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Rangers Select Matt Duffy, Promote Dustin Harris

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The Rangers made a handful of moves before tonight’s series opener in Oakland. Texas selected veteran infielder Matt Duffy onto the roster and recalled outfielder/infielder Dustin Harris for what’ll be his big league debut. The Rangers also activated reliever Josh Sborz from the 15-day injured list.

Texas placed third baseman Josh Jung on the 10-day IL, optioned lefty reliever Walter Pennington and put utilityman Ezequiel Duran on the paternity list. Tyler Mahle moved from the 15-day to the 60-day IL in a procedural move to open a 40-man roster spot for Duffy. Texas had already shut Mahle down on account of shoulder soreness.

The 33-year-old Duffy gets a brief opportunity to return to the majors. Duffy has been in Triple-A since signing a minor league deal in Spring Training. The veteran infielder hasn’t produced much offensively, turning in a .218/.296/.280 slash across 216 plate appearances in the Pacific Coast League. Texas was out of healthy infielders on the 40-man roster, though, so they’ll give Duffy a shot to play in the big leagues for a ninth season. He’ll back up Marcus Semien, Josh Smith and Jonathan Ornelas for the final six games of the year. Duffy will be a free agent at the start of the offseason and will be in line for another minor league contract somewhere.

Harris, 25, has a bit of third base experience himself. He has started 12 games there with Triple-A Round Rock this season. He’s primarily an outfielder, logging more than 900 frames between left and center field. The left-handed hitter carries a .272/.358/.391 slash with 10 longballs across 564 trips to the plate. That’s minimal power production for the hitter-friendly PCL, but Harris has stolen 35 bases and has strong plate discipline numbers over his minor league career.

Texas added Harris to their 40-man roster over the 2022-23 offseason. They’ve remained intrigued enough by his physical tools to keep him on the roster even while he was on optional assignment in the minors. Baseball America ranked Harris as the #11 prospect in the system on its midseason update. He could make his MLB debut against the organization that drafted him. Harris was an 11th-round pick by the A’s in 2019. Oakland traded him to the Rangers the following summer in a deadline deal for lefty Mike Minor.

Jung’s season comes to a close because of right wrist discomfort. The All-Star third baseman broke his wrist on a hit-by-pitch in the first week of the season. He underwent surgery that sidelined him until the end of July. Jung hasn’t played up to his 2023 level since returning and he’ll finish the year with a .264/.298/.421 slash in 46 games. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News wrote this week that Jung will visit a specialist on Thursday to determine the source of his ongoing discomfort. He’ll hope for a mostly healthy offseason.

Jon Gray Done For Season Due To Foot Injury

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Rangers right-hander Jon Gray is done for the season due to a foot injury. Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News was among those to relay the news on X from manager Bruce Bochy. Gray is not yet on the injured list but will presumably be placed there shortly. Righty Tyler Mahle is also “pretty much shut down,” according to Bochy, per Kennedi Landry of MLB.com on X.

The Rangers are out of contention at this point, so there’s little reason for any individual player to push through an injury. They are 65-73 and 9.5 games back of a playoff spot with just a few weeks left to play. At this point, there’s nothing to suggest Gray’s foot issue will impact his 2025 campaign, but it seems he will sit out what’s left of the 2024 season. Mahle has already been on the IL for about two weeks due to shoulder stiffness, but it appears he may not have enough time to ramp back up before the schedule is done.

That doesn’t matter much in the short term because, as mentioned, the club is effectively done in the context of the current campaign. But taken in aggregate, the club may have some concerns with next year’s rotation. Both Max Scherzer and Andrew Heaney are slated for free agency this winter. Nathan Eovaldi is likely to be joining them. He needs to pitch 16 more innings this year to unlock a $20MM player option for 2025. But even if he does open up that player option, it would be logical for him to turn it down and head to the open market in search of a lengthier deal with a larger guarantee.

The core of next year’s rotation, on paper, consists of Gray, Mahle and Jacob deGrom. Gray has only thrown 102 2/3 innings this year as he made two separate stints to the IL due to a right groin strain. Now this foot injury will prevent him from adding to that total. Both Mahle and deGrom underwent Tommy John surgery last summer and have been working back to health this year. Mahle made three starts, logging 12 2/3 innings, before heading back to the IL with the aforementioned shoulder soreness. deGrom hasn’t yet pitched at the big league level but is currently on a rehab assignment and could be back in the majors before the season is out.

That leaves the club going into 2025 with a rotation nucleus consisting of three guys who will be coming off incomplete seasons due to injuries. Cody Bradford, Dane Dunning and Jack Leiter figure to be in the mix for jobs, but Bradford and Dunning also missed time due to injury this year. With Bradford, a low back strain limited him to 56 innings in the majors. Dunning made two separate trips to the IL due to shoulder problems and logged 90 1/3 innings. He’s currently on optional assignment. Leiter still has just five big league outings under his belt and an ERA of 11.78 in those.

Kumar Rocker is looking good in the minors but is also coming back from a 2023 Tommy John surgery, like deGrom and Mahle. His numbers have been great this year, a 1.71 ERA, but in just 31 2/3 innings. He’s at the Triple-A level now and is technically close to major league readiness, but it’s unclear how much the Rangers can realistically expect him to provide next year.

Taken all together, there’s plenty of rotation uncertainty going into 2025, so it should be a priority for the Rangers this winter. For the rest of the season, they will have a rotation of Eovaldi, Heaney, Bradford and Leiter. With Gray heading to the IL, perhaps Dunning will be recalled from his optional assignment. Or the club also has veterans José Ureña and Chase Anderson currently in their bullpen for long relief work, with either of them candidates to make some spot starts down the stretch.

Rangers To Place Tyler Mahle On Injured List

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Rangers manager Bruce Bochy informed the club’s beat today that right-hander Tyler Mahle is going to be placed on the 15-day injured list with some shoulder stiffness. Righty Jon Gray will be reinstated from his own IL stint in a corresponding move. Kennedi Landry of MLB.com was among those who relayed the news on X.

Mahle, now 29, underwent Tommy John surgery last summer just before hitting free agency for the first time in his career. The Rangers then signed him to a two-year, $22MM deal, knowing that they wouldn’t be able to count on him to join the club until some point in the middle of the 2024 season at the earliest. He was on the IL until two weeks ago and has since made three starts. He went five innings in the first of those, then four and two thirds, followed by just three innings in Sunday’s game.

It’s unclear if the shoulder was bothering him in his last outing or has been nagging at him since. While he was removed after just three innings, he also allowed four earned runs on six hits while recording just one strikeout, so his removal might simply have been about his performance rather than his health.

Shoulder issues have been a problem for him before, as he only made six starts after July 2 in the 2022 season due to a strain and some inflammation. Between those shoulder issues and his recent Tommy John layoff, it’s been three straight seasons of having a truncated workload.

The Rangers have fallen back in the standings lately and are now 11 games back of the Astros in the West and 12.5 games back of a Wild Card spot. Both the Playoff Odds at FanGraphs and the PECOTA Standings at Baseball Prospectus give them just a 0.4% chance of cracking the postseason at this point.

With the club’s season on the ropes, they can make their decisions based on optimizing results next year. Ideally, Mahle would be building up his workload since he hasn’t pitched much in recent years, but pitching through an injury would run the risk of aggravating a shoulder that has given him problems in the past, so it seems the club has decided a breather is the best decision for now. Assuming the issue isn’t major, perhaps he can return for the final few weeks and log some innings in September.

Going forward, the club’s rotation could be facing notable changes. Jacob deGrom is starting a rehab assignment this week and Max Scherzer will be as well, per Landry on X. When those two come back, they will likely slot into the rotation with Gray, Nathan Eovaldi and Andrew Heaney, with Cody Bradford and Dane Dunning also in the mix and perhaps Mahle coming back down the line.

Looking ahead to next year, Scherzer and Heaney are impending free agents with Eovaldi perhaps heading to the open market along with them. Eovaldi’s contract has a conditional $20MM player option that he unlocks if he totals 300 innings pitched over 2023 and 2024 or finishes in the top five in Cy Young voting this year. Even if he unlocks that option, which is possible since he’s at 271 innings since the start of last year, he might turn it down and elect free agency since he’s having a strong season and could look for a bigger guarantee in free agency.

Without those three, the Texas rotation for 2025 projects to include deGrom, Mahle and Gray. The latter two, as mentioned, are coming off lengthy Tommy John rehabs and could have workload concerns next year. Bradford has also missed significant time this year, due to a low back strain, and only has 14 big league starts to his name. Dunning has often been in the club’s swingman/sixth starter role, moving between the bullpen and rotation as needed. Prospects Jack Leiter and Owen White are on the 40-man roster but both have ongoing control issues.

The Rangers are still the reigning World Series champions for a few more months but the title defense has obviously not been what they had in mind. Perhaps that will lead them to shake up their rotation mix in the offseason, as there’s plenty of uncertainty in next year’s group.

What Would It Take For The Rangers To Duck Under The Luxury Tax Line?

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The 2023 Angels entered the trade deadline as something of a long-shot contender but nevertheless embarked on an aggressive win-now push. In an effort both to break their postseason drought and perhaps to show impending free agent Shohei Ohtani a commitment to winning, the Halos went out and acquired Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez, C.J. Cron, Randal Grichuk and Dominic Leone. It was a valiant, if not desperate effort, and it fell short almost immediately. By mid-August, the Angels were buried in the standings with virtually no hope of climbing back into contention. With the former August trade waiver system no longer in place, GM Perry Minasian and his staff waved the white flag in a new and more drastic way: they put more than one quarter of the roster on outright waivers.

By placing Giolito, Lopez, Cron, Grichuk, Leone, Matt Moore, Hunter Renfroe and Tyler Anderson on waivers, the Angels positioned themselves to A) save an enormous amount of money, B) potentially dip back under the luxury tax threshold (they succeeded), and C) impact several postseason races ... just not in the way they originally envisioned. For those who don't recall, the Guardians claimed Giolito, Lopez and Moore. Renfroe was claimed by the Reds. Leone went to the Mariners. Grichuk and Anderson were not claimed.

Last week, MLBTR's Darragh McDonald previewed a handful of veterans who could hit waivers in just this fashion later this month. Since Darragh wrote that piece, one team has emerged as an even likelier candidate to go down this road; as the Astros have gone on an eight-game winning streak and the Mariners have kept in arm's reach, the Rangers have fallen to a daunting 10 games back in the AL West and 10.5 back in the Wild Card hunt. FanGraphs gives the Rangers a 0.6% chance of reaching the postseason. Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA is more bullish ... at 2.4%. Texas isn't mathematically eliminated, but they're not far off.

As Darragh noted last week and as both Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic and Jon Becker of FanGraphs have explored this week, there's an argument that the Rangers should jettison some of their impending free agents and cut back costs. In his column, Becker looked at how much money the Rangers would save by placing their impending free agents on waivers two days before the Aug. 31 postseason eligibility deadline. Rosenthal noted within his column that there's no clear path to dipping under the luxury tax for the Rangers, "so their only motivation would be to save on salary."

Technically that's true, but it's also not impossible for the Rangers to duck under the threshold without placing their entire roster on waivers for the taking. While sneaking under the tax threshold is a tall order, it could potentially be done without completely decimating next season's roster. Let's take a look at how they could get there and at what type of benefits they'd receive for doing so.

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Rangers Designate Andrew Knizner For Assignment

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The Rangers announced that right-hander Tyler Mahle has been reinstated from the 60-day injured list. In corresponding moves, the club optioned left-hander Walter Pennington and designated catcher Andrew Knizner for assignment.

Knizner, 29, signed with the Rangers in the offseason after being non-tendered by the Cardinals. Texas gave him a one-year deal with a $1.825MM salary, knowing that he could be retained via arbitration beyond this season as well.

Unfortunately, the club has been struggling to get much production from the catcher position this year. Jonah Heim hit .258/.317/.438 last year for a 103 wRC+ but he has dropped to a line of .232/.277/.346 and a 73 wRC+ this year. The falloff from Knizner has been even more drastic as he slashed .241/.288/.424 with the Cards last year for a 92 wRC+ but he is hitting .167/.183/.211 this year for a wRC+ of 4.

Perhaps some of that can be attributed to a .206 batting average on balls in play but Knizner has also drawn walks at a paltry 1.1% clip and hit just one home run in his 93 plate appearances, compared to the ten he hit in 241 trips to the plate last year. The Rangers fortified their catching corps by acquiring Carson Kelly from the Tigers prior to the deadline and then optioned Knizner to Triple-A, though he has now been bumped off the 40-man roster altogether.

With the trade deadline now passed, the Rangers will have to put Knizner on waivers in the coming days. Despite his rough season, he could perhaps garner interest based on his past performance and contract status.

He has one option left and therefore a claiming club wouldn’t need to give him an active roster spot right away, though he would be out of options next year in that scenario. He has not yet spent 20 days on optional assignment this year, so it’s possible he could retain that option next year if he either doesn’t get claimed or is kept in the majors by some other club. He also came into this season with four years and 21 days of service time, putting him just shy of the five-year mark at present. If any club felt especially bullish about Knizner’s future, they could claim him, keep him on optional assignment for the rest of the year and then control him via arbitration for two more years.

As for Mahle, he will be taking the mound for the first time in over a year. He required Tommy John surgery in May of last year, just a few months from free agency. The Rangers signed him to a two-year, $22MM deal with the knowledge that they would have to wait for his arrival.

With Mahle and Jacob deGrom both on their way back from surgeries last year, the club felt good enough about their rotation depth to deal Michael Lorenzen to the Royals prior to the deadline. But both Jon Gray and Max Scherzer recently landed on the IL, thinning the group out further. As of right now, the group consists of Mahle, Nathan Eovaldi, Andrew Heaney, José Ureña and Cody Bradford, with Dane Dunning in a long-relief role in the bullpen.

Rangers Place Max Scherzer On Injured List

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The Rangers announced that right-hander Max Scherzer has been placed on the 15-day injured list with right shoulder fatigue. Left-hander Walter Pennington was recalled in a corresponding move.

It’s been a challenging season for Scherzer, who just celebrated his 40th birthday last week. He underwent back surgery in the offseason and initially hoped to return some time in the middle to the end of May, but then he was delayed by some nerve irritation in his thumb and didn’t make his season debut until June 23.

He has since made eight starts for the club but questions surrounding his health popped up recently. He only lasted two innings on July 20 and later told the media he was experiencing arm fatigue, with Shawn McFarland of the Dallas Morning News among those to relay the message along on X. He felt good enough to make his next start on July 25, tossing six innings against the White Sox. But on July 30, he only lasted four innings and 68 pitches against the Cardinals with manager Bruce Bochy relaying that arm fatigue was again present, per Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News on X.

All year long, it has seemed like the Rangers would have a rotation that would get gradually healthier over the course of the year. Scherzer was coming back from his back surgery while Jacob deGrom and Tyler Mahle were lined up to join the mix in the second half of the season after recovering from last year’s Tommy John surgery. The reigning World Series champions were hoping to ride a rotation of Nathan Eovaldi, Jon Gray, Andrew Heaney, Michael Lorenzen, Dane Dunning and Cody Bradford until that trio returned.

That was sort of going according to plan when Scherzer returned back in June but has kind of gone off the rails since. Dunning was on the IL for most of July due to shoulder soreness and recently returned in a relief role. Bradford missed a few months due to a low back strain but, like Dunning, returned recently in a relief role. Gray hit the IL due to a groin strain last week. The club felt good enough about the rotation depth to trade Lorenzen to the Royals for Pennington prior to the deadline.

With Scherzer now out of the mix, the healthy rotation is down to Heaney and Eovaldi. Bochy says Mahle could be back and start on Tuesday, per McFarland on X. José Ureña has been oscillating between the rotation and bullpen this year and is starting tonight’s game. Tomorrow’s starter is still listed as TBD with Eovaldi scheduled for Sunday. Perhaps Dunning or Bradford will have to take the lead tomorrow as part of a bullpen game.

All together, it’s a less than ideal situation as they try to cobble a rotation together for the next few weeks. The club is 52-57 and eight games back in the Wild Card picture. Some struggles from the Mariners and Astros mean that the Rangers are only 4.5 games away from the West division lead but they would have to catch both clubs in order to nab that spot. Doing so with a patchwork rotation for the next weeks will be tricky. The trade deadline has now passed, limiting the options for finding external help.

It’s also less than ideal for Scherzer personally, as he is heading towards free agency at the end of this season. Chelsea Janes of the Washington Post hinted on X tonight that the veteran righty is uncertain how much longer he can keep pushing his body to its limits. Perhaps he would consider retiring after this season, which would be understandable given his age and this mounting ailments. But he also has a reputation as a fierce competitor so it’s anybody’s guess as to when he’ll decide to hang up his cleats. In either case, he’ll undoubtedly be doing everything he can to get over his arm issues and find a way back on the mound in the coming months.

Latest On Rangers’ Rotation, Trade Possibilities

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The Rangers have patched together their rotation for much of the season as they anticipate the returns of veterans Max Scherzer, Tyler Mahle and Jacob deGrom. Scherzer has already returned. Mahle is set to make his fifth minor league rehab start today and should make his Rangers debut before long. It’ll be a bit longer before deGrom makes it back, but he tossed a 40-pitch bullpen just yesterday, per Jeff Wilson of RangersToday.com. Left-hander Cody Bradford is on a minor league rehab assignment and expected to return soon, though Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News writes that he’ll work out of the bullpen upon his return. Texas reinstated righty Dane Dunning from the injured list earlier today, too. He’s in the ’pen for now but could move back to a starting role depending on how the next week goes.

What once was a starting pitching hodgepodge looks increasingly enviable. If Mahle is cleared to return after today’s start, he’ll join Scherzer, Nathan Eovaldi, Jon Gray, Michael Lorenzen, Andrew Heaney and Dunning as viable rotation options, with Bradford in the bullpen and deGrom looming on the horizon. That’s nine MLB-caliber starters, to say nothing of veteran starter Jose Ureña (who started six games but is in the bullpen presently).

With so many options suddenly at their fingertips, there’s been plenty of speculation about the Rangers trading from that stockpile of arms — even as they narrow the deficit in the postseason hunt. Texas has won four straight games. The Mariners have lost three straight. The Rangers now sit only three games back of the first-place Astros in the West and are just 5.5 games out in the Wild Card hunt. They’re not going to operate as a pure seller, but Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic suggests that Lorenzen or perhaps even Gray could be moved before Tuesday’s trade deadline.

Lorenzen, 32, signed with the Rangers on a one-year, $4.5MM deal in spring training. It was a bargain price for a veteran righty coming off a solid season, and he’s proven to be well worth the investment. He’s pitched 97 innings over the course of 17 starts and turned in a 3.53 ERA. Lorenzen’s 18.5% strikeout rate and 11.6% walk rate both leave plenty to be desired and point to some likely ERA regression, but he’s been precisely the type of veteran rotation stabilizer the Rangers hoped to be acquiring when signing him.

As of deadline day, Lorenzen will have just $1.5MM of that base salary yet to be paid out. He’s already picked up $800K of innings-based incentives and will get another $200K when he reaches 100 innings, likely in his next start. Assuming that comes with the Rangers — he’s their probable starter Saturday — a new team would be on the hook for the remaining portion of his base and additional incentives he’d unlock by reaching 120 innings ($300K), 140 innings ($350K), 160 innings ($400K) and 180 innings ($450K). He’s on pace to barely reach that final milestone.

At most, a team adding Lorenzen would pay around $1.5MM in base salary and an additional $1.5MM worth of incentives. If Lorenzen is pitching well enough to reach that 180-inning mark, it’d be considered money well spent. If nothing else, a budget-conscious team looking to add a stable starter (e.g. Twins, Guardians) could view Lorenzen as an affordable option.

Gray would be a more surprising trade candidate. He’s in the third season of a four-year, $56MM contract that’s paying $13MM both this year and next. Thus far, he’s posted 94 innings of 3.73 ERA ball on the season. While Gray’s 19.7% strikeout rate is the lowest of his career (aside from the shortened 2020 season), his 5.8% walk rate is a career-best mark. He’s still averaging 95 mph with his heater, while his opponents’ chase rate and swinging-strike rate are roughly in line with his 2022-23 marks.

Rosenthal also cites a pair of names the Rangers would prefer to hang onto even as they ponder trading from their rotation depth: Eovaldi and Heaney. The former is well on his way to vesting a $20MM player option for the 2025 season. That option would decrease his trade value — a new team would be stuck with the $20MM in the event of a major, post-trade injury. Beyond that, Eovaldi has been one of the team’s best arms this season, notching a 3.31 ERA, 24.6% strikeout rate and 6.1% walk rate in 106 innings. He’d likely be ticketed for their playoff rotation, should they get there. And, even if they don’t, the Rangers might simply hope Eovaldi stays healthy and enjoys pitching in his home state enough that he’d pick up that player option for the 2025 season.

As for Heaney, he’s turned things around after a shaky first season in Texas. The veteran southpaw boasts a 3.60 ERA, 23.5% strikeout rate and 6.8% walk rate in exactly 100 innings. He’s a free agent at season’s end, so one would imagine he’s an on-paper trade candidate in this scenario where Texas deals from its excess. However, the Rangers don’t have an established left-hander in their bullpen. Brock Burke was excellent in 2022 but took a step back in ’23 and was optioned earlier this season after being shelled through 9 2/3 innings. Rookie Jacob Latz has a solid 3.68 ERA in 36 2/3 innings, but he’s walked 13.5% of his opponents. Bradford could possibly fill that role, but he’s yet to return from a stress reaction in his ribcage.

Heaney has experience pitching both as a starter and reliever, including during his time with Texas. He’s throwing well right now but would likely be pushed out of a theoretical postseason rotation. In that setting, he could slide into the bullpen and match up against tough lefties and/or provide multiple innings in long relief.

Tyler Mahle Begins Rehab Stint

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Tyler Mahle saw his first official game action as a member of the Ranger organization tonight. Texas assigned the offseason signee to Triple-A Round Rock to begin a rehab assignment. Mahle threw two scoreless innings on 19 pitches in his first appearance since he underwent Tommy John surgery last May.

Texas inked the righty to a two-year, $22MM guarantee in December. Mahle is making $5.5MM this year and is due a $16.5MM salary for next season. The backloaded term reflected the fact that Mahle would miss the first few months of the 2023 season. His recovery process has gone smoothly thus far, opening the possibility he could make it to Globe Life Field not long after the July 30 trade deadline.

Mahle looked to be coming into his own as a mid-rotation starter in Cincinnati a few seasons ago. Between 2021 and the ’22 trade deadline, he turned in a 3.99 ERA over 52 starts. Mahle fanned 27% of opposing hitters against a solid 8.6% walk rate over that stretch. Despite pitching in a difficult home environment, he looked the part of a #3 starter. The Twins bought into that impressive form, sending Christian Encarnacion-Strand, Spencer Steer and Steve Hajjar to the Reds for the final year and a half of Mahle’s arbitration control.

That proved one of the more regrettable deadline deals in recent history. Injuries essentially derailed Mahle’s tenure in Minnesota from the beginning. Shoulder issues limited him to four starts down the stretch in ’22. Mahle looked to be in good form at the start of the next season. He carried a 3.16 ERA with a 27.5% strikeout rate over five starts before his elbow gave out. The surgery marked a sour end to the impending free agent’s time in the Twin Cities.

If Mahle can rediscover the form he showed before the injuries, he’d be a major boost to the Texas rotation. The Rangers had hoped to stay afloat in the first half before welcoming back Max Scherzer, Mahle, and eventually Jacob deGrom from the injured list. They haven’t performed at the level they were expecting. They’re still seven games below .500 after tonight’s shutout victory over the Padres. Texas is seven and a half games back of the division-leading Mariners and for the final Wild Card spot held by the Royals.

While the defending champions have clearly underperformed, that’s not so much about their injury-riddled rotation. The starting pitching has held up about as well as the front office could have anticipated. The far bigger issue has been a lineup where only Josh Smith has played above preseason expectations. Corey Seager and Rookie of the Year favorite Wyatt Langford have picked things up after slow starts, but the overall offense hasn’t been good enough.

The Rangers have a few more weeks to clarify their deadline trajectory. Mahle himself will not be a trade candidate, but Texas has a number of impending free agents they could consider moving if they don’t turn things around quickly. If the Rangers play their way within a few games of a postseason spot, upgrading the bullpen and deepening the outfield could be priorities.

Rangers Notes: Seager, Mahle, Rocker

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Rangers fans were dealt a major injury scare last night when star shortstop Corey Seager went down after being struck on the wrist by a pitch from Orioles lefty Cade Povich. Seager immediately exited the game but fortunately Rangers manager Bruce Bochy confirmed to reporters last night that initial x-rays came back negative. That indicated that the runner-up for the 2023 AL MVP award seemingly had avoided a worst case scenario, though the Rangers still planned to evaluate him further today.

Said evaluation could have been more encouraging. As noted by Evan Grant of The Dallas Morning News earlier today, Bochy told reporters prior to today’s game against Baltimore that Seager was still feeling “pretty sore” and that the club is planning to have him undergo an MRI exam tomorrow when the club returns home to Texas. Even if the MRI comes back clean, however, Bochy admitted that Seager is going to be out for at least “the next couple of days” even in an absolute best case scenario.

The Rangers called up infielder Jonathan Ornelas prior to tonight’s game to serve as an extra infield option while Seager nurses his injury, but the 24-year-old youngster has just nine plate appearances to his name at the big league level and a lackluster 66 wRC+ at the Triple-A level this year. That leaves him unlikely to impact the club on more than an emergency basis, and if Seager were to go on the injured list the club would likely call up utility bat Ezequiel Duran to fill in on the infield instead. It’s possible Duran would’ve been recalled instead of Ornelas if not for Duran being optioned to the minors just last week, meaning he can’t return to the big leagues for ten days unless replacing a player headed to the IL.

While the news regarded Seager certainly could be better, Rangers fans have also received positive news regarding the status of a handful of rehabbing pitchers in recent days. As noted by Grant, right-hander Tyler Mahle threw a bullpen yesterday and is slated to begin a rehab assignment next week as he makes his way back from Tommy John surgery. Mahle went under the knife on the same day as top pitching prospect Kumar Rocker, who will start a rehab assignment of his own in rookie ball sometime next week. According to Grant, Bochy indicated that both Mahle and Rocker are essentially going to be on the schedule of a starter ramping up during Spring Training, meaning that Mahle could be an option to join the Rangers rotation sometime after the All Star break.

Mahle signed with the Rangers on a two-year deal this past offseason while rehabbing the aforementioned Tommy John surgery and has long appeared ticketed for a return at some point in the season half of this year. The 29-year-old has generally been a solid mid-to-back of the rotation arm when healthy enough to take the mound, with a 3.90 ERA (117 ERA+) and 3.86 FIP across 374 innings of work while striking out a solid 21.7% of batters since the start of the 2020 season. Health has been the primary question regarding Mahle in the recent years of his career, as he’s only made it to 30 starts once (a 33-start campaign in 2021) in his eight years as a big leaguer. Should he stay healthy enough to contribute, Mahle figures to provide the Rangers additional rotation depth behind their current group of Max Scherzer, Jon Gray, Nathan Eovaldi, Andrew Heaney, and Michael Lorenzen.

As for Rocker, the right-hander was among the best-regarded prospects in both the 2021 and 2022 drafts. He was selected 10th overall out of Vanderbilt in the 2021 draft by the Mets but ended up not signing over concerns regarding his elbow, leading the Rangers to pick him third overall the following year. Rocker posted a solid 3.86 ERA in six starts with the Rangers at the High-A level last year before going under the knife back in May, striking out a fantastic 37.9% of batters faced at the level. Now 24, Rocker figures to resume his ascent up the minor league ladder upon his return to action. While it seems unlikely that he would factor into the club’s plans at the big league level this year given his lack of pro experience, it’s easy to imagine the righty debuting in the majors as soon as next season if he sports the same high-octane stuff he flashed in the minors and the SEC prior to his surgery.

Rangers Notes: Carter, Mahle, Bradford, Foscue

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The Rangers placed Evan Carter on the injured list last week, initially announcing the issue as back tightness. Manager Bruce Bochy provided more specifics yesterday, telling reporters (including Kennedi Landry of MLB.com) that the rookie left fielder is dealing with a stress reaction. Texas expects Carter to miss upwards of a month.

It has been a challenging first full MLB season for Carter. The 21-year-old top prospect debuted late in 2023 and immediately cemented himself as a key piece of the franchise’s first World Series run. Carter hit .300/.417/.500 in 17 postseason games, making him a popular Rookie of the Year pick in 2024. He has had a much tougher go through this season’s first couple months, running a .188/.272/.361 line with a 26.5% strikeout rate over 162 plate appearances.

Carter admitted he played through back discomfort for a couple weeks before the IL placement. That certainly could’ve played a role in his middling offense. He remains an integral piece of the Rangers’ plans for this season and beyond, but he’ll be down for a few weeks. Wyatt Langford has stepped into left field, opening some DH at-bats for Robbie Grossman and Ezequiel Duran.

Texas received better news on a few other injured players this week. Offseason signee Tyler Mahle threw to hitters on Wednesday for the first time in his recovery from Tommy John surgery (link via Shawn McFarland of the Dallas Morning News). Mahle is ticketed for three more live sessions before he could head on a minor league rehab stint. If all goes smoothly, he should be on track for his Rangers debut a couple weeks after the All-Star Break.

Mahle is around 13 months removed from the elbow procedure that ended his tenure with the Twins. The right-hander was barely able to pitch for Minnesota. He was a mid-rotation starter with the Reds before that, pitching 180 innings of 3.75 ERA ball while striking out more than 27% of opponents three years ago. The Rangers guaranteed him $22MM on a backloaded two-year deal in December.

Texas has a full rotation on the injured list. Jon Gray has had a fairly brief stint related to a groin strain, but the other four pitchers have faced long recovery timelines. Mahle, Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom are still rehabbing from 2023 surgeries. Cody Bradford has been out since mid-April with a stress fracture in his rib. The southpaw told reporters that he has progressed to throwing from 120 feet on flat ground (X link via Landry). Bradford opened the season as the fifth starter and turned in a 1.40 ERA over 19 1/3 innings in three appearances before the injury.

On the position player side, Texas has been without rookie infielder Justin Foscue for nearly the entire season. The Rangers called up the former first-round draftee on April 2. He took two plate appearances before sustaining a left oblique strain that pushed him to the 60-day injured list. Foscue will be eligible for reinstatement in the next few days and seems to be on track for a return. Texas assigned him to the Arizona complex league to begin a rehab assignment tonight. The Rangers might not have an immediate MLB roster spot for Foscue, as Josh Smith has played very well at third base while Josh Jung has been on the shelf.

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