As the calendar starts moving through June and into July, talk begins about trade deadline deals. And nobody is more attractive to teams looking to add quality pitching than Kyle Gibson.

Every game he takes the mound for the Rangers is an audition for better trade chips.

Teams like the Rangers are the league’s ATM. They dispense the talent currency contending teams need. For that, Texas gets bodies in the hopes that one day they will get enough quality bodies to create a team that poaches on the pitiful teams like themselves.

Since his opening day debacle, Kyle Gibson has been as close to a lights-out reliable ace as possible. He has eleven starts, and has earned a quality start in ten of those. The game he didn’t have a quality start was when he was returning from the I.L. and the Rangers were being overly cautious. He went 5.1 innings that game, giving up zero runs.

In the past eleven games, Gibson’s ERA is 1.51. He’s 4-0. He’s as good as it gets.

He’s the perfect trade chip for a team that is going nowhere that has illusions of collecting prospects in order to compete in four or five more years, once those prospects mature. 

So, start savoring Gibson starts. He won’t be making those in a Rangers uniform much longer.

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