Baseball can be a cruel sport to play. On Cloud Nine one minute, on the way out of the door the next minute.

Friday, the Rangers cut Adolis Garcia and Jonah Heim. It would be cruel if it wasn’t deserved. According to BaseballReference.com, of the 155 players to have accumulated a thousand plate appearances over the past two years, Garci ranked 145 in OPS at .675. Heim, ranked 154 at .602.

Because of the arbitration system, though, both players, as bad as they have been for two seasons, would have seen an increase in their 2026 salaries. Even if the Rangers weren’t reducing payroll, neither player earned a raise or is worth what they would have made. Being in salary cutting mode meant it was a no-brainer to cut ties with both of them.

This isn’t Garcia’s first time to be DFAed. After defecting from Cuba in 2016, Garcia signed with the Cardinals. He made it to the big leagues in 2019, batting just .118 with a double and an RBI for Saint Louis. They DFAed him in December, and the Rangers traded for him three days later. He got six hitless at-bats for Texas in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, and the Rangers DFAed him. Nobody claimed him. In 2021, Texas invited him to spring training, he was promoted to the Rangers in early April when Ronald Guzman was injured. Something clicked. He was American League Rookie of the Month for May, hitting .312 with eleven homers. He ended up leading all rookies that year with ninety runs batted in and thirty-one home runs. He made the All-Star team and finished fourth in Rookie of the Year voting. He was a bright spot in an otherwise miserable season. The Rangers lost 102 games. In 2022, he drove in 101 runs for another bad Rangers team.

Then the magical 2023 season happened. He was an All-Star and won a Gold Glove. But what he did in the playoffs and Wplrd Series elevated him to legendary status in Rangers lore for the rest of time. He was a one-man wrecking crew, burying the Astros with five home runs dfaover the last four games of their seven-game classic Championship Series, driving in fifteen and winning MVP of the ALCS. His tenth-inning home run won Game 1 of the World Series. Then, it all seemed to disappear. His offensive disappointment became the Rangers in ’24 and ’25.

Jonah Heim came over from Oakland in the Elvis Andrus deal and wasn’t expected to do much. And, other than a few months in 2023, he didn’t do much offensively. In his six seasons with Texas, Heim batted .223 with a .653 OPS. His OPS+ with Texas was 85, meaning his offensive performance was fifteen percent worse that league average. He had an unfortunate pattern of disappearing in the second half of the season. Even in his lone impressive year, 2023, it was his first half numbers that got him selected to the All-Star team. He hit .282 with an .812 OPS in the first half to 2023. Those numbers tanked to .217/.656 in the second half. In fact, for his career, he hit .249 with a .705 OPS in the first half—decent numbers for a catcher—but fell off the face of the earth in the second half, hitting .189 with a .582 OPS.

He hit his way off the Rangers, racking up an OPS+ of 75 in ’24 and 77 in ’25. He simply could not hit. When his defensive skills diminished with his bat, the Rangers decided to cut ties with Heim.

So, the business of baseball continues. Reality has reared it ugly head and Garcia and Heim are no longer Rangers. Good luck to Adolis and Jonah. Thanks the memories. You won it all in 2023, and there’s no taking that away.