Former big league catcher Mike Zunino announced his retirement today, via an Instagram post from his reps at Wasserman Baseball. Hat tip to Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times.
“With profound gratitude, I am announcing my retirement from Major League Baseball after 11 seasons,” Zunino says in the post. “As I reflect on my career, I am appreciative of the support of the baseball community and those who have guided me along the way.” He goes on to thank the Mariners, Rays and Guardians, their fans, the MLBPA, team staff and teammates, as well as his advisors, representatives and family members. “While my time on the field has concluded, my passion for baseball remains as strong as ever, and I eagerly anticipate exploring new avenues to contribute to the sport. I am excited to bring what I have learned in the game to the next generation of MLB players, and to give back to the game that has given so much to me.”
Zunino was a trumpeted prospect over a decade ago. He was selected third overall by the Mariners in the 2012 draft, with only Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton going ahead of him. He secured a $4MM signing bonus and, just a few months later, Baseball America ranked him the #1 Mariners’ prospect and the #17 prospect in all of baseball going into 2013. He started that year at Triple-A but was up in the majors by June. He missed some time due to a broken hand and only got into 52 big league games, hitting just .214/.290/.329 in that time.
He got his first full season in the majors in 2014 and showed some of the mixed results that would go on to be trademarks of his career. One of the positives was his glovework, as he posted eight Defensive Runs Saved that year. FanGraphs also considered his framing to be really strong, one of the top five backstops in the majors for the season. On offense, he launched 22 home runs but also had some less-exciting elements. His batting average was just .199 and his on-base percentage only .254, thanks to a 3.6% walk rate. He was also struck out in 33.2% of his plate appearances. His 87 wRC+ indicates his offense was subpar overall but he nonetheless was considered to be worth 3.8 wins above replacement by FanGraphs, thanks largely to the defense.
Over the next couple of years, his struggles with strikeouts and low batting averages continued and he was optioned to the minors from time to time. He seemed to take a step forward in 2017, when he walked in 9% of his plate appearances and hit 25 home runs. But he still struck out at a 36.8% rate and his results dipped again in 2018.
Going into 2019, he had two years of club control remaining but was traded to the Rays as part of a five-player swap. His first season in Tampa didn’t go especially well, as a quad strain and an oblique strain limited him to just 90 games in which he hit .165/.232/.312. In the shortened 2020 season, he missed time due to another oblique strain and and struck out in 44% of his 84 plate appearances across 28 games.
Despite the offensive struggles, the Rays clearly valued his defense and work with a pitching staff as the club went all the way to the World Series in 2020. Zunino reached free agency after that but the club brought him back via a one-year, $3MM deal with a club option for 2022.
He would be in arguably the best form of his career in 2021. The Rays limited his workload to 109 games but he still managed to launch 33 home runs and make the American League All-Star team. His strikeout rate was still high at 35.2% but he also walked at a 9.1% clip. His .216/.301/.559 batting line translated to a wRC+ of 133 and he tallied 4.5 fWAR. That’s just behind the 4.6 fWAR he produced in 2017, though that was in a larger sample of 124 games.
The club option for 2022 came with a base value of $4MM but had escalators that could push it to $7MM if he got into 100 games, which he did. After that monster campaign, the Rays triggered the $7MM option to keep him around but 2022 turned out to be a frustrating year for him. He hit just .148/195/.304 through 36 before landing on the injured list and requiring surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome.
The Guardians took a shot on a bounceback, signing Zunino to a one-year, $6MM deal for 2023. But Zunino struck out in 43.6% of his plate appearances and was hitting .177/.271/.306 when he was released in June. He didn’t sign elsewhere in the final months of the season.
Though he clearly had a lopsided profile, Zunino was incredibly skilled in certain areas. He retires with a .199 batting average and .271 on-base percentage, but he launched 149 home runs and racked up 18.3 fWAR thanks to 46 Defensive Runs Saved. He was often cited for his role as a clubhouse leader and could perhaps parlay that skill into future coaching opportunities. Based on his retirement statement, it sounds like he may pursue that line of work at some point. We at MLBTR salute Zunino on a fine playing career and wish him the best with whatever comes next.
Best of luck, too bad he couldn’t get a deal. His service time is just a bit over 9yrs…
maybe but he hasn’t really been serviceable since 2021
He was an All-Star in 2021.
Homered in it, too!
This why I didn’t go back further than 2021.
He had a volatile profile that usually doesn’t age well anyway but I think the reason for his very sharp decline is the thoracic outlet syndrome.
TOS surgery is a career ender, most players (usually pitchers) never come back from it productively, that is also what ended Strasburgs career.
Does major league coaching earn service time?
No. Service time is a Union thing and coaching is a management position.
The Manager and five designated coaches along with two trainers are getting MLB pension time. Pensions start at one day of service and max out at ten years.
Thank you notagain, I thought I had read about someone just short of 10 as a player who spent some time on a coaching staff to get ther, but then I couldn’t find a reference.
I suspect that Zunino takes a year off and then lands in a major league staff in a game planning or bullpen coach role, and eventually gets his 10th year in one of those designated roles.
I think he’s going to be ok with his $28M
He made about $30 million as a pro, is educated and a well spoken guy. I’m sure the Zuninos are in great shape.
Yes, catchers who have some brain are very sought after for coaching and managing because the catcher is the only player who knows a lot about offense and pitching as he has to know the whole pitching staff and their tactics but also offense.
Nice statement, sounds like he wants to be a coach.
Probably make for a good one.
catchers seem to be pretty good at becoming good coaches
Hopefully not a hitting coach.
Maybe as a “don’t be like me” kind of hitting coach.
Too bad. He could’ve went to Japan with Bauer.
Bauer should be in MLB as should Anthony Bass.
Bauer isn’t going to play in MLB again. let it go
MoneyBall: The start of a team that won’t play in MLB again:
SS Wander Franco
P Trevor Bauer
P Julio Urias
Don’t forget Mike Foltynewicz.
Wait, what did Folty do (other than pitch poorly)?
And add the aforementioned Anthony Bass, Addison Russell, and Pablo Ozuna to that list.
Who’s Pablo Ozuna?
@harambe
A journeyman middle infielder who played from 2000-2008 with the Marlins, White Sox, Dodgers and Rockies (for those of you playing Immaculate Grid).
In other words, I got my wires crossed when trying to write Roberto Osuna *facepalm*
Username post combo eerily on point there I.M. Insane
Too bad George Steinbrenner isn’t alive. He’d sign Bauer in a heart beat.
Maybe, but Bauer would have to shave.
Big Stein would not have signed bauer imo. Hard to think of a player less in line with the old man’s idea of “the yankee way.”
Why not? We saw what happened when the Chiefs signed the SDSU punter. It was a story for like a day or two.
I thought they cut the punter
Bills did. Then the Chiefs signed him.
Could have formed a karaoke trio with Bauer and Osuna, a real missed opportunity.
Legendary Ray in 2021!!!
This leaves Guillermo Zuñiga as the alphabetically last active player.
No way that’s a real name, right?
It was Daphne Zuniga. What a dish
And she had the best bass singing voice ever.
Loved her in spaceballs!
Princess Vespa!
Also John Cusack’s love interest in The Sure Thing.
Yep. He’s a relief pitcher with the Angels. Was with the Dodgers last year.
Cardinals last year
I feel like Fernando Abad is probably done, too. So we might be getting a new alphabetically first player too.
Based on his career batting average, he should have retired years ago.
He was a catcher who could hit double digit home runs.
True he hit double digit home runs; conversely, Zunino could never hit a curve ball! Spent many years at Safeco Field watching him flailing away at curves outside the plate and looking ridiculous.
There should be an option to auto-mute comments that discuss batting average
BA and OBP> any other offensive stat. See Old York’s comment for a good example.
@King123
Yeah, it’s sad to see but kids do often say the strangest things… I guess johnrealtime will miss out on some proper discussions since he doesn’t find BA that useful for evaluations.
@johnrealtime
Which stats do you like to discuss? If you’re an expected stats fanboy, you probably should be on that auto-mute list.
community.fangraphs.com/properly-diving-into-expec…
“Once you have a large enough sample size on a player, previous batting average, on-base percentage, weighted on-base average, home runs, and stolen bases are the best way to estimate what a player will accomplish in an upcoming season. “
Without a mathematical way to measure the relative importance of each stat that’s still just a set of numbers fueling guesswork when trying to predict a player’s overall contribution to offense. WAR is an embarrassing overreach but still better than looking at 4-5 separate numbers.
WAR looks at the cumulative history of production so it’s not really good for predictivness. FRA is decent for predictivness.
175th best catcher in MLB history according to BR’s JAWS and a wRC+ of 87. On the JAWS ranking, he’s ahead of HOF mega stars like Connie Mack, Wilbert Robinson & Louis Santop.
Career wRC+:
Connie Mack: 78
Wilbert Robinson: 84
Louis Santop: 127
Mike Zunino deserves to be enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame for his legendary career so he can be among his mega star peers with much weaker wRC+ and JAWS ranking.
That’s not how JAWS rankings work, Mr. York.
r/woooosh
2MLB Fanatic
I guess your sarcasm detector is out of order. Might want to fix that…
Not familiar with the other two, but Connie Mack is in the Hall as a manager, not a catcher.. Bruce Bochy will eventually get into the Hall as a manager, but his catching stats are just not good.
Sad to see in his early 30s. I think he could’ve had a much longer career had he not been rushed to the majors by the early 2010s Mariners farm.
Still a good career though. Hope Mike has great things to look forward to post-professional Baseball.
I remember one year I had him as the catcher on the Tigers in MLB the Show and he hit 55 homers; doesn’t mean anything at all but always made me like him.
Mighty Joe Young.
He just hit homers against the yankees on any team he played on. Wish him nothing but the best, one of the good guys
I like him more now
A career he can be proud of. Wish him luck as he goes to the next challenge.
With 28 million in the bag and 149 bombs as a catcher, he did just fine being a power-hitting catcher best of luck to him. At only 32 years-old he’s got a lifetime to look forward to.
Catchers’s bodies deteriorate faster than the average player. To Zunino, 32 years feels like 37-38 years.
You made an All-Star team, Mike. That’s not an easy thing to do. Enjoy your retirement, Mike.
Good career Mr. Zunino.
Another guy younger than me already retiring. Makes me feel old.
And also sad that I will likely be working for another 30 years.
Congrats to Z! Hard earned, well deserved career. He still has arguably the greatest June by a catcher of all time
Good luck in the future Mike!
Future catching coach. I could see him being a big help to teams with young catchers who are good with the bat but struggling defensively.
Kept getting jobs because of a certain reason(Others don’t get that chance”. Good he is retiring
The guy hit bombs and has a nice amount of earnings so he’s done well, no need to disrespect the guy please.
God bless he has been an above average. Catcher his entire career. Good luck to you in your future endeavors
Seems like he will probably be a future manager in MLB. My guess would be Cleveland somewhere around 2033.
That has to have been one of the better careers batting under the Mendoza line
As a Mariners fan from Day One, I will tell you that Cal Raleigh has been a lot more fun for me. Tom Murphy was, also.
Sure, Zunino could hit some long balls, but mostly he just was awfully disappointing in the clutch if the team needed him to get a run driven in.
That’s how I saw it.
No HOF for Mike. He could still be a good coach or manager.
Fred Park
Good eye! His career BA with RISP and 2 outs is .155, .44 lower than his career BA. Not clutch
Time to update terminology. The ‘Mendoza Line’ should now be the ‘Zunino Line’
Fred, M’s fan here. You and I will always remember that he could not lay off the low and away, two strike pitch. Over and over, he would fish for it and always come up empty. Strike three! But a good dude who had a solid career.
Amen to that, BPax.
That’s just how it played out, time after time.
His approach was the definition of swing for the fences or die trying.
Nobody wanted him so he retired. He should have got a few years ago.
He had a good year in 2021. His other good year was 2017.
Gets his gold card!
Elite behind the plate. Big power. Class act human. Don’t need to hit for average to be an elite catcher. Just throw out baserunners, lower your staffs ERA, and have occasional pop. If I’m any GM I’m overpaying him to coach in my organization.
I see a site that says he only accured 9.077 service time, but when I read about service time it calls out “DAYS” not “GAMES”, so being injured accrues certain service time and playoff days, thus I think he reached the 10 year full pension mark. WE ALL KNOW HE SPENT A HIGH AMOUNT OF TIME ON INJURED LIST
A full year of service time is defined by the MLB as 172 days. A player receives one day of service for each day on the active roster or on the Major League injured list. In 2021, the regular season consisted of 162 games played over 186 calendar days.
Zunino maybe the new line name for batting .199 or below.
Would have been a Hall of Famer if he was drafted by the right stadium and organization with his talent. Hall of Very Good is still a nice achievement.
I remember his parents wanted him to go to college before signing with Seattle…Perhaps now he will and he’d probably make the team and maybe find a way to lay off that high cheese and revamp as a sold D1 DH idk
Seams like anybody that was a Mariner got traded. When Dipoto arrived.
His performance last year after TOS was painful to watch. He couldn’t catch the ball behind the plate, couldn’t throw, and certainly couldn’t hit. Francona kept putting him in the lineup because the front office wanted their $6 million monies worth. Eventually he got so bad even Antonetti finally conceded he’d made a huge (by Cleveland’s free agent standards) mistake and allowed him to be DFA’d.
Great person, great player. He is from my area of Florida near Cape Coral. Go Gators