ARLINGTON -- In a perfect world, Kumar Rocker probably wouldn’t have been starting for the Rangers on Sunday afternoon.
The Rangers entered the day with the best rotation in the American League and one of the best of that group, Tyler Mahle, was slated to start the series finale against the White Sox if the rotation stayed in order.
Instead, Mahle landed on the injured list with shoulder fatigue and Rocker was recalled from Triple-A Round Rock to make his seventh start of the season. Rocker tossed five scoreless innings in a 2-1 win at Globe Life Field, marking the first scoreless outing of his young big league career.
“Anytime you have injuries, you gotta change things,” said Rangers manager Bruce Bochy before the game. “He's been up here. He's won some ballgames. He's pitched some great games up here.
“Sometimes you want a guy to get more playing time, maybe somewhere else, but injuries don’t allow you to do that. We need starting pitching right now. He's our best guy to go out there and give us a chance to win today. You hope he looks at this as I'm getting another chance here to show what I can do and run with it.”
It wasn’t exactly how the Rangers wanted to draw it up, but it was a step in the right direction for the 25-year-old right-hander, who entered the day with an 8.87 ERA in 2025.
Reliever Luke Jackson jokingly called it the “pickle juice game” after Rocker downed five bottles of pickle juice while suffering through cramps in the fifth inning.
“Kumar had good stuff, but the cramping thing, he just couldn't get rid of it,” Bochy said. “I think he broke the record on how much pickle juice you can drink. … I just thought he really was under control today and calm out there. He’s determined. When he's throwing strikes with the weapons that he has, he's going to be tough. He made pitches when he had to. It was a really nice bounce back.”
Rocker was in control as much as he ever has been at this level since making his MLB debut in September 2024. His arsenal was as diverse as it’s ever been with the Rangers. Rocker mixed in 24 four-seamers, 21 sinkers, 18 cutters, 16 curveballs, two sliders and a changeup.
“I thought he was great,” said catcher Kyle Higashioka. “He was mixing his pitches really well and throwing a lot of strikes and attacking guys early in the count. I think for him especially, it's really important to just get the count leverage so that guys chase a little more and he's got other weapons to put them away too. I thought [today] was really good.”
Rocker was optioned to Triple-A Round Rock on June 5, just one start after he was activated from the injured list. In that start, he allowed five earned runs in 3 1/3 innings in a 5-4 road loss to Tampa Bay.
Though his pure on-field performance that game was not up to par, Rocker also made a few mental errors that became the difference in a one-run game.
In the third inning that day, when the Rays sent nine batters to the plate, Jake Burger was late throwing to Rocker covering first base on Jake Mangum’s two-out slow roller, allowing Yandy Díaz to score from third base. Then, with Rocker not paying attention, Jonathan Aranda kept running and scored a second run.
At the time Bochy said the mental mistake wasn’t the reason for the demotion, but it was part of the “little things” Rocker could work on in Triple-A, president of baseball operations Chris Young acknowledged when addressing the media on Sunday.
“With Kumar, it’s just the way the game speeds up on him,” Young said on Sunday. “Again, it's little things -- holding runners, knowing situations, reading hitters, backing up bases, the PFPs that are required, and then the complete aspect of being able to do all of that and still make your best pitch to the hitter.”
Bochy said that going down to the Minors, in the fashion that Rocker had to, could mentally wreck some players. But Rocker handled it well, with the toughness that the Rangers always expected of him.
“I’m just taking it day by day,” Rocker said. “That's all you can do. Those guys in Triple-A are fun; they're having a good time. I came back up here and was welcomed with open arms and got a team win. It’s a great opportunity to be back up here. I gotta help these guys win, gotta be a winning player, and just take it one day at a time. That's all you can do.”