Multiple former Rangers experience range of emotions as Blue Jays win AL Pennant

The Texas Rangers will have some connection to the 2025 World Series after the Toronto Blue Jays ALCS Game 7 win gets them a matchup with the reigning champions.

Fueled by George Springer's go-ahead three-run homer in the seventh inning on Monday, the Blue Jays beat the Seattle Mariners 4-3, after losing the first two games of the season.

That means former Rangers Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Max Scherzer will be heading to the Fall Classic with Toronto across their chest, representing the American League. It also means that Luke Jackson and Mitch Garver, other former Rangers, reached the end of the line with Monday's loss.

Scherzer, Kiner-Falefa played instrumental roles in getting Blue Jays AL Pennant win

Kiner-Falefa, the former Rangers' farmhand, isn't lighting up the stat sheet but his doing everything he needs to do to help the Blue Jays be successful this October.

Returning to Toronto for the 2025 season, Kiner-Falefa is 5-for-21 (.238) with two doubles, three hits and a RBI in nine games for the Blue Jays this postseason. IKF, 30, came up clutch in Game 6 with his lone RBI of the series to make it 2-0 at the time. He also singled up the middle in the seventh inning of Game 7 which was followed two batters later by Springer's homer.

The future Hall of Famer in Scherzer pitched 5.2 innings of two run ball in Game 4 of the ALCS in Seattle to help tie the series at two games a piece. His five strikeout performance was unexpected after pitching for the first time in the postseason after a September where he gave up 17 runs.

Scherzer, 41, signed with Toronto in prior to the 2025 season in hopes that he'd get back to the World Series and here he is. He went viral with his outburst of emotion in Game 4 when Blue Jays' manager John Schneider attempted to take him out of the game in the fifth inning.

Season ends in heartbreak for former Rangers now in Seattle

Just one win away from earning Seattle's first World Series trip in the existence of their franchise, the magical run fell short on Monday, to the heartbreak of an entire state and fanbase in the Pacific Northwest.

Garver, a World Series champion with Texas in 2023, helped get Seattle so close to the Fall Classic this year. As a back up to one of the best catching seasons of all time in Cal Raleigh, Garver only played in 87 games this year. In the postseason, he only got seven at-bats. A tough contrast to the 2023 run with Texas where he played 14 games as the team's primary DH.

As for Jackson, the former first rounder was released by Texas earlier this season and picked up by Seattle in August. He as well didn't get much playing time with the Mariners, only appearing in 11.1 regular season innings and three postseason innings.

Whether or not they saw a lot of time with the team, they were with the club either majority of the season or at the intense times and it's a tough blow. Seattle will be given a shot to go for it again next season, but it will take some time to get past this one.