Cardinals clean up Rangers' Jordan Montgomery roster move (but lose ex-top prospect)

For the second time this offseason, the St. Louis Cardinals have claimed Zak Kent off waivers, this time from the Texas Rangers. They are releasing fellow waiver claim Bryan Ramos to make room for Kent on the 40-man roster.

This whole web of moves has the Cardinals fingerprints all over it. The Rangers, who claimed Kent after the Redbirds DFA'd him following their acquisition of Justin Bruihl, are now sending Kent back to St. Louis after signing former Cardinals starter Jordan Montgomery to a one-year deal.

Expect the 27-year-old reliever, who is on the 40-man roster, to compete for a spot in the Opening Day bullpen, assuming he makes it through camp with the team.

Zak Kent returns to St. Louis as underrated relief piece

Originally brought in by the Cardinals back in December, Kent made his MLB debut with the Guardians in 2025. He covered 17 2/3 innings for them, pitching to a 4.58 ERA and 3.59 FIP.

Though he's not a particularly hard thrower, the right-hander does a brilliant job of managing contact quality; had he thrown enough innings to qualify, he would have ranked in the 90th percentile or better in hard-hit rate, barrel rate, and average exit velocity allowed. Much of his success stems from a funky slider with a unique, drop-heavy shape that generated whiffs at a 27.6% rate and yielded an opponent's batting average of just .138 last season.

Kent also has familiarity with Rob Cerfolio, the Cardinals' current Assistant GM, who was in Cleveland when the right-hander was first acquired by the Guardians. Beyond his intriguing profile, his work in Triple-A (2.84 ERA, 31.4% strikeout rate in 2025) surely speaks volumes to the front office. He'll need to issue far fewer walks and induce a lot more ground balls to succeed as a pitch-to-contact reliever at the highest level, but there's no denying that the talent is there.

As for Ramos, the Cardinals claimed him just a couple of weeks ago from the Chicago White Sox. Long considered one of the better prospects in the Pale Hose's farm system (he was top 10 in both 2022 and 2023), Ramos has run into pretty significant strikeout concerns in his limited time in the big leagues. St. Louis will only be able to hold onto him if he clears waivers, which is unlikely now that teams can clear roster spots by using the 60-day injured list again.