The Texas Rangers have signed left-handed pitcher Jordan Montgomery to a one-year Major League contract for the 2026 season. To make space on the 40-man roster, right-handed pitcher Zak Kent has been designated for assignment.
Montgomery, age 33, did not pitch during the 2025 season as he was recovering from Tommy John ligament replacement surgery performed by Rangers team physician Keith Meister on March 28, 2025. Before his injury, Montgomery made two Cactus League appearances for the Arizona Diamondbacks in spring training and was later traded with Shelby Miller to the Milwaukee Brewers on July 31, 2025.
Montgomery is an eight-year MLB veteran with a career record of 46-41 and a 4.03 ERA over 166 games (161 starts) with New York-AL (2017-22), St. Louis (2022-23), Texas (2023), and Arizona (2024). He was originally drafted by the Yankees in the fourth round of the 2014 MLB Draft and finished sixth in American League Rookie of the Year voting in his debut season.
This will be Montgomery’s second stint with Texas. He previously joined the Rangers via trade from St. Louis on July 30, 2023, posting a record of four wins and two losses with a 2.79 ERA over eleven starts between August and September that year. During Texas’s run to its first World Series title, he recorded a postseason ERA of 2.90 across six appearances (five starts), including victories in key playoff games against Tampa Bay and Houston.
Since entering MLB in 2017, Montgomery ranks among top left-handed pitchers in several categories for those with at least 800 innings pitched: seventh in FIP; eighth in home runs allowed per nine innings, walks per nine innings, and strikeouts per walk; ninth in ERA; and tenth in ERA+. Between 2020 and 2024 he made the third-most starts among left-handers.
Zak Kent, age 27, joined Texas through a waiver claim from St. Louis earlier this year after spending last season with Cleveland where he debuted in twelve relief appearances for the Guardians. Kent was originally drafted by Texas out of Virginia Military Institute in the ninth round of the 2019 draft. The Rangers have seven days to trade him, release him or assign him outright to minor leagues.
Following these moves, Texas maintains its full complement of forty players on its Major League roster and currently has sixty-five players participating at Major League Spring Training camp.
