How will Young rebuild the bullpen?
Young has built discounted bullpens for three years in a row, some more successful than others. 2026 was not exactly successful, outside of the emergence of Jacob Latz as the closer after losing out on the fifth starter spot in Spring Training.
Tyler Alexander, Jakob Junis, Chase Silseth and Trevor Williams are all impending free agents. Chris Martin didn’t make it through the season healthy. There were some wins, like 31-year-old Peyton Gray becoming a key middle-relief arm, but Texas lacked stability down the stretch.
Now Young has to rebuild it -- seemingly on a budget -- all over again.
Can the front office build a team that plays to Schumaker’s preferred style of play? Can the current players on the roster be that kind of team?
Schumaker clearly wants to play a particular style of baseball, one that relies on speed and grit and athleticism. The Rangers, for a variety of reasons, couldn’t make that happen in 2026.
“I think there's a health component to it,” Schumaker said. “Quite honestly, there were some limitations with some of our guys that couldn't steal bases like they wanted to, or advance like they wanted to.”
That applies to guys like Langford and Nimmo, both of whom had nagging lower body injuries throughout the season. But there were clearly also a number of players without that level of speed and aggressiveness -- Josh Jung, Jake Burger, Joc Pederson and Seager -- who couldn’t always take the extra base, either. When looking at a potential reshuffle, it likely starts with Schumaker’s preferred style of play.
“I think it's a very big offseason for a lot of these guys -- not just the younger guys, but the older guys -- because we need them to be healthy, and we need to be able to push and and play the game as hard as we can without limitations,” Schumaker said. “It's a tough way to play when you're holding back. We need them to come in ready to know what the expectations are. That’s without limitations and hitting the ground running, because I think that's going to be an important part of this thing moving forward.”
