As the 2026 MLB Season reaches its final stages, the historical context of Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh‘s poor season. In 2025, Cal Raleigh hit for 60 home runs, which is the ninth most in MLB all time and the third most in American League history. He also set records for home runs by a Seattle Mariner, catcher, and switch hitter in a single season. It remains an incredible season that Mariners fans will cherish for years to come.
However, 2026 obviously has not been what anyone expected. Even if people expected him to regress, a fall off of this magnitude is unprecedented. Looking at his OPS+ from 2025 to 2026, it is a full 103 point drop off (168 in 2025 to 65 in 2026). That is the largest decrease in OPS+ in MLB history (min. 300 plate appearances), per FoxSports.
Most players who experience a decline of this degree are either injured or older. Yet, Raleigh should be in his peak years of his career at 29 years old. That makes this 2026 season confusing on multiple levels. Raleigh did have a stint on the injured list with an oblique strain this year, but his unproductivity tracks back all the way to World Baseball Classic.
Seattle Mariners Cal Raleigh’s Season Broken Down Historically
Hopefully Cal Raleigh can now turn the page on this poor chapter of his career during the remainder of the season, a critical period for the Seattle Mariners.
Looking historically at Raleigh’s season, his raw OPS is tied for the second lowest number in MLB history. That is behind Hall of Fame Baseball Players Rogers Hornsby and Hack Wilson. Hornsby’s OPS fell .394 points from 1925 to 1926 and Wilson’s fell .380 points from 1930 to 1931. Both players won MVP the year prior in their own leagues. That being said, both players were still above average hitters in those metrics despite the decrease in production. They would continue to play some good baseball later in their career.
In comparison, Raleigh has been one of the worst hitters in Major League Baseball this season. The only other key comparison is Max Carey. Carey’s OPS was .909 in 1925 but fell to .594 in 1926. Yet, Carey entered his age 36 season when he became a poor player. Raleigh is not even close to that.
Some More Modern Examples
Hopefully the future remains bright for Cal Raleigh and he can bounce back to become one of the most valuable players in all of baseball.
Some players like Christian Yelich and Jeff Bagwell have experienced strange downturns in their careers. Yet, they resolved whatever was plaguing their play quickly. Those bad seasons were in shortened years though. Bryce Harper had a similar decline after his historic 2015 season where he won the NL MVP. He was merely decent the following year, but we all know that Harper is a probable Hall of Famer at this point of his career.
George Scott’s OPS fell from 139 to 40 between the 1967 and 1968 seasons when he was just 24 years old. His bat eventually recovered. Yasmani Grandal and Victor Martinez were also older players who experienced grand departures from their prior selves. Roy Campenella is another player who had issues because of injury causing him to experience a great decline.
As FoxSports outlined in all of these examples, its clear that a path to recovery is completely possible and perhaps even likely for Raleigh. The Seattle Mariners are in the midst of a massively disappointing season based on their expectations, and Raleigh’s performance takes huge slice of blame in that. However, the expectation for Raleigh should be a return to greatness, and this should not be the norm moving forward.
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