Marcus Semien is a long, long way from where he was two years ago, when his numbers say he was the Rangers’ best player. Never missed a day of work. If he wasn’t as magnificent as Corey Seager or as dramatic as Adolis Garcia or as precocious as Evan Carter, he was the most dependable of that championship bunch, a handy tool in an everyday sport.
Yet even if he can still pick it at 35, it was time for Semien to go. Hard to watch a great player’s decline, swing by swing, day after day.
Even harder to pay for it, apparently.
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Brandon Nimmo, the outfielder coming back from the Mets, works cheaper than Semien, and he better fits the Rangers’ new hitting approach. Which is to say he has one. At 32, he may not be the player he once was, but his splits are similar against righties or lefties, and his .760 OPS would have ranked behind only Seager and Wyatt Langford among the Rangers’ regulars.
If his 40-minute Zoom call Monday with local reporters is any indication, he should lead the club in sheer verbiage. Pretty sure he said more than Seager’s let slip since he got here. The new guy’s a one-man camaraderie kit. He designed his house in Port St. Lucie, Fla., where the Mets train, to host team parties. Among the topics he addressed at length Monday was a desire to mentor the Rangers’ younger players, who, frankly, could use a little brotherly love.
Mets fans are reportedly apoplectic that Nimmo’s no longer one of them, and it’s not hard to see why. He’s winsome, charming, introspective. Talks through a perpetual smile. If this Rangers thing doesn’t work out, I’m thinking about adopting him.
As noted, Nimmo will also save the Rangers $5 million a year, plus the cash the Mets are sending will mitigate a little of the cost in the five years left on his contract.
The savings might not seem like much, but, with Ray Davis doubling down on his bottom line, every little bit helps.
“Considering last year we built a bullpen for $10 million,” Chris Young said of the savings, “I think it gives us about eight relievers.”
Texas Rangers General Manager Chris Young listens during a post season press conference, on Friday, Oct. 3, 2025, at Globe Life Field in Arlington.
Shafkat Anowar / Staff Photographer
The team president was only half-kidding. He still has much to do. Needs a bullpen, another catcher, at least one more starting pitcher and maybe a second baseman, unless Skip Schumaker likes the Josh Smith/Zeke Duran/Cody Freeman/Michael Helman cover band.
My choice would be Luis Arraez, a three-time batting champ and old favorite of the new skipper, but he should cost around $17 million a year. Hard to squeeze all of the above into Young’s new budget.
The problem with having less money to spend is it belies the message Young sent Nimmo, in which he assured him the Rangers are reloading, not rebuilding. Question is, if that’s so, how does he make it work?
Young did well to unload Semien’s contract and get a nice player in return who should be good for what was an uptight clubhouse. But where does he go from here? He might find a taker for Seager’s contract, but, without him, who in this lineup scares anyone? Young could deal Jacob deGrom, but the rotation is the only thing that kept the Rangers afloat last season. In fact, Nimmo cited the Rangers’ rotation for the difference it can make in the playoffs.
Besides Sebastian Walcott, an untouchable, the Rangers don’t have enough prospect capital to make a significant deal. Bruce Bochy employed an all-hands-on-deck approach in his final season. We’ve seen anyone who’s close to playing in the big leagues, and they weren’t good enough. Won’t be next year, either.
Just 24 months removed from the club’s only fairytale ending, Young finds himself scrambling for answers because Semien, Adolis, Carter, Leody Taveras, Josh Jung and Jonah Heim couldn’t sustain what was for most of them the season of a lifetime. Even in a sport where greatness doesn’t often wear well, that’s surely some kind of record.
Texas Rangers’ Marcus Semien celebrates hitting a two-run home run during the ninth inning in Game 5 of the World Series against the Arizona Diamondbacks, Wednesday, Nov. 1, 2023, in Phoenix. Texas won 5-0 to win the World Series.
Smiley N. Pool / Staff Photographer
Makes it seem as if the title was a fluke, or what passes for one when you play 162 games, plus a postseason. Doesn’t make the title any cheaper. They earned it, as did a long-suffering fan base. But it helps explain the fact that, over the last nine years, the Rangers have had just one winning season, and it ended in a parade.
The Rangers simply hit the lottery in ‘23. Unless you’re Hollywood Henderson, that kind of fortune comes once in a lifetime. If Young wants to make good on his promise to Nimmo, he’ll have to be more clever than he was even in building a championship roster. Back then, he had half a billion to spend just on the middle infield. The rest he sprinkled with stardust.
Of the ‘23 position regulars, only the left side of the infield remains, unless you count the left fielder, who’s now the first base coach. Over the last week alone, the Rangers have let go not only of Semien and Adolis — the man who almost single-handedly brought Minute Maid Park down around the Astros’ ears — they’ve also said goodbye to the guy who threw the last pitch in that championship season as well as the one who caught it.
“I don’t want that to get lost in this,” Young said Monday, “because these are really, really tough decisions. It’s not lost on us what these players accomplished and their connection to our fans.
“The last two years have been very difficult as we feel like we have not lived up to our expectations, and when you don’t meet expectations, you have to make tough calls.”
No question about it then, it’s time to move on, even from the greatest season in Rangers history. Fortunately, the memories remain. A personal favorite: Josh Sborz spiking his glove after a called third strike and Heim rushing out to embrace him, then taking the game ball and stashing it in his back pocket for safekeeping. As I wrote then, history was secured at last. At least they can’t take that away.
Twitter/X: @KSherringtonDMN