Mitch Garver Returns to Seattle

On Wednesday, catcher Mitch Garver agreed to a minor league deal to stay with the Mariners in 2026. He reported to camp for a bodily on Thursday, and will he make the main league roster, he’ll earn a prorated $2.55 million for any time he spends with the massive membership. Due to his veteran standing, Garver could have the power to decide out and search for a job elsewhere, in late March, on Could 1, or June 1 if he stays within the minors. We don’t typically dedicate complete articles to minor league offers, however I needed to spotlight this one, as a result of the 35-year-old Garver has had such an fascinating profession and such a dramatic turnaround over the previous two years.

A bit over two years in the past, Garver signed a really completely different contract with Seattle. It was a two-year deal for $24 million, practically 5 occasions as a lot per yr as his new one. He was coming off a 2023 season by which he launched 19 house runs and completed with a 142 wRC+ regardless of an April knee sprain that knocked him out for greater than two months. It was simply the 18th time this century a catcher that had put up such an excellent offensive line over at the very least 300 plate appearances, and it wasn’t even Garver’s greatest season. He debuted at age 26 in 2017, and over the primary seven years of his profession, he ran a 124 wRC+. Should you go to our leaderboards and rank catchers via their age-32 seasons, that mark ties him with Corridor of Famer Gary Carter and Mickey Tettleton for thirty second all-time (simply behind his teammate Cal Raleigh’s 126).

That’s to not say that Garver was on tempo to be among the finest catchers ever. Due to all kinds of accidents, he’d solely reached 80 video games performed in a season 3 times. And due to each the accidents and his very poor protection, he’d spent greater than 40% of his time at first base or DH. Regardless of being among the finest hitting catchers within the recreation, he had simply 8.3 WAR to his title. Nonetheless, the bat was so plain that he grew to become the primary non-pitcher Jerry Dipoto had ever signed to a multi-year contract whereas main the Mariners. The transfer carried danger, however that danger was about whether or not Garver would keep wholesome, about whether or not his bat would play up sufficient if, as anticipated, he spent the overwhelming majority of his time as a DH.

You understand what occurred subsequent. Garver stayed wholesome, avoiding the IL in each 2024 and 2025. He appeared in 201 video games, tied for probably the most of any two-season stretch in his complete profession. However the bat utterly disappeared. This wasn’t essentially the danger we have been nervous about. Garver batted a mixed .187 and put up an 88 wRC+ and -0.4 WAR. Particularly, his capacity to hit right-handed pitching simply evaporated. He posted a 66 wRC+ towards righties throughout these two seasons and was relegated to platoon responsibility by mid-July 2024.

So what on earth went mistaken? Garver’s Ninetieth-percentile exit velocity fell from 106.6 mph in 2023 to 104.4 during the last two seasons. He began chasing a little bit extra, and his contact capacity took a nosedive, which drove his strikeout fee up. Sounds prefer it may simply be a man getting older, proper? The factor is, all of this had occurred earlier than at one time or one other. Garver’s EV90 was a career-worst 103.9 mph in 2022. His chase fee was the identical or worse in 2021 and 2022. His zone contact fee was decrease over the two-season span of 2020 and 2021 than it was throughout the previous two years. So whereas these are all unhealthy issues, they’re additionally unhealthy issues that Garver has efficiently fought via earlier than and put up good numbers anyway.

Let me throw yet one more principle within the combine, and I must acknowledge up entrance that I can’t show it. All of us bear in mind how Teoscar Hernández struggled with T-Cell Park. Garver didn’t come into the 2024 season with an enormous monitor file in Seattle. He’d made simply 33 plate appearances there. Nevertheless, inside these 33 occasions up, he was abysmal. He had a .042 wOBA and .129 xwOBA, his worst marks of any ballpark. His exit velocity and hard-hit fee have been his third lowest of any ballpark (above solely Residents Financial institution Park in Philadelphia and Nationals Park, the place he’d taken a mixed 15 plate appearances). Is it doable that Garver simply actually struggles at T-Cell and that messed him up?

The argument that I’ve been not-so-subtly constructing right here is easy sufficient. Possibly Garver simply had a nasty couple of years. Possibly he was out of kinds and had some unhealthy luck or no matter it may be, however he’s been roughly the identical man beneath all of it, and if he will get an opportunity, he might he’ll hit effectively once more in 2026.

As a lot as I’d prefer to, I don’t suppose I actually purchase this argument. Two unhealthy years is far more telling than one, and Garver’s manufacturing has cratered towards fastballs specifically, which is all the time worrisome. While you mix that with worse swing choices, worse contact capacity, and weaker contact, it definitely begins to sound like he’s simply having hassle maintaining. Furthermore, even when all of that have been true and Garver actually has been the identical man beneath all of it, effectively, he’s a 35-year-old catcher who’s undergone sufficient accidents for 2 full careers. He’d be resulting from decelerate any time now anyway.

That brings us to bat pace. A few yr in the past, Tom Tango revealed some preliminary growing older curve information indicating that swing pace begins dropping at age 32. At first blush, Garver’s bat monitoring information doesn’t look significantly damning. Statcast began gathering it within the second half of the 2023, and the general numbers say Garver’s bat has really gotten sooner within the final two years: 70.28 mph in 2023, 71.2 in 2024, and 71.8 in 2025. That’s definitely encouraging! It’s a bit higher than league common, and while you evaluate apples to apples, say trying solely at fastballs over the center of the plate, or solely at hard-hit balls, the numbers are practically similar. However earlier than we resolve Garver didn’t all of the sudden lose his bat pace when he hit his mid-30s, we have to take a look at his common contact level. As you possible know by now, bat pace will increase all through the swing, and Statcast measures it on the level of contact.

The chart above reveals Garver’s bat pace and intercept level (relative to his heart of mass), solely on hard-hit fastballs over the center of the plate. Mainly, it reveals his numbers when all the things’s going proper. Over the previous two years, Garver’s intercept level has slid ahead by three full inches. To place that in perspective, in 2025, shifting from an intercept level of 28.2 to 31.2 would transfer you from the 51st percentile to the eightieth percentile. It’s a very massive shift, and if his precise swing pace have been staying the identical, we’d have seen a commensurate enhance in measured swing pace. That didn’t occur, so we’ve got to conclude that the swing is slowing down. Moreover, as a way to meet the ball manner out entrance, he’s compelled to begin his swing earlier. Mix that with the difficulty hitting fastballs, the upper chase fee, and the decrease zone contact fee, and we’ve got a tidy, depressive narrative going.

Garver’s bat is slowing down, so he’s doing what older gamers do: getting began early to compensate for it. Usually, these older gamers begin pulling the ball extra after they execute this transfer, making up for the additional whiffs with additional energy. However that’s not occurring for Garver. He already pulled the ball about as a lot as is feasible. From 2019 to 2022, his 54% pull fee was the best in baseball. So despite the fact that he’s getting began earlier and assembly the ball farther out in entrance, his pull fee has dropped some. And since he can’t afford to remain again anymore, his already low opposite-field fee has dropped even additional. He’s hitting extra balls to the center of the sphere, the place they’re much less priceless, which is among the causes he’s been operating low BABIPs and barely underperforming his anticipated stats.

Regardless of all of this, Garver was nonetheless serviceable towards lefties, and it’s not utterly out of the query that he’ll bounce again some in 2026. Even the projections, which think about age-related decline, anticipate a really modest rebound to a wRC+ round 90. This contract doesn’t carry a lot danger for the Mariners. The truth is, as a result of they’ve Andrew Knizner signed to a significant league deal for a mere $1 million, lower than half of what they’d pay Garver if he makes the massive league roster, Knizner has a leg up on the backup catcher spot anyway. I’ll be rooting for Garver to get one other shot in Seattle or elsewhere and to profit from it. His defensive shortcomings and hassle staying on the sphere made it a little bit too simple to look previous his offensive talents, however he had severe expertise and received to take full benefit of all of it too hardly ever.