One of the surprises of the Texas Rangers’ early 2024 season has been pitcher Cole Winn’s major league success thus far.
Arguably, success of any kind, whether major league or minor league, would have been a surprise with Winn, given how his last couple of seasons have gone. Winn, the team’s first round draft pick in 2018, had a terrific 2021 season for AA Frisco, then pitched well in a couple of late season starts for AAA Round Rock. Winn started 2022 at Round Rock fairly well, and it seemed like he was going to be a major league rotation option at some point that year.
Then the wheels came off. After leaving a start prematurely on April 26, 2022, after getting hit in the ankle by a comebacker, Winn walked 6 batters and allowed four runs in five innings his next time out. In his following start, he walked six and allowed eight run in four innings. Things continued to spiral for him, and he ended the season with an ugly 6.51 ERA in 28 appearances over 121 innings. And looking just at the games after the April 26 game where he got hit by the comebacker, he put up a 7.18 ERA in 105 innings, with 82 walks against 108 Ks.
Winn was still added to the 40 man roster that winter, but 2023 went poorly as well. His final line was 101 innings, a 7.22 ERA, 79 walks and 97 Ks. This year, in spring training, Winn was unimpressive and was one of the early cuts.
Texas opted to use Winn in a relief role to start the year in Round Rock, and it took to it fairly well. In 6.1 IP he did allow four earned runs, but those all came in his third inning of work in his second appearance, and he was throwing strikes, having issued just one walk on the season in his four appearances for Round Rock.
Winn was called up 12 days ago, after Cody Bradford was unexpectedly placed on the injured list. Michael Lorenzen was scheduled to be called the next day, therefore Winn’s stay was expected to be brief, and he might not even play in a game.
Winn did, however, pitch on April 14 and performed admirably. Winn came into the seventh inning of a game against the Houston Astros in relief of Yerry Rodriguez, who had faced six hitters, walked three, and retired only one. He did his job, retiring all five batters he faced. Thus, when Lorenzen was activated on April 15, Winn remained and Rodriguez was sent down.
Winn has appeared in three more Rangers games since then, all coming from the bullpen. He’s faced 19 batters and retired 18 of them. Seven batters have struck out, while one has reached via walk. Six innings is still a short sample size, but Winn has performed well when given the opportunity.
Interestingly, Winn has largely used a starter’s repertoire while pitching out of the pen, particularly against righthanders. Winn has attacked righties with a near-equal mix of fastballs, sinkers, sliders and split fingers, while going mostly fastball and splitter against lefties, with the occasional show-me curve. He’s been effective at getting swings and misses with his fastball, splitters and slider thusfar.
