The Rangers announced Sunday that they’ve designated right-hander Jesus Tinoco for assignment. Right-hander Cole Winn was recalled to take Tinoco’s spot on the active roster.
This has been Tinoco’s second stint with Texas, as he had previously pitched to a strong 2.18 ERA with a 4.22 FIP in 20 2/3 innings of work with the club back in 2022. That said, he walked a worrisome 11.9% of batters faced that year and ultimately found himself outrighted off the club’s roster that November.
Tinoco spent the 2023 campaign pitching overseas for Nippon Professional Baseball’s Seibu Lions, and the righty performed well with a 2.83 ERA in 35 innings of work in Pacific League play.
A 12.5% walk rate during that time suggested that Tinoco had not yet resolved his struggles with control, but the Rangers nonetheless offered him a minor league deal back in December. He eventually made his way back onto the active roster in Texas last month, but his second stint with the club has not gone well.
In 10 innings of work across nine appearances with the Rangers this year, Tinoco has walked a hefty 14% of batters faced while surrendering an 8.10 ERA with a 6.64 FIP. That performance proved to be untenable for the Rangers, and after the righty allowed two runs in an inning of relief during last night’s game against the Mariners, the club decided to part ways with Tinoco once again.
They’ll now have one week to either trade Tinoco or attempt to pass him through waivers. Since Tinoco has been outrighted previously in his career, the righty will have the opportunity to reject an outright assignment if he so chooses.
Replacing Tinoco on the club’s 40-man roster is Winn, 24. The youngster was selected in the first round of the 2018 draft by the Rangers and was once a consensus top-50 prospect in the sport but struggled badly during the 2022 and 2023 seasons at the Triple-A level, substantially lowering his prospect stock. That led the Rangers to convert Winn to a full-time relief role in 2024, and he’s generally taken to the job well with a 3.45 ERA and a 30.3% strikeout rate at the Triple-A level this year.
Unfortunately, Winn’s first taste of big league action did not go over well. While he fired off a streak of seven scoreless innings across his first five outings, he surrendered a whopping 11 runs in the month of May across just 7 1/3 innings of work while striking out only 13.1% of batters faced.
Those brutal numbers left the Rangers to send Winn back to the minor leagues in late May, although he’s now back in the majors just under a month after his demotion. If Winn can harness the high-octane stuff that allowed him to dominate back in April, it’s not hard to imagine him providing valuable middle relief innings to a beleaguered Rangers bullpen that ranks 25th in baseball by ERA.