comparable numbers in the postseason as the Rangers marched to their first World Series title in franchise history. Last year’s ongoing back injuries surely contributed to a dismal follow-up effort, wherein he slashed just .188/.272/.361 in 162 turns at the plate. He’s been somewhere between those two extremes in 2025, hitting .247/.336/.392 — about seven percent better than league-average, by measure of wRC+.

All told, Carter is a career .235/.326/.420 hitter in the majors though that doesn’t include his outstanding playoff showing in 2023, when he batted .300/.417/.500 in 72 plate appearances. It’s clear that Carter is an immense talent, making it all the more frustrating for both him and the team that injuries have repeatedly kept him off the field.

The Rangers optioned Carter at the beginning of the season and kept him in Triple-A until May 6. It’s probably not a coincidence that said timeline means he’ll finish out the year just two days shy of two full seasons of major league service. Had Carter been recalled even two days earlier, he’d be controllable for an additional four seasons. Instead, the Rangers now control him for five additional years, all the way through 2030. In all likelihood, he’ll be a prominent factor in the Texas outfield both next year and for the foreseeable future — health permitting, of course.

In the meantime, a floundering Rangers club will try to piece together the outfield with a combination of Langford, Smith, Freeman, Duran and Pederson. Texas operated as buyers at last month’s trade deadline, but they’re 7.5 games back in the AL West and 5.5 games out of an AL Wild Card spot. Since their deadline additions are believed to have pushed them over the CBT line, it wouldn’t be a surprise if Texas placed some impending free agents on outright waivers between now and the Sept. 1 deadline for postseason eligibility, in an effort to tiptoe back underneath the luxury threshold.

Rangers Notes: deGrom, Rotation, Jung

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The Rangers will skip Jacob deGrom’s scheduled start Wednesday, president of baseball operations Chris Young told reporters (link via Kennedi Landry of MLB.com). Young framed it as a workload management decision after the star righty experienced minor shoulder fatigue. Manager Bruce Bochy noted that deGrom has already visited team physician Dr. Keith Meister and been cleared of injury.

It doesn’t come as a huge surprise that deGrom is battling fatigue late in the season. He’s up to 24 starts and 140 1/3 innings. It’s a workload that he hadn’t come close to approaching since 2019. The truncated ’20 schedule limited him to 12 starts. deGrom was limited to 15 appearances the following year by elbow inflammation. Shoulder issues kept him to 11 starts in his final season with the Mets. His first two seasons in Texas were largely wiped out by Tommy John surgery.

That makes it all the more remarkable that deGrom has continued to dominate during his age-37 campaign. He owns a 2.76 ERA while striking out 27.3% of batters faced with a huge 14.3% swinging strike rate. His fastball is back into the 98 MPH range on average. deGrom did have his two worst starts in consecutive appearances on July 28 and August 3, but he has rebounded to toss 11 2/3 frames of three-run ball over his past two outings.

Texas has yet to announce a starter for tomorrow’s game. They don’t have a team off day until next Thursday, so even one skipped start won’t be easy to work around. A bullpen game would put a lot of stress on the pitching staff. Kumar Rocker is their only starter who is on optional assignment to Triple-A Round Rock. While there’s no indication that Rocker is dealing with an injury, he hasn’t pitched in the minors since August 7. Jacob Latz has made a few spot starts this season and could be recalled, but he hasn’t gone past two innings in an appearance in a month.

The short-term is less important than taking precautions with deGrom’s health. He’s signed for another two seasons with a club option for 2028. Meanwhile, this season increasingly looks like a lost cause. Texas lost again tonight to drop three games below .500. They’ve lost 10 of 12 and fallen six games back in the Wild Card race.

As their season appears to be slipping away, Opening Day third baseman Josh Jung finds himself on the bench. Bochy has left the former All-Star out of the lineup in each of the past three games. He did make a pinch-hit appearance midway through Tuesday’s contest. Young didn’t sugarcoat things when discussing Jung’s recent lack of playing time.

“There’s been a lot of volatility with Josh,” the front office leader said on Monday (link via Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News). “There are times when he’s dialed in and the performance is strong, but when it hasn’t been as dialed in, it’s been a little bit more undisciplined. And just inconsistent. Given the kind of team our team is and the way a lot of guys have struggled this year, you can only tolerate so much volatility.”

It’s clear Jung has fallen out of the lineup for performance reasons, not any kind of nagging injury. Rookie Cody Freeman started at the hot corner on Sunday and Monday. Tonight, Josh Smith moved into third base from the right field spot he’d manned of late, drawing Alejandro Osuna into the outfield.

Jung entered play with a .241/.290/.376 batting line over 372 plate appearances. As Young mentioned, he continues to chase would-be balls at a high rate and hasn’t taken many walks. Jung had nevertheless hit fairly well through the end of May, but an atrocious June (.158/.208/.221) led Texas to send him back to Triple-A for a reset. Jung recorded a 10-game hit streak with three home runs immediately after being recalled on July 21. He has dropped back into a slump over the past two weeks, batting .143 with 11 strikeouts in 10 games.

A former eighth overall pick, Jung is on track to surpass the three-year service threshold and will reach arbitration this offseason. The Rangers wouldn’t non-tender him, but it doesn’t seem out of the question that they could consider a change-of-scenery trade. They’ll certainly need to make some changes to a lineup that ranks 24th in MLB in scoring.

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