With the 2025 Texas Rangers season having come to an end, we shall be, over the course of the offseason, taking a look at every player who appeared in a major league game for the Texas Rangers in 2025.
Today we are looking at outfielder Leody Taveras.
I come to bury Leody, not to praise him.
Metaphorically, that is. Leody didn’t die. He is still alive, and is a member of the Baltimore Orioles, with whom he signed on November 6 of this year. He was the first player signed to a major league deal in free agency this offseason, so you know, he’ll always have that distinction. They can’t take that away from him.
But he is no longer a member of the Texas Rangers. He stopped being a member of the Texas Rangers back in May, when he was claimed on waivers by the Seattle Mariners, saving the Rangers a little less than $4 million, give or take, along with gaining them $50,000 from the Mariners for the waiver fee. Leody had been a member of the Texas Rangers organization just shy of 10 years at that point.
Leody Taveras was a member of the Texas Rangers organization before Cole Hamels was. Leody Taveras was a member of the Texas Rangers organization before Ian Desmond was. He signed with the Rangers less than a month after Dillon Tate did. He pre-dated Cole Ragans, Kyle Cody, Hans Crouse and Bubba Thompson.
I believed in Leody Taveras. I believed in him as he worked his way up through the minors, even as others jumped off the train. I was encouraged by his 2020 performance. I didn’t give up after his awful 2021. I was encouraged by his 2022 season. I felt vindicated by his breakout 2023 campaign. I thought the Rangers had center field locked down for the next several years, and felt there was upside there that could make Leody a potential All Star caliber player.
2024 was bad for Leody, but I hung in there. The floor was second division starter, I felt, and if that’s all he was he’d still have value. Yes, the defensive gaffes could be frustrating, but the overall package was still a useful major league player.
Then came 2025.
Maybe he was feeling the pressure. Maybe he was pressing. Whatever was going on, his performance at the plate regressed horribly.
In 2023, Leody walked a below average amount and struck out an average amount. In 2024, his walks and Ks were both around average.
In 2025, both rates went dramatically in the wrong direction. After walking between 6 and 8 percent of the time the previous three seasons, Leody drew just 2 walks in 82 plate appearances for the Rangers, a 2.4% rate. After striking out right around 21% the previous two years, he struck out 23 times for the Rangers, a 27.8% rate.
That’s an approaching-D.J. Peters-level bad walk to K ratio.
Somehow he managed a .241/.259/.342 in those 82 plate appearances for Texas, good for a .261 wOBA, though his .205 xwOBA suggested that even that paltry slash line was exceeding what would be expected. He was popping up a bunch, not making good contact, with just a 15.8% hard hit rate. DRS and Statcast disagree on whether he was okay or not defensively, but either way he wasn’t good enough defensively to stay in the lineup with that sort of offensive performance.
The Rangers put Taveras on outright waivers. Whether the primary goal was to send him to the minors or see if a team would claim him and get the pro-rated portion of his $4.75 million 2025 salary off their books, the end result was the Mariners claiming him. He was Seattle’s problem now.
Things did not improve with the Mariners. His walk and K rates stayed about the same. His quality of contact improved, thought he results actually got worse — he slashed .174/.198/.272 before the M’s decided to move on from him as well. Seattle designated him for assignment a month after claiming him on waivers. Leody cleared outright waivers this time, and was banished to Tacoma.
He didn’t do poorly in Tacoma. Whatever issues he had with strike zone control in the bigs in 2025, he got under control in the PCL, walking 41 times and striking out 57 in 372 plate appearances. It was the best K/BB ratio he had ever put up, and the lowest K rate he’d ever posted. He ended up slashing .280/.358/.446 in AAA, and apparently showed enough for Baltimore to give him a guaranteed major league deal.
Leody Taveras’ career goes on. But the Leody Taveras Experience in Texas has come to an end.
Previously:
