The Rangers dipped back into the bag of injured pitchers and plucked out former good pitcher and former Padre Tyson Ross on a one-year deal reportedly worth six million, with incentives.

Ross started on opening day for the Padres last season, then didn’t pitch again. He had Thoracic Outlet Syndrome surgery, which, other than Tommy John, is the most drastic surgery a pitcher can have.

This article from 2015 from SB Nation.com will tell you all you need to know about TSO, who has had it, and how they did when they came back. It’s sort of encouraging.

Even still, Ross is a crapshoot. He is damaged goods. Damaged goods with a huge upside.

He’s a twenty-nine year-old, right-hander, six-foot six inches tall starter, who came up with Oakland, pitched there mostly in relief for three seasons, then was traded to San Diego, where he pitched for four seasons. Well, three seasons and one game.

Ross became a full-time starter in 2014, and put up impressive numbers: In thirty-one starts, he had a 2.81 ERA with a WHIP of 1.2111, and 195 strikeouts in 195.2 innings.

His second season as a starter, 2015, was just as impressive: Thirty-three starts, ERA of 3.26, and 212 strikeouts in 196 innings.

Then he broke.

But for those two years he was really good. And reliable.

Ross’s bread and butter pitch is his slider, which he gets a high percentage of swings and misses on, and gets a lot of ground balls, as does his four-seam fastball, which sits in the 93 to 96 MPH range. He also has a sinker and a cutter, and throws an occasional change up.

Ross may not be ready by the start of opening season. But the Rangers took a huge gamble. Combine that with the ten million they threw at formerly good Andrew Cashner, and Jon Daniels has really stuck out his neck in a huge way.

All indications point to Ross being worth the roll of the dice.