The Rangers’ bullpen was an underwhelming group in 2026. It combined for a 4.47 earned run average, 20.0% strikeout rate, 8.7% walk rate, and 39.2% ground ball rate. Only the walk rate was better than league average. Among the positives in the ‘pen was left-hander Jacob Latz. A veteran of parts of five big league seasons, he emerged this year as something of an unlikely closer.
The 30-year-old Latz held opponents to a sharp 2.13 ERA in 72 innings while earning 30 saves in 34 opportunities. The main change from prior seasons was a surge in strikeout rate. He previously sat in the 20-22% range but struck out 30.6% of opponents in 2026. Latz also brought his walk rate down by 2.1% to a roughly average 8.5%, which left his K-BB rate at 22.1%, good for 14th-best among 147 qualified relievers. ERA estimators were similarly kind, as Latz’s 2.65 xERA and 2.96 SIERA were both career-best marks in a full season.
Those expected numbers were significant improvements over 2025. In that season, Latz delivered a 2.84 ERA in 85 2/3 innings as a swingman, but his 4.11 xERA and 4.37 SIERA painted him as fairly lucky. He kept the ball in the yard, although his 21.8% strikeout rate and 10.6% walk rate were far from the levels he’d post in 2026. Before that, Latz had walked 14.1% of opponents in 43 2/3 innings in 2024. He only pitched 11 innings in the Majors from 2021-23 and spent all of 2022 at Triple-A Round Rock.
Latz’s game plan this year involved upping the use of his four-seamer and throwing a harder, more horizontal changeup. The four-seamer had always been his best pitch. Statcast gave it a +11 Run Value in 2025 and a +14 rating this year. After throwing the pitch 49.4% of the time last year, Latz did so at a 55.6% rate in 2026. Granted, throwing your best pitch more often is an obvious approach, but the lefty sure used it to his benefit. Opponents batted just .152 and slugged .276 against the fastball, or 41 and 51 points worse than their 2025 levels, respectively.
Of greater consequence was Latz’s changeup turning into a dominant secondary offering. The pitch was arguably his worst in 2025, with Statcast giving it a -4 Run Value. This year, Latz threw the changeup 1.4 mph harder while still giving it 8.7 mph of separation from the four-seamer. Movement-wise, the uptick in velocity resulted in 2.9 fewer inches of vertical drop but 0.3 more inches of arm-side run. Opponents batted .306 and slugged .471 against the changeup last year. They were completely outclassed this time, batting just .080, slugging .120, striking out 14.7% more often, and experiencing a 21.4% drop in hard-hit rate. In the end, Statcast gave Latz’s changeup a +8 Run Value.
All told, the late-blooming Latz looks like an effective reliever who will anchor the Rangers’ bullpen in 2027. He is projected to earn $3MM in his first year of arbitration, per MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz. Since he’s entering arbitration as a Super Two player, Latz is under team control through the 2030 season, when he’ll be 34 years old.
The main questions are whether Latz can maintain his strikeout numbers and prove that this year wasn’t just a product of good luck. The league average on balls in play this year was .290. From 2021-25, hitters had a .263 BABIP against Latz. In 2026, that number was all the way down to .182. There’s no way he’ll maintain that going forward, so expect Latz’s run prevention to regress as the hits start falling in at normal rates.
There’s also the matter of Latz’s strand rate. From 2024-25, he left over 80% of runners on base, well above the league average of around 72%. This year he stranded 78.6% of opposing runners, but that’s still on the lucky side and may eventually normalize. In addition, Latz continued to allow his share of hard contact. Statcast put him in the 35th percentile or worse for average exit velocity (89.2 mph), hard-hit rate (41.2%), and barrel rate (8.5%) in 2026. That leaves plenty of room for regression if and when the BABIP normalizes.
Whatever happens with the batted ball luck, Latz will still be a key piece for the Rangers on account of his durability and ability to pitch more than one inning. He hasn’t been on the big league injured list since September 2024. He also recorded four outs or more in 20 of his 58 appearances this year, including his lone start – a four-inning effort on March 28th. Even if Latz doesn’t maintain a pristine ERA, there is always a place in a big league bullpen for a plus fastball-changeup combo who isn’t just a one-inning-and-done guy.
As MLBTR’s Mark Polishuk noted in our Offseason Outlook series, the rest of the Rangers’ bullpen could use some reinforcements. The position player group could stand to get younger and more athletic, while the rotation appears stable with Jacob deGrom, Nathan Eovaldi, MacKenzie Gore, Kumar Rocker, and Jack Leiter returning. Latz figures to be a key contributor as Texas looks to improve on their 80-82 record in 2026 and return to the playoffs for the first time since winning the World Series in 2023.
Photo courtesy of Matt Krohn, Imagn Images
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