Cal Raleigh extension
Cal Raleigh will stick around in Seattle through the end of the '20s.
Anonymous sources told reporters on Tuesday the Mariners agreed to an extension with Raleigh. The deal is for six years, which buys out the rest of his arbitration and his first three years of free agency.
Here are the details, according to Jeff Passan:
@JeffPassan tweeted Details on Cal Raleigh's extension with the Seattle Mariners, per sources:
$10 million signing bonus 2025: $1 million salary 2026: $11 million 2027: $12 million 2028: $23 million 2029: $23 million 2030: $23 million 2031: $20 million vesting player option (with $2 million buyout)
— Passanthallich (@passanthalbot.bsky.social) March 25, 2025 at 12:22 PM
Raleigh is probably the best catcher in MLB at this point. He has the most fWAR among primary catchers over the last three seasons (13.9), largely on the back his Platinum Glove winning defense. He's also been one of the 20 most valuable players in MLB over the last three seasons. As I pointed out yesterday, Raleigh is now the 1b to Julio, and together they represent the Mariners best position player duo of the last 20+ years. ZiPS projects him for 5.3 fWAR in 2025, making him the third highest projected player in the division (after Julio and Yordan Alvarez) and the 12th highest projected player in MLB. Whether he can maintain strong production into the future is always the risk to teams, but few players would seem more deserving of that risk.
The timing is interesting on Raleigh's end, as John Trupin wrote at Lookout Landing:
[Raleigh's] relationship with longtime Mariners catching coach Dan Wilson, now the club’s manager, has been highlighted as a positive aspect of Raleigh’s experience in Seattle and as a mutually beneficial environment of trust. Additionally, Raleigh switched agents in the off-season, changing away from big swinging Scott Boras to Excel Sports Management.
The timing has layers for the Mariners as well. The future value of catchers is unclear. MLB debuted its Automated Ball-Strike System (ABS) in Spring Training this year, and presumably it will come to regular season games soon. It's possible catchers who are good at framing (and Raleigh is among the best) could lose value when the system is implemented. But as Michael Rosen of Fangraphs points out, advanced knowledge of the strike zone could make players like Raleigh even more valuable behind the dish.
ABS will make him even MORE valuable
— Michael Rosen (@michaelrosen.bsky.social) March 25, 2025 at 11:33 AM
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The extension announcement caps an otherwise quiet offseason for the Mariners and a frustrating one for fans. The org continued to avoid free agency and long-term contracts from outside the org, instead using their budget to cover current players whose salaries increased through arbitration or otherwise. Jerry Dipoto in an interview with KJR in February hinted at the org's budget strategy, acknowledging fan's frustration with payroll and suggesting the org's preference is to save money for extensions.
"We're not growing our payroll at a rate that's, I guess, acceptable to the listening public in some way. We have grown it year over year. ... We're one of just two teams in MLB who's grown our payroll each year. That's unique. We've just not grown it as fast as people would like us to grow it. And we've grown it in a different way than people want us to grow. At least that's my sense. I think the expectation is we go out and pour it out on free agents. Our preference is to develop from within, to invest in our players, and to build that way. We're not working on a low payroll. We're working with one of the largest payrolls in team history. We continue to look to invest in our players. And the true answer to that question is somewhere in between. We work on a budget like at least 28 other teams work on. And we try to make the best decisions we can within the parameters of those budgets. And we try to focus on what we believe is a sustainable way to build a team, which is through the draft and development.”
The Mariners budget now sits at an estimated $154 million, according to Darren Gossler's budget [spreadsheet](tab:https://cloud.goose1701.com/s/md4ZX6qewxqDZTi?openfile=true). The Mariners remain roughly $15 million below their all-time high payroll set in August 2018. It's unclear whether ownership will make more money available to spend during the season, as the Mariners have typically tried to add a veteran player or two at the trade deadline. It's also unclear how much ownership is willing to grow the budget in future years. Julio and now Raleigh are the only players owed guaranteed money past 2028, but the Mariners have several players (like Logan Gilbert) who could be eligible for similar extensions. Perhaps the Raleigh extension is the first of many, or perhaps the Mariners were simply keen to lock up one of the most valuable batters in MLB.
Regardless, Raleigh's extension is another sign of financial life from Mariners ownership. The team released Mitch Haniger on Sunday, opting to eat the remainder of his salary in 2025. While the move doesn't incur much additional cost, the blogosphere (in all our wisdom) was previously skeptical the org would be willing to pay someone to not play, even if it meant a better roster. The team also recently announced a new uniform patch with Nintendo, and a new streaming service through ROOT Sports. It's not clear how much money either deal will generate or whether they will impact payroll, but it's four positive financial news cycles in a row after four-plus years of mostly negative ones.
Update from The Seattle Times on 3/26:
I mentioned that it's unclear whether the extension would affect the Mariners ability to add a veteran bat during the season. But The Seattle Times suggests the structure of the deal in 2025 (big signing bonus, low salary) should allow for some budget flexibility at the deadline:
"Raleigh’s $1 million salary for the 2025 season should free up some payroll flexibility in the Mariners’ budget, meaning the club could potentially add a significant piece to the roster around the July trade deadline."
Raleigh also released a statement on his decision to stay in Seattle. He had previously been critical of the org's commitment to winning, but it sounds as if he heard enough good things throughout the negotiation process to be willing to stay.
“It won’t be easy but I believe ownership and management share the same vision and commitment. I won’t stop working and I won’t stop grinding until this city gets what it deserves, and that is a perennial playoff team and a World Series Championship.”
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