The Texas Rangers’ offseason choices are starting to look a lot more practical than flashy, and that’s where the trade market comes in. With payroll constraints looming and the farm system finally showing signs of life after years of attrition, Texas appears headed toward a stretch of lower-risk moves rather than another swing at a big-spending winter.
That’s the backdrop for Bleacher Report’s projection that the Rangers will land New York Yankees right-hander Luis Gil. The logic is easy to see: Texas needs controllable pitching, and Gil comes with three years of team control. For a club trying to map out both the immediate future and what comes after, that kind of contract runway matters.
The Rangers do have six starters under team control for next season - Jacob deGrom, Nathan Eovaldi, MacKenzie Gore, Kumar Rocker, Jack Leiter, and Cody Bradford. But the picture gets much murkier after 2027.
Gore and Eovaldi are set to hit free agency, and deGrom could join them if the Rangers turn down his $20 million club option. Replacing all of that at once would be an expensive task, which makes the idea of getting ahead of the problem more appealing.
Gil looks like the type of arm that could fit that plan on paper, but the track record since his 2024 breakout makes the fit less certain. He won the AL Rookie of the Year award that season, going 29 starts, 151 2/3 innings, a 3.50 ERA, and a 26.8% strikeout rate. At that point, it would have been hard to picture the Yankees moving him.
But the years that followed have not resembled that version of Gil. In 2025, a lat strain knocked him out for a large chunk of the season. When he finally returned, he made 11 starts and posted a 3.32 ERA, but the underlying numbers told a less encouraging story: his strikeout rate dropped to 16.8%, and his walk rate climbed to 13.5%.
2026 brought another rough chapter. Gil did not break camp with New York, but he was called on for early April starts while Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodón were on the injured list.
That stopgap plan unraveled quickly. He allowed 13 earned runs in 19 1/3 innings, walked 11 batters, and struck out only nine.
After that, he was sent to Triple-A and soon shut down for much of the year because of right shoulder inflammation.
He did return in September, this time out of the bullpen, and logged eight innings with a 1.13 ERA. Even so, that was too small a sample to erase the concerns around him. That’s why Yankees beat writers expect him to be a strong non-tender candidate.
Texas could simply wait and see whether New York reaches that point, but that route carries its own risk if Gil signs somewhere else. His projected 2027 arbitration salary is just $2.3 million, which makes him a relatively cheap shot at a pitcher with real upside. If the Rangers believe they can clean him up, the price tag would be worth the gamble.
There is a path where this works out. Gil has the kind of pedigree that could make him a Cal Quantrill-like find for Texas, giving the Rangers a long man who could move into the rotation if needed. With Quantrill heading to free agency, that sort of bridge role would fit.
The catch is that even if Gil helps in 2027, he doesn’t really settle the bigger issue waiting in 2028. Texas would still be left wondering whether he can be trusted as a starter once the expected departures arrive after next season.
If he bounces back, the Rangers get a ready-made answer. If not, they’ll have spent a trade chip without solving much at all.
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