3 Texas Rangers trade proposals with the Tampa Bay Rays

The Texas Rangers and the Tampa Rays have a long history of making deals with each other. Since 2018 there have been five trades involving each other, the most notable (and recent) being Texas trading for Nathaniel Lowe in 2020.

Tampa Bay is notorious for fleecing teams and raking in pitching. Texas has yet to fall prey to them in a major deal, though (Pete Fairbanks for Nick Solak has worked out well for Tampa, but that’s no major deal). Do they dare test their luck and make an earth-shattering trade with the (Devil) Rays?

The South Florida team is always looking to move players and restock to keep payroll down. They don’t seem to keep their “Ace” pitchers around for long either (see Blake Snell). Savvy on their part as we’ve seen what happens to the likes of David Price, Chris Archer, and even Snell with San Diego in 2021.

Things will be different this time around, right? The Rangers have Jon Daniels AND Chris Young to help make fair deals all around. So let’s take a dive and see what we can come up with to help.

3 trades between the Texas Rangers and Tampa Bay Rays

Much has been discussed (a lot by me) about taking Hosmer off the Padres’ hands and landing Robert Hassell. That does seem a bit difficult, so we pivot to the Rays.

Kevin Kiermaier has a contract of $12 million due in 2022 and a $2.5 million buy-out after the season. That is a load for the cash strapped Rays to pay for an under-performing outfielder.

The Rangers would be all too happy to take that money off their hands to bring in Nathaniel Lowe’s younger brother, Josh. The younger Lowe had his best year yet in 2021, hitting .291 with 21 homers in AAA. He is an athletic center fielder who is defense first. He made adjustments to his swing and could develop into an everyday player.

In return, the Rays nab Adolis Garcia to pair with AL Rookie of the Year Randy Arozarena. It’s a steep price to pay to bring in Lowe, but the Rangers’ offense figures to be strong enough with new additions if his bat doesn’t improve.