I am very happy with the Rangers keeping Lynn and Gallo! Sorry if that isn't comforting to Ranger fans.
Click must feel confident that Verlander and other bullpen pieces will be ready come October. I think the Padres set the bar so high on what they gave up and i think it had an impact.
They were smart keeping him. The Rangers were open to moving a number of players but it was a buyers market. The Rangers likely will get more this off season trying to move him. The same is true for Gallo. The Rangers got two lottery tickets for a guy (Minor) that was an 8 WAR pitcher last year and had 6.5 WAR the two prior seasons before last. Granted Minor is a free agent and has struggled, but he was arguably an ace last season. Perhaps the Astros could have gone after someone like Minor, but the Rangers in the past have wanted more to trade with the Astros.
I love a well told story with a happy ending https://blogs.fangraphs.com/as-add-to-rotation-while-rangers-get-comparatively-minor-return/ Minor was considered a top trade target last year even as the Rangers reached their high-water mark of 10 games above .500 as of June 28. At that point, they were 46-36, albeit with Playoff Odds of just 7.5%. They proceeded to lose 18 of their next 26 games to fall to 54-54 and 0.0% by July 31; about two weeks before that, Dan Szymborski checked in on the pitcher and the team and estimated their chances at 1.5%, concluding that Minor, who was forecast to finish the season with 3.0 WAR and due for considerable regression given his ZiPS zHR rate (“Minor has allowed eight fewer homers than you would expect, the sixth-largest over-performance in baseball in 2019”), would never be more valuable as a trade chip. Nonetheless, the Rangers held onto both Minor and righty Lance Lynn, but they finished just 78-84.
The Rangers always seem to be open to moving players, but always seem to never get good offers. I suspect the Rangers ask for too much and other teams just move on before making serious offers. Whether the Rangers got good offers or not, the Ranger fans, if they still exist, should be upset with their team for not getting something good in the past two trade deadlines and last offseason when they had not one, but two highly valued pitchers.
Archie Bradley return was roughly equivalent to Abraham Toro and Jeremy Pena. I probably would not have done that.
I can tell you that the Rangers in the past have requested a tremendous amount in attempted dealings with the Astros. So excessive that the Astros have backed off negotiations in the past.
So far the one trade I wish Houston would have made is for Brian Goodwin. Reds got him cheap and Houston could have used him next season. Depending on who the PTBNL are, getting Chirinos and Frazier from the Rangers would have helped Houston next season as well.