When the Rangers made the move to get MacKenzie Gore, there were some Rangers fans grumbling about the move and asking if the Rangers really gave up five prospects headlined by 2025 first rounder Gavin Fien for a guy that posted a ERA over four.
That doesn’t tell the full story as Gore’s 2025 was a tale of two halves. He had a 3.02 ERA in the first half that earned him an All Star nod. The second half wasn’t too kind to him as he posted a 6.75 ERA. He just needs to not burn out in the second half and keep going strong.
This is why people shouldn’t look at ERA as the ultimate decider for pitchers. Looking at some of his other stats, he put up a 3.74 FIP and had 10.4 strikeouts per nine which was higher than any starting pitcher in the rotation last year. Those strikeouts per nine are tied with Paul Skenes last year.
Advanced Stats
His advanced stat show why the Rangers traded for Gore and the potential that he possesses.
His best advanced metric is his extension, which makes his pitches look faster than they actually are and helps him get more movement on his pitches. That may seem like a small thing to most people, but it will reduce the strain on Gore’s arm and overall just helps Gore’s pitches play better.
The other advanced stats that he excels at are his strikeout percentage, whiff rate, chase rate, fastball velocity and his breaking run value. All of these stats stacked upon each other. He is able to get hitters to chase and miss at a high rate which leads to him racking up more strikeouts.
Then comes in his fastball velocity and his breaking run value on his pitches which help Gore put away hitters. He gets hitters to chase and miss while getting good results from his breaking pitches and good velocity on his fastball.
Some of the areas where Gore has struggled are his barrel rate and hard hit percentage. So when hitters are able to make contact, they are hitting his pitches hard. This is a trend for Gore as the lowest exit velocity against him was 88 miles per hour in 2024.
Another thing that he struggles with are walks are they had a walk percentage of 9.3. This above the league average which is around 7 or 8 percent. This is backed up by his walks per nine which are at 3.6.
These issues snowball upon themselves. When Gore starts to lose the zone that will lead him needing to throw a strike and that will lead to hitters being able to tee off on him. Gore will need to have better control of the zone, to not put himself in a hole and keep free runners off the bases.
These are things that the Rangers will look to work on for Gore. Now it is time to look into the pitching arsenal that he has.
Pitches
MacKenzie Gore throws five different pitches to keep hitters off balance and all of them have a higher velocity compared to the average left handed pitcher. All of his pitches excel at different things.
He throws his 4 seamer fastball the most at 49 percent of the time. Despite him throwing this the most and it racking up 51 strikeouts, it will probably his worst pitch. He allowed a .294 batting average on the pitch while it just generated a 20.7 whiff percentage and a 15.6 put away rate. It is surprising to see how much he has struggled with the pitch and it being the one that he throws the most.
The curveball is the next pitch that he throws at 24 percent. This pitch is better as it has most of his strikeouts with 69. Hitters have hit .217 against it and generated a whiff rate of 35.7 percent and put away rate of 22.5 percent. The curveball is much better than the fastball was and is Gore’s strikeout pitch.
The slider is up next with a 11.8 usage percentage and it is the pitch that hitters struggle against the most with just a .195 batting average. It also has a whiff rate of 40.5 percent and a put away rate of 24 percent. This is a great pitch to have in his arsenal and is something that he should try to throw more.
The changeup is his fourth throw pitch with 10.3 percent usage and has the highest whiff rate at 47.2 percent. However, hitters are hitting .271 against it. So when hitters are able to make contact against it, they are doing well. It is also generated a 21.5 put away rate. This is a great pitch and Gore will just to do his best to get better results when hitters make contact on it.
The final pitch that Gore throws is his cutter. It had the highest put away rate at 27 percent and had a whiff rate of 40.9 percent. Hitters also had a tough time against this pitch with a .200 batting average. He only threw the pitch 4.7 percent of the time and him throwing the pitch so little did a good job at keeping hitters on their toes.
Verdict
MacKenzie Gore has a lot of potential and has had some success. It is easy to see why the Rangers made the move to acquire him. He can be a front line starter and future ace for the Rangers in the next few years.
