Alex Rins was already well aware there may not be a place in MotoGP for him in 2027 even before the reports that Yamaha has signed Ai Ogura to replace him in its factory line-up made his exit feel inevitable.

The 30-year-old six-time grand prix winner has had a torrid time since getting badly injured at the 2023 Italian Grand Prix.

A little under two months before the Mugello crash that changed his career, Rins had incredibly taken what still stands as Honda's most recent dry-weather MotoGP win for the satellite LCR team in just his third race weekend since joining from Suzuki.

That win came at Austin. Back there for the last MotoGP round at the end of March, Rins was in a very, very different position.

"Well, there is a long time that I'm not enjoying the bike," Rins admitted after another tough outing ended with him finishing the grand prix 18th and last.

"But apart from this, I don't know if I'm going to be here next year. So I also need to find my place with the results that we are having. For sure it's not helping. Let's see."

Rins has been on a horrible run of form since joining Yamaha, with only five top-10 finishes from his 45 grand prix starts for the factory.

He missed almost all of the rest of the 2023 season after shattering his leg at Mugello and was still far from fit when he arrived at Yamaha, spending much of his debut season there barely able to walk, let alone be fully fit to race.

And while his physical condition might have finally improved, it has coincided with a marked decrease in Yamaha form. Though he's finally been able to come close to team-mate Fabio Quartararo in the opening three races of the year - sitting just one point behind the 2021 world champion and ahead of satellite Yamaha riders Toprak Razgatlioglu and Jack Miller - the Yamaha quartet are 17th, 18th, 20th and 21st respectively in the standings.

In that lack of performance from the new V4-engined Yamaha lies the real shame for Rins, because it means that it's looking increasingly unlikely that any team in the championship will extend him an olive branch for 2027 given just how competitive the paddock is right now.

Moving for Ogura makes plenty of sense for both Yamaha as it gains a fast, talented, Japanese-speaking rider as it prepares to step up its game in a new regulation cycle. It's very good news for Ogura too as he gets a factory salary and the chance to help steer development on what is essentially a wholly new MotoGP project.

However, it's also going to trigger a sadly quiet departure from the paddock for a racer who arguably was Suzuki's best-ever rider in the premier class.

Over the course of Rins's six seasons with the Suzuki project - from his arrival as a MotoGP rookie in 2017 alongside then-team-mate Andrea Iannone until Suzuki's departure with a Rins victory at Valencia in 2022 - the now 30-year-old racked up an impressive five wins, accounting for nearly three quarters of the team's total modern era premier class victories.

Given the anomaly of team-mate Joan Mir's title in 2020 coming with just one race win, Rins's achievements of fifth, fourth and third across the 2018-20 championships plus his victory tally give him a statistical claim to being Suzuki's most successful MotoGP star.

And while Mir, Kenny Roberts Jr, and Kevin Schwantz might have secured titles for Suzuki, there are caveats to their successes, from COVID-affected, shortened seasons to injury woes for title rivals that mean that it's not that far-fetched to make a claim that Rins was Suzuki's best ever rider through a time when MotoGP racing was closer than it has ever been. He essentially dominated its final weeks on the grid before its 2022 exit.

Of course, none of that is likely to matter when it comes to securing a ride in 2027 - but it's an impressive legacy for Rins as his career increasingly looks set to end in somewhat ignominious circumstances at Valencia this year.