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Rangers pitching staff hit with another injury as promising 2024 arm goes down

Of course another Rangers pitcher is hurt. It is 2024, after all.
Eric Cole
Eric Cole

Nolan Writin'

Texas Rangers v Kansas City Royals / Jay Biggerstaff/GettyImages

At this point, we shouldn't be surprised that any Texas Rangers player ends up getting hurt. Either the Rangers' training staff is headed by Dr. Nick from The Simpsons (look it up) or Texas had to agree to some sort of voodoo curse on the 2024 season in exchange for winning the World Series last year. If it is the latter, we can respect that.

Nathan Eovaldi getting hurt was the latest injury blow to the Rangers, but it at least seemed like his issue is minor and he should only missed a handful of starts.

However, Texas' pitching staff somehow took another hit on Wednesday as it was revealed that the Rangers placed Dane Dunning on the IL with a shoulder injury. In his place, the team is bringing up Owen White from the minors.

Texas Rangers News: Dane Dunning to the injured list, Owen White recalled

At this point, one can do nothing else but laugh at the absurdity of all these injuries. Dunning's 4.10 ERA has been hurt by walks and a propensity to give up a lot of hard contact, but the guy does have upside as he misses bats and his breaking ball is legitimately good. Moreover, he was at least making starts every fifth day, and now Texas has to find a way to make do without yet another member of their rotation. How bad Dunning's shoulder injury is hasn't been revealed, but Dunning has previously had Tommy John and hip surgeries as well.

Texas' corresponding move was to call up White, who is getting another chance in the big leagues. Formerly one of the Rangers' absolute best pitching prospects, White struggled mightily during his two-start cameo appearance in the big leagues in 2023 with an 11.25 ERA, and his numbers this year in the minor leagues don't inspire a ton of confidence (5.70 ERA and opposing batters are hitting .302 against him).

However, he is on the 40-man roster and the Rangers have a doubleheader on Wednesday, so they had to call up someone.

Hopefully Scherzer's issues with thumb soreness resolve themselves soon and Eovaldi's injury is truly minor. In the meantime, covering Jack Leiter and Jon Gray in bubble wrap in between starts and hoping for the best is really their only option.

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Eric Cole

Eric Cole

I started my career writing about baseball covering the Atlanta Braves for SB Nation's Talking Chop back in 2015 which has since been renamed Battery Power. After years of writing for those fine folks, I made the decision to take over as Site Expert at House That Hank Built before becoming a full-time MLB Staff Writer for FanSided in 2023. Along the way, I have been a guest on multiple ESPN radio affiliates as well as 680 The Fan and 92.9 The Game to discuss Braves baseball and especially Braves prospects and was a long-time host on the Battery Power podcast. These days, I continue to write about the Braves as well as covering the Astros, Padres, and Angels with particular expertise with minor league coverage, the MLB Draft, and bashing Anthony Rendon when possible. When I am not writing about or talking about baseball (which is seldom), I am an avid baseball card collector (Maddux and Soroka being my primary personal collections) and I also collect shark teeth. All other sports are mostly dead to me as my Bills have broken my heart too many times.