Mitch Garver

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Mitchell Lyn Garver

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Biographical Information[edit]

Catcher Mitch Garver made his major league debut with the Minnesota Twins late in the 2017 season. In 2018, he began to see regular playing time, as he hit .268 in 102 games with 7 homers and 45 RBIs. He was the team's most-used catcher that year, as Jason Castro missed large chunks of time due to injury.

In 2019, he was off to a great start, hitting .329 with 9 homers and 19 RBIs in his first 25 games when he was the one set back by an injury. On May 15th, he was placed on the injured list with a sprained left ankle. He missed just two weeks, returning on June 2nd, and picked up where he left off: he hit his 20th homer on July 31st and exactly a month later, on August 31st, he hit the blast that allowed the Twins to break the all-time record for most home runs by a team in a season. His 9th-inning shot in a 10-7 loss to the Detroit Tigers was the 268th by a Twins batter that year, eclipsing the previous mark set by the New York Yankees the previous year. On September 7th, a two-homer game against the Cleveland Indians, the second a three-run shot in the 7th inning that led the Twins to a 5-3 win. That gave him 28 homers on the year, eclipsing the team record by a catcher of 26 set by Earl Battey in 1963. He finished the season at .273 in 93 games, with 31 homers and 67 RBIs. In the postseason, he went 2 for 12 as the Twins were swept by the New York Yankees in the Division Series.

In 2020, the Coronavirus pandemic and injuries limited him to just 23 games and 72 at-bats, and he was unable to recapture the previous year's magic, batting just .167 with 2 homers. He appeared in the postseason again, but had only one at-bat, in which he struck out, when the Twins were again swept, this time by the Houston Astros in the Wild Card Series. He managed to bounce back to a large extend in 2021 even if his team did not, as he hit .256 with 13 homers and 34 RBIs in 68 games, with an OPS+ of 139. However, he was now 30, and the much younger - and better defensive player - Ryan Jeffers had emerged as the Twins' starting backstop while he was struggling the previous year. While Jeffers was nowhere neat the hitter Garver was, the Twins saw an opportunity to improve their team after the resolution of the 2021-2022 lockout, trading him to the Texas Rangers in return for SS Isiah Kiner-Falefa and P Ronny Henriquez, Kiner-Falefa filling a large and obvious hole at shortstop for the upcoming season. Meanwhile, the Rangers had received little offensive production the previous season from their catchers, Jose Trevino and Jonah Heim, so Mitch was an obvious fit there.

In 2022, he played 54 games for Texas, hitting .207 with 10 homers and 24 RBIs for an OPS+ of 98. Only 14 of these games were at catcher, as Heim improved significantly, and even with Trevino having been traded to the New York Yankees, Sam Huff and Meibrys Viloria saw more time behind the dish than he did. Most of his appearances were as a DH, a trend which continued in 2023 when he had a much better season, hitting .270 in 87 games with 19 homers and 50 RBIs. His OPS+ rose to 134, which fully justified using him regularly as a DH. Meanwhile, Heim was an All-Star providing excellent defense by then, and new manager Bruce Bochy basically used him every day behind the plate in the stretch run, when the Rangers claimed a postseason slot. Garver did not see action in the first round of the postseason, but then made an important contribution to the Rangers claiming their first ever World Series title as he homered in each of the next three rounds, driving in 14 runs. The first of his long balls was a grand slam hit off Jacob Webb of the Baltimore Orioles in Game 2 of the Division Series on October 8th, and on October 28th, he homered off Merrill Kelly of the Arizona Diamondbacks in Game 2 of the World Series.

Garver became a free agent following Texas's World Series win. On December 24th, it was reported that he had agreed to a two-year, $24 million deal with the Seattle Mariners. He was expected to be primarily a DH going forward, while occasionally backing up Cal Raleigh behind the plate.

Notable Achievements[edit]

Further Reading[edit]

  • Daniel Kramer: "Garver agrees to 2-year deal with Mariners", mlb.com, December 24, 2023. [1]
  • Kennedi Landry: "Newly acquired Garver adds pop, stability to Rangers' mix: Former Silver Slugger-winning backstop provides good mentor for young pitching staff", mlb.com, March 12, 2022. [2]

Related Sites[edit]

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