Victor Martinez will take the final at-bat of his career this Saturday, per Chris McCosky of The Detroit News. Friday and Saturday against Kansas City will be the final two games of Martinez’s career.
It seems, then, that Martinez has put aside any remaining doubt as to his intentions. He said recently, in reference to the remainder of the 2018 season, that he was “pretty sure this is going to be it,” as Evan Woodberry of MLive.com was among those to cover. It’s now clear that Martinez will hang up his spikes after taking the final at-bat of his career in front of his home crowd in Detroit — which, as Woodberry tweets, is the way the veteran wants to wrap things up.
Martinez, a native of Venezuala, signed as an amateur free agent with the Cleveland Indians in 1996. After breaking into the majors as a catcher with the Indians in 2002, Martinez played his first full season as a 24-year-old the following season. Cleveland traded their star catcher to the Boston Red Sox at the 2009 deadline for a package of Nick Hagadone, Justin Masterson, and Bryan Price. After finishing out the 2009 season with a disappointing ALDS loss to the Angels, Martinez returned to Boston for the 2010 seasons – his last year of playing full-time at catcher.
As a free agent in 2011, Martinez joined the Detroit Tigers on a four-year, $50MM contract, where he became a primary designated hitter. The Tigers won the AL Central in all four seasons of Martinez’ initial deal, prompting the Tigers to re-sign him after the 2014 season to a second four-year pact, this one worth $68MM. That contract runs out at the end of this season.
The last two seasons have not been kind to Martinez, but he was legitimately one of the most feared hitters in the American League for a ten-year stretch from 2004-2014. His best season came with the Tigers in 2014 when he hit .335/.409/.565, leading the league with an impressive .974 OPS. For his career, Martinez slashed .296/.360/.455, with 246 home runs and a 118 OPS+, making the All-Star team five times and winning a Silver Slugger Award twice – in 2004 as a catcher and in 2014 as a DH.
Unfortunately, Martinez never won a World Series, but he was no stranger to the postseason, reaching the ALCS with Cleveland in 2007 and again with Detroit in 2011. Martinez missed the entirety of the 2012 season after tearing his left ACL during offseason conditioning, which was – unfortunately for Martinez – the year Detroit won the American League Pennant, getting swept by the San Francisco Giants in the World Series.
With 32.3 career rWAR, there’s a Hall of Fame case to be made for the switch-hitting catcher/1B/DH – but it’s unlikely. His 30.6 JAWS score puts him well below the average Hall of Fame score of 44.0 for catchers, but certainly impressive enough to receive some votes and remain on the ballot for a few years. Nevertheless, Saturday will mark the final playing time in a long and impressive career for Martinez, who turns 40 in December. Martinez will retire having made over $140MM across 16 major league seasons.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
What a great career, fantastic switch hitting catcher that was always dangerous. I know he moved away from behind the dish, however he was a solid big leaguer. Best of wishes Victor.
Well said.
32 career WAR – Let’s call him a lot more than an “above-average” hitter
Yeah, definitely a luke warm description.
Give us a moment! V-Mart will get his due from MLBTR.
32 WAR is hardly above replacement
Yes, 32 WAR is a very nice career
You don’t need saberstats to notice what a great hitter he was. Using your eyes was all you needed to do.
I’m creating my own version of WAR. See how easy it is to fit a narrative?
Okay. Let’s see it then. What are your inputs? Are you incorporating statcast data? How about context within lineup construction? If you “show your wors,” as teachers used to say, and it looks like fantastic work, then it will be a nice new set of data. Any of the two versions of WAR have pages and pages of information about what data is collected in the formula, why it matters, and how it is incorporated in the final product. So as long as you have all that, I’ll be interested in seeing your work.
Nice solid career. Where has the time gone?
Agreed. That bittersweet nostalgia feeling when you think back to the beginning of a player’s long career and what was going on in baseball (and life in general) that year, and now he’s retiring… THE FEELS!
Martinez is a class act all the way!
How could you possibly know that?
It’s all over the internet, and the internet NEVER lies.
I just Googled “Victor Martinez class act”.
You left out “all the way”.
“All the way” is actually the first hit
Because this guy says so, and apparently nowadays all a person needs to do is say something and we are supposed to believe it. Badum tiss
Steve Chitwood…you’re a class act!
How could you possibly know that?
I just Googled “Steve Chitwood class act” — and the first result was an obituary!
Steve Chitwood is no longer with us. RIP.
Too much leeway? Dude earned that respect. He was playing for a team that was going no where.
So no yearlong farewell tour receiving gifts from every organization along the way? Sad. He’s missing out on some quality maple syrup from the Blue Jays.
Glad Chris Ilitch let him finish it up the right way. Plenty would’ve cut him to make way for a youngster, but the Ilitch family does it right (mostly).
Great! Now Steve Chitwood gonna ask if the Ilitch family has you over for dinner.
I lol.’d at this; I don’t get the cynicism over positive comments. If the poster above said something along the lines of “Victor Martinez is evil,” then I would understand the demand for proof. But if we perceive a person to be classy, why critique that? Everyone already knows that we are only seeing a little bit of each person in the public eye.
“Above average hitter”
Pure trash from below average writers. Clowns
Well why read if thats what you think…
It was just the description of his overall career numbers from the initial short version of the post. But admittedly “well-” ought to have gone in front, for a guy with a career 117 wRC+.
Why do you even apologize to these clowns?
Not apologizing, just explaining!
If you’re friends with V well then you’re friends with me.
I just heard that song yesterday!
Maya Rudolph to boot.
Great hitter, capable of getting hot and carrying a team for a while. He had a good career and I wish him well in his next endeavor.
Forget Victor Martinez’s last game, this is TC Zencka’s first mlbtr post. I wonder if he will be able to match VMart’s 16 years..
As much as I’m a Red Sox fan & loved when we got him, I loved watching him in 2014 when he had almost as many home runs as strikeouts & almost had twice as many walks as strikeouts
I think he deserves to be considered for the hall. I know his overall WAR falls short but it’s the hall of fame not the hall of value. Sheer dominance in one facet of the game deserves recognition.
Not saying I’d vote for the guy for sure, I haven’t even looked at his stats that closely yet… I’m just saying these types of players should also be considered.
Uh, no. Nice career, but just off the top of my head I could name 25 players better than him that aren’t in the Hall and shouldn’t be. Let’s not turn the baseball HoF into the Football or Basketball Hall, where anyone who was just good gets in. I like the exclusivity of the MLB Hall.
Exclusivity? Jim Rice would like a word.
Rice is far from the worst Hall of Famer. Think Tinker/Evers/Chance, Dean, Maranville, Morris, Bottomley, Perez, Lyons, a bunch of 1920s guys: Herman, Medwick, Manush, Puckett. Rice isn’t a great selection – his teammate Dwight Evans would have been a better selection, but Rice is far from the most egregious pick.
Mazeroski. If he’s in, Joe Carter should be too, and we know Carter was a very good player but not a Hall of Famer
Gossage, Wilhelm, Sutter and Trammell don’t belong there either. But I digress.
I agree completely about the relievers. I honestly don’t think any contemporary reliever belongs, save Mariano. (And that pains me to say as a Padre fan; I loved Trevor but he’s not a HAll of Famer). Trammell is very deserving; he’s one of the ten-best shortstops of all time.
You could probably easily list a bunch of players in the Hall that are worse too…
Agreed. This is what TEAM Halls of Fame are for — the “good, not great” players to honor, even if they don’t retire their number.
Definitely not. I honestly don’t see him getting past the first round.
32 war is decent but injuries derailed the catching/fielding career. Great with celevenad and Boston early on.
Now if only some team would take on Miguel Cabrera s contract. SF giants looks like they would do this.
He was a career .300 hitter when he had both knees.
No HOF but at his best he was amazing and could be dominant at times. Thanks for sharing your talent with us fans V Mart!
I got a foul ball hit by Victor at my first baseball game ever when I was pretty young. He was thrilled to sign it later. Best wishes for him as he hangs up a great career.
Hall
Of fame
Hall of Very Good, maybe. A fine career, but HOF is out of the question.
Best switch hitting catcher of all time
Ted Simmons/Victor Martinez is a fun debate.
A career to be proud of. I wish him the best.
Definitely a Hall of famer first ballot
you win ballgames with players like martinez, hof not so much
A very very good player. Difficult to get into the Hall of Fame when you led the league in Sacrifice flies once and OBP once. Many thought his career was on a quick decline when he left the Indians at 30 years old. He was still very good until he was 38. The last two years were typical for an aging star.