Will Carter's status impact Trade Deadline?

This story was excerpted from Kennedi Landry's Rangers Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

Trade Deadline whispers are permeating throughout the baseball world, but Max Scherzer believes that the Rangers’ best additions will not come from outside the organization.

“We're starting to play our best baseball now,” Scherzer said after Thursday’s start against the White Sox. “We're going to start getting more and more healthy and get more arms [Tyler Mahle and Jacob deGrom] and our bats [Josh Jung and Evan Carter] back. That's going to be kind of like our Trade Deadline acquisitions.

"We're getting really good players back from injury. … We're in a tight race right now. We’ve got to play our best baseball now, and that's what's going on. There are good things in front of us.”

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Unfortunately, there’s a slight snag in that plan.

The dispatch from reporters in Toronto is that Carter will see a back specialist in California this weekend to get a second opinion on his injury. The 21-year-old is shut down from baseball activities until he rejoins the club and his situation can be evaluated.

“He’s just not coming along like we were hoping,” manager Bruce Bochy said.

Carter missed seven games from May 11-17 with back soreness, but he returned without a stint on the injured list. The Rangers placed Carter on the injured list on May 28. While a return looked possible when he rejoined the club around the All-Star break and ramped up activities, Carter hasn’t felt healthy enough for a rehab stint, which prompted the most recent shutdown.

It’s yet another unfortunate bump in the road for the rookie outfielder, who was hoping to build off a phenomenal MLB debut last season.

Carter entered 2024 as the No. 5 overall prospect in baseball, according to MLB Pipeline, after making his MLB debut on Sept. 8. He was a breakout star on the biggest stage in ‘23, hitting .306 with a 1.058 OPS in 23 regular-season games before appearing in all 17 games of the Rangers’ World Series run. Carter hit .300 with a .917 OPS in the postseason.

This isn’t the first time Carter has dealt with a back injury either, despite being just 21 years old.

He played only 32 games with Single-A Down East during his professional debut in 2021 due to a stress fracture in his back, though he slashed .236/.438/.387 in that small sample that season.

“It's the same injury,” Carter said. “Exactly the same thing. … Except instead of fighting through it like an 18-year-old in Single-A vs. a 21-year-old facing All-Star pitchers in the big leagues -- you can't really fly through quite as long.

“Obviously, you kind of get it exposed very quickly whenever you're not up to par with how you should feel and how you want to play. When something's off, it shows on the field very quickly, so I wasn't doing myself or the team any good trying to play through it. So we backed off and it definitely wasn't near as [severe] an injury as it was before, but it was the same thing.”

That said, if Carter’s shutdown is extended, Tuesday’s 5 p.m. CT Trade Deadline becomes even more important for the Rangers. With Houston (55-49), Seattle (55-51) and Texas (51-54) separated by only 4 1/2 games atop the American League West, all three will likely be buyers.

The Rangers’ biggest weakness has been out of the designated hitter spot, where the club ranked last in the Majors in both average (.196) and OPS (.566) entering Sunday. Texas hoped the returns of Carter and Jung would lengthen the lineup, but if Carter can’t come back soon, general manager Chris Young and the front office may be better off adding another bat at the Deadline.

On the positive side, Jung began a rehab assignment with Double-A Frisco on Friday night. He went 1-for-3 on Friday and 1-for-4 with a hit-by-pitch on Saturday.