{"id":555758,"date":"2026-02-05T09:06:26","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T09:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555758\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T09:06:26","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T09:06:26","slug":"rangers-mason-thompson-agree-to-minor-league-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/555758\/","title":{"rendered":"Rangers, Mason Thompson Agree To Minor League Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Rangers have agreed to a minor league contract with free agent righty Mason Thompson<\/a>, per the team\u2019s transaction log at MLB.com<\/a>. It\u2019s a homecoming for the Round Rock native, who\u2019ll presumably be in big league camp with the club later this month.<\/p>\n

A third-round pick by the Padres in 2016, Thompson has pitched in parts of four big league seasons between the Friars and the Nationals. The 6\u20196\u2033, 240-pound righty been tagged for a 5.21 ERA in 114 innings, with a gruesome 11.81 ERA (16 runs in 10 2\/3 innings) this past season skewing that mark a bit. Though Thompson\u2019s 2025 performance was rocky to say the least \u2014 he also posted an ERA over 6.00 in 16 minor league frames \u2014 it bears mentioning that this was his first time back on the mound following Tommy John surgery in spring of 2024.<\/p>\n

Prior to his injury, Thompson pitched 103 1\/3 major league frames with a more palatable 4.53 ERA. His 17.7% strikeout rate and 10% walk rate were both notably worse than league average, but his 51.1% ground-ball mark was excellent. The velocity on Thompson\u2019s sinker was down a big in his return, but he still averaged a hearty 95 mph on the pitch, complementing it with a lesser-used four-seamer at the same velocity, a mid-80s slider and a very occasional upper-80s changeup.<\/p>\n

Because they cobbled together their 2025 bullpen primarily via a series of low-cost, one-year contracts, the Rangers entered the 2025-26 offseason in need of nearly an entirely new relief corps. They\u2019ve followed a similar path to the one they took last winter, adding veterans Chris Martin<\/a> (who re-signed), Jakob Junis<\/a>, Alexis Diaz<\/a> and Tyler Alexander<\/a> on one-year contracts and claiming righty Michael Ota\u00f1ez off waivers. Assuming he is indeed invited to camp, Thompson will be the most experienced bullpen arm among Texas\u2019 collection of non-roster invitees.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Rangers have agreed to a minor league contract with free agent righty Mason Thompson, per the team\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555759,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2290],"tags":[5,12064],"class_list":{"0":"post-555758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baseball","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mason-thompson"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116017232923136485","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=555758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/555758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=555758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=555758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=555758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}