Last Friday, the Rangers embarked on what’s poised to be their most important road trip of the season.
With the trade deadline approaching at the end of this month, the results of three games in San Diego, four in Anaheim, and three in Houston could very well determine how the front office decides to approach the rest of the season. Perform well over the next week, and the Rangers might decide to push toward a playoff berth in 2025. Continue to tread water in mediocrity, however, and it might be time to sell and look ahead to 2026.
As things currently stand, Texas is 44–46, just two games shy of the elusive .500 mark. The race for the American League West appears all but over. The Astros now lead the Rangers by 11 games, and the Mariners are in second place, seven games back. The more pressing pursuit is the hunt for a Wild Card spot. The Rangers are four games behind the Mariners, who currently hold the final Wild Card position. There’s certainly a path to the postseason, but for the front office to believe it's even a possibility, the players on the field need to start pulling their weight, and soon.
Over the past month, the Rangers’ quest for .500 has been a recurring theme. There have been moments where the team is just one game away from evening its record, only for a disappointing result to push it further away. After all, a team can’t climb the standings if it never manages to win more games than it loses.
The most recent example of being so close yet so far came this weekend against the Padres. After losing on the 4th of July in another backbreaking extra-innings affair, the Rangers rallied for an impressive 7–4 victory on Saturday to even the series. Perhaps more important was the fact that Texas was now just one game under .500, meaning a win on Sunday in San Diego wouldn’t just seal a series win, it would also secure the ever-so-crucial even record.
But, much like the entirety of this season, disappointment lurked. Despite taking a 1–0 lead just two batters into the game, the Rangers looked continuously inept on offense en route to a 4–1 defeat. Is that really a surprise, though?
No matter what the front office decides to do at the deadline, the 2025 Texas Rangers will be remembered for one thing and one thing only: a terrible offense that wasted some of, if not the best, pitching this franchise has ever seen.
Let’s just go down the line of pitchers who have been standout performers all season long:
Nathan Eovaldi, the 2023 postseason hero whom the Rangers re-signed to a three-year, $75 million contract this past offseason, has posted a 1.75 ERA over 14 starts and 77 1/3 innings. He’s completely transformed his pitching style from earlier in his career, when he was a fireball-throwing righty who overpowered hitters. Now, he’s an old-school hoss who knows his way around the strike zone and outsmarts hitters left and right. Even a triceps injury that sidelined him for several weeks couldn’t derail the momentum Eovaldi had built.
Jacob deGrom might be the best pitcher to don a Rangers uniform in the 21st century. That’s right, he’s been that good this season. Just look at the numbers: a 2.13 ERA over 101 1/3 innings across 17 starts. Those stats become even more impressive considering the context of deGrom’s career. His 17 starts this season are the most he’s had in a single campaign since 2019, when he started 32 games for the Mets. Injuries have repeatedly derailed his greatness, but 2025 is clear evidence that when he’s on the mound, he’s one of the best to ever do it. He’s the only Ranger, outside of injury replacements, selected to the American League All-Star team, and he’s certainly earned it. Every time deGrom takes the mound, I’m confident the Rangers will win. It’s been a pleasure watching him pitch this season. I just wish he was pitching for a better team.
Can you believe Patrick Corbin is actually not bad? When the Rangers signed him toward the end of spring training, I wrote a piece about how Corbin was essentially here to take the ball every five days, eat innings, and take losses for the sake of saving other arms. He’s done the first two tasks exceptionally well, and instead of losing, he’s actually done some winning too. Corbin, while neither dominant nor particularly threatening, has been a perfectly serviceable member of the rotation. With several others going down to injury throughout the season, Corbin has been steady.
Jack Leiter is a rookie pitcher going through the rookie pitcher motions. At times, he’s looked like the top-end talent we were promised. At others, he appears to still be learning on the job, which is totally fine, by the way. Leiter has met my expectations, which is a pleasant sight for a member of the 2025 Rangers.
There are several other arms that have been solid. Chris Martin, Robert Garcia, and Hoby Milner have all been reliable bullpen contributors. Unfortunately, due to the offense’s inability to put games away, the relievers have been overworked since the beginning of the season. At this point, some of them look pretty well spent. That’s just another side effect of a lineup that’s completely lost.
When we look back at the expectations for the 2025 Texas Rangers, we’ll keep pointing to the offense’s failures. Every national outlet I read predicted this lineup, featuring veteran stars like Corey Seager and Marcus Semien, alongside newcomers like Jake Burger and Joc Pederson, would return to form. Instead, the regression we saw in 2024 has continued, and the lineup as a whole, despite every change and tweak attempted by the coaching staff and front office, is a lost cause.
But who knows? Maybe these next seven games against the Angels and Astros will be the turnaround we’ve all been yearning for. Maybe this team fights to the very end, and we’ll all look back at the struggles of the first half and laugh. To be honest, though, that sounds more impossible than the Cowboys winning the Super Bowl.
I’ve gotten past being sad or angry about this team. At this point, I’m just disappointed. There was so much potential here, and for it all to be wasted is disheartening, to say the least.