The baseball movement season is underway! The MLB 2025-26 offseason has already begun, and at Alofoke Deportes we keep you informed with analysis and ratings of each major move. Whether it’s a big-money free agent signing that changes the course of your team or a high-impact trade, we’ll let you know what it means for next season and beyond. Stay tuned for the latest analysis as we head towards the start of spring training. The Mariners begin the winter with Naylor’s renewal The agreement: 5 years, $92.5 million Rating: A-
If there were an award for the free agent prediction most likely to come true, Josh Naylor’s return to the Seattle Mariners would have been the favorite, so it’s no surprise that this is the first significant signing of the offseason (pending a physical). As soon as the Mariners’ season ended with that heartbreaking loss in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series, the management made it clear that re-signing Naylor was their top priority. Such public statements at that level are rare, and the Mariners backed them up with a five-year contract.
It’s easy to understand why they wanted Naylor back. The Mariners have been looking for a long-term solution at first base for, well, almost 20 years, really, since they traded John Olerud in 2004. Ty France gave them a couple of solid seasons in 2021 and 2022, but since 2005 only the Pirates’ first basemen have produced a lower OPS than Seattle’s. Meanwhile, Naylor arrived at the trade deadline from Arizona and provided a great spark down the stretch, batting .299/.341/.490 with nine home runs and 33 RBIs in 54 games, earning him 2.2 WAR. Including his time with the Diamondbacks, he finished with .295/.353/.462 with 20 home runs in 2025. Given the pitcher-friendly nature of T-Mobile Park, it’s not easy to attract free agent hitters to Seattle, but Naylor talked about how he loves to hit there. The numbers back it up: in 43 career games at T-Mobile, he has hit .304 and slugged .534. It’s important for a Seattle lineup that has a lot of strikeouts, Naylor is a high-contact hitter in the middle of the order; he finished with the seventeenth-best strikeout rate among qualified hitters in 2025. Naylor’s whole game is a bit contradictory. He ranks in the seventh percentile in chase rate, but still had a nearly league-average walk rate (46th percentile) with an excellent contact rate. He can’t run (third percentile!), but stole 30 bases in 32 attempts, including 19 of 19 after joining the Mariners. He doesn’t seem like he’s fast on the field, but his Statcast defensive metrics have been above average in each of the last four seasons. It’s not a star: 3.1 WAR in 2025 was the highest of his career, but he’s a safe and predictable player to count on for the next few years. This deal extends to his age-33 season, so there may be some risk at the end of the contract, but for a team with World Series aspirations in 2026, the Mariners needed Naylor to return. The management will be happy with this signing, and so will the Mariners fans.
