The Rangers’ Roster Bind

The Rangers should be at a crossroads offseason. Texas failed to take advantage of an historically weak division, finishing 80-82 to come up two wins short of a playoff berth. They missed the postseason for a third consecutive year and have been a league average team since their 2023 World Series. That’s a clear letdown for a team that has a lot of money tied up on players in their mid-late 30s.

According to Baseball Reference, Texas had the fifth-highest average age in MLB on both the position player (29.3) and pitching (30.3) sides. The Braves were the only other team in the top five in both areas. It’s an aging roster that hasn’t been good enough for three seasons, mostly struggling with the same inability to score runs.

Ownership has also hamstrung the front office recently. They’ve pulled back spending in the wake of the team’s collapsed local TV contract. Texas should’ve been motivated to add at the 2026 trade deadline with the AL West wide open. They instead declined to take on payroll and traded for a middle reliever (Chase Silseth) and a change of scenery third catcher (Logan O’Hoppe).

Where do the Rangers go from here? At his end of season press conference, president of baseball operations Chris Young suggested they’d look to shake up the roster to an extent (link via Kennedi Landry of MLB.com). “If anything, we need to reshuffle our cards to some degree. I mentioned some of the goals that we have in terms of becoming more athletic, more dynamic,” Young said. He added that the focus is “to make this a playoff-caliber team next year,” so it doesn’t appear a complete teardown is coming.

At the same time, Young said the front office would “be open-minded to any way to improve this roster.” They contemplated a massive move at the deadline, reportedly talking with the Braves about a deal that would’ve sent Jacob deGrom to Atlanta (and potentially acquiring Spencer Strider back as part of a salary offset). It’s unclear how far talks between the teams progressed, as the two-time Cy Young winner informed the team he wasn’t interested in waiving his no-trade clause.

deGrom is entering the final guaranteed season of his five-year, $185MM free agent deal. He’ll make a $37MM salary. There’s a club option for 2028 that comes with a $20MM base value as a result of the Tommy John surgery which deGrom underwent earlier during the contract term. He spoke generally about the trade rumors after the deadline. “I signed here to help this team win a World Series. In ’23, the team was able to do that, and I want to be a part of that in the future. … That was the reason I wanted to be there,” deGrom said on deadline day (Associated Press link). “So, I want to stay here and help this team compete.”

Some players are more comfortable waiving no-trade rights during an offseason when they’d have time to get settled. deGrom didn’t directly address whether he’d reconsider if the Rangers approached him during the winter. Still, if he takes the same approach as he did over the summer, Texas wouldn’t have any choice but to hold onto him.

Nathan Eovaldi has the same control over his destiny. He’s entering the final season of a three-year, $75MM contract that also includes a full no-trade clause. The two-time All-Star will make $20MM. While there weren’t public rumors about Eovaldi’s deadline trade candidacy to the same extent as deGrom, it stands to reason other teams would have interest if he were willing to move.

Eovaldi is coming off a fine but unexceptional season. He worked to a 4.20 earned run average with a 23.5% strikeout rate across 145 2/3 innings. Eovaldi now sits in the 94-95 mph range after pushing the upper 90s earlier in his career. He has compensated by throwing more secondary stuff, particularly the splitter that remains an excellent pitch. Eovaldi missed a month late in the season with elbow soreness but returned without a rehab stint and generally pitched well in a multi-inning relief role over the final few weeks.

A $20MM salary feels about right for Eovaldi’s age 37 season. He’s fairly similar to Kevin Gausman, who still had positive trade value at the deadline on a $23MM salary. Merrill Kelly and Chris Bassitt commanded salaries in that range as free agents last winter. Teams like the Cubs, Braves, Padres or White Sox have the short-term payroll flexibility to accommodate that kind of salary for one year and need a #2 or #3 caliber starter. Eovaldi’s strong postseason track record is a nice bonus in that regard.

The Rangers probably wouldn’t command a huge prospect return but could look to offload Eovaldi’s salary if the budget is tight. They have needs in center field, behind the plate, at the back of the bullpen, and potentially at second base (depending on their plans for top shortstop prospect Sebastian Walcott). As with deGrom, however, that’s contingent on Eovaldi being open to moving.

deGrom and Eovaldi are two of four players on the Texas roster making upwards of $20MM. The others, Corey Seager and Brandon Nimmo, also control their destinies. Seager has completed five seasons in Texas, giving him full no-trade protection under the CBA as a 10-and-5 player (ten years of service, last five with one team). Nimmo’s eight-year deal with the Mets came with a full no-trade clause. He waived to facilitate the move to Texas but would need to do so again if the Rangers wanted to trade him.

Both Seager and Nimmo would be difficult to trade even if they didn’t have a say in the matter. Seager is signed for five more years at $31MM annually, covering ages 33-37. Nimmo has four more seasons (age 34-37) at $20.25MM per year. Neither player would match that if they were free agents.

Seager battled back issues and had a league average batting line on the year. A strong second half demonstrated that he’s still capable of driving a lineup when healthy, but the age and injuries are concerning enough that Texas would need to eat a decent chunk of money. Nimmo had an excellent April but hit at a league average level (.252/.313/.390 with 10 homers) after May 1. He posted some of the worst defensive grades of his career in right field. Nimmo still provides some value as a reasonable on-base threat with double digit homer power, yet it’s no longer commensurate with the salary.

Those are four of the five players on guaranteed contracts for next year. (The other is part-time catcher Danny Jansen, who’s signed for $9.5MM.) All four have deals that’d make them difficult or impossible to trade, depending on the players’ individual motivations. For the Rangers to actually make meaningful roster changes, they may need to look to their arbitration and pre-arbitration group.

Dealing any of Wyatt Langford, Josh Jung or Ezequiel Duran would only further concerns about their lack of offense and the age of their core players. Evan Carter no longer holds anywhere close to the trade value he had when he broke in as a key contributor to the World Series team at 21. Jake Burger hits homers but doesn’t provide much else and is getting expensive in arbitration. He’d have minimal trade appeal, though Texas could non-tender him to drop a projected $6.9MM salary from the books.

That could leave MacKenzie Gore as the team’s most realistic trade candidate. That’s surely not what the Rangers had in mind when they traded five prospects to the Nationals last offseason. Gore had a pedestrian first season with Texas, tossing 173 innings of 4.58 ERA ball. His strikeout rate dipped four points to a slightly above-average 23.2% clip.

Gore still has pedigree as a former third overall pick with a mid-90s fastball, but he’s down to one year of team control with a projected arbitration salary approaching $9MM. He’s certainly less appealing from a trade perspective than Freddy Peralta was entering his walk year. The Brewers landed two borderline Top 100 caliber prospects (Brandon Sproat and Jett Williams) for Peralta. Texas would probably be looking at one player in that range and perhaps some controllable bullpen help if they put Gore on the market. It’s probably not Plan A for Young and company, but the bigger moves to reallocate salary might be out of the front office’s hands.