Rangers Place Cal Quantrill On Injured List

The Rangers announced this afternoon that right-hander Cal Quantrill is going on the 15-day injured list with a right lat strain. Fellow righty Winston Santos is being recalled from Triple-A Round Rock to take Quantrill’s spot. The move is 40-man neutral.

Quantrill started yesterday against the Blue Jays but was removed after just 1 1/3 innings. He has averaged 93.8 mph on his four-seamer this year, but he averaged just 91.7 mph last night, throwing his last fastball for 87.8 mph. After a managerial visit, Quantrill was removed from the game for lefty Jordan Montgomery, who recorded the next 11 outs.

The Rangers currently hold a one-game edge on the Astros for control of the AL West. Assuming they hold on and the Rays and Guardians finish as the Junior Circuit’s top two division winners, the Rangers will face the AL’s No. 6 seed (currently the White Sox) in the Wild Card Series starting September 29th. The lat strain will keep Quantrill out of action in that series, but he could return at some point in the Division Series if the Rangers advance that far.

For now, the club will have to make do without Quantrill, who has been surprisingly effective this year after struggling for the previous three. After delivering 32 starts with a 3.38 ERA for the Guardians in 2022, Quantrill struggled to a 5.39 ERA from 2023-25, which he split with Cleveland and three other teams. His 15.7% strikeout rate in that span was typical for him, but the righty was now struggling with the long ball. Quantrill surrendered 45 home runs in 266 innings from 2024-25 (1.52 HR/9), despite sitting at 1.01 HR/9 in 2022 and 0.99 HR/9 in 2023.

This year, Quantrill has gotten the long ball under control, and the Rangers could not be happier. In 110 innings split between the rotation and bullpen, the righty has a nice 2.86 ERA, a pristine 5.6% walk rate, and has allowed only 13 home runs (1.06 HR/9). Opponents are only batting .239 in balls in play off Quantrill, which certainly works in his favor, but the Rangers will take the bottom-line performance regardless. He’s started in all of his last seven appearances and covered six innings or more in all of them except yesterday. He and Jacob deGrom have been the club’s best starters since the middle of August, while MacKenzie Gore has struggled and Kumar Rocker has averaged less than five innings in his last six starts.

With Quantrill out of commission, the Rangers’ rotation for the Wild Card Series will likely go deGrom, Gore, then one of Rocker or Cody Bradford. Quantrill has performed better than the latter two and would probably be the No. 2 or 3 guy if he were healthy. Gore experienced back spasms in his most recent start, though manager Skip Schumaker described him as day-to-day rather than needing an IL stint, as relayed by Shawn McFarland of The Dallas Morning News. Alternatively, the Rangers have Montgomery and Nathan Eovaldi working as relievers right now, so they could mix in a bullpen game.

Santos, 24, has not pitched in the Majors since his big league debut on July 1st, when he surrendered two earned runs in two innings of relief. He has struggled mightily with Round Rock since then. In 41 innings there, Santos has allowed more than six earned runs per nine while striking out a decent 24.3% of opponents, but walking them at a high 9.7% clip. He’ll factor into the relief mix in the season’s final week.