Mariners could benefit from surging Rangers' complicated trade deadline reality

Heading into the 2025 campaign, it was believed by many that the Texas Rangers would be closer to the version which finished last season 78-84 as opposed to the one which won their first ever World Series a year earlier. This seemed to be playing out when they began with a 29-35 record, which alluded to them not posing much threat to the Seattle Mariners for a playoff spot.

Well, since then the Rangers have been on a tear by winning 27 of 44 games, while the Mariners have gone 25-21 and now have just a 1.0-game advantage for the AL's third wild card spot. Texas has seemingly come out of nowhere but give credit where it's due, with their +69 run differential easily best in the AL West and third in the AL as a whole.

With the Rangers right back in the thick of things and aiming to add at the July 31 trade deadline, The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal recently highlighting a high-leverage reliever and right-handed bat as two areas of need. However, it's not quite as simple as that, when considering the complicated trade deadline reality in Texas.

Rangers have a significant financial dilemma to consider

As per Rosenthal again (subscription required), the Rangers are effectively day-to-day, with every win and loss impacting just how aggressively they want to approach Thursday's trade deadline. Put another way, whether they're willing to go over the luxury-tax threshold for a third consecutive season:

"The Rangers’ estimated luxury-tax payroll, per Fangraphs, is $234.9 million. The first threshold is $241 million. As a third-time offender, the Rangers would be taxed at 50 percent for every dollar they spend over the threshold. If they stay under, their penalty rate would reset to 20 percent."

On the one side, if Rangers ownership gives the front office the flexibility to exceed the threshold they may as well go all in, with it making little sense to end the season, say $1 million over. On the other side, what the Mariners are probably hoping is that their division rivals decide they want to stay under the tax.

If the Rangers do decide to go with the latter option, then this either limits what they can do by the trade deadline or makes them have to be both a buyer and a seller. We know this is a team which theoretically has the money to spend — they were sixth in the majors this year in opening day payroll — but the prospect of being taxed more this time around will surely be weighing heavily on whatever final decision is made.

Surely the Mariners are in a better position than the Rangers ... surely?

Either way, you want to believe the Rangers are more limited in what they can do compared to the Mariners at the trade deadline. Even allowing for the fact the M's have already traded for Josh Naylor and given up two prospects, they still have an elite farm system which surpasses their divisional rivals in Texas.

Adding to the Mariners' advantage over the Rangers is the apparent willingness to increase payroll, again even after already adding the balance of Naylor's $10.9 million salary for the 2025 season. As previously reported by Daniel Kramer of MLB.com, ownership has given the green light for increased spending at this year’s deadline.

Now, the Mariners must seize on this seemingly superior position over the Rangers, even allowing for also holding an insurmountable 7-2 advantage in the head-to-head season series with three games remaining. No one needs to remind the M's they finished one game back of a playoff spot in each of the two past years, so every move and every decision becomes magnified as being the potential make or break in returning to the postseason.