3 Rangers Who Won't Survive the Trade Deadline

Sometimes teams end up in a tricky spot at the trade deadline, not playing well enough to be true contenders but not being bad enough for a fire sale to make sense. But fortunately for us, the Texas Rangers have no such dilemma.

This team is an obvious buyer. Even with Jacob deGrom on the shelf, the Rangers are still one of the best teams in MLB. A run at the franchise's first-ever World Series title is firmly on the table.

And making a true championship push will mean casting off some extra baggage in order to make the upgrades required to hang with the elite.

Here are three Rangers that will be playing elsewhere come August.

Rangers Trade Deadline: Players on the Move

1. Jack Leiter

The question isn't whether the Rangers will move some of their top prospects at the deadline. The question is how many prospects, and which ones?

The number is going to be high, and five-plus prospects being shipped off wouldn't surprise me considering how many players Texas is rumored to be interested in. At the top of that list is Jack Leiter.

Leiter is a stud pitching prospect, no doubt. I love his game and don't really want to see him go, but it makes too much sense. He's coming along very slowly so far, struggling to the tune of a 5.54 ERA in Double-A last season and barely beating that with a 5.51 in 2023. There are signs his game is improving (better strikeout rate, lower WHIP, lower xFIP), but he still seems to be a long way from developing into the MLB-level starter we're hoping he'll be.

Of course the Rangers don't want to mortgage their entire future for a single run this season, but we've got a lot of high-end pitching prospects, and that means there's not going to be as much room to be patient with Leiter.

Next up is the kind of name it's going to take if the Rangers want to pull off one of the blockbuster deals they're being connected to in rumors.