Cal Raleigh Hits Three-Run Homer Despite .115 August
The season number does not win the at-bat. The catcher does.
Cal Raleigh hit 60 home runs in 2025. Sixty! That is the most ever by a catcher in the history of baseball.
But in 2026, he has been something else entirely. Two weeks ago on this site, we covered how Raleigh’s front-hip timing broke down against elevated fastballs. As a result, pitchers had begun exploiting it. The result: a .157 batting average, a drop in the batting order, and more questions than answers.
August was the hardest month yet. He was batting .115 heading into Friday’s game. In fact, half his August hits had been home runs — and he was about to add another one.
The Chicago Cubs came to Seattle on Friday, August 22 with serious bats. Alex Bregman had already homered twice. Pete Crow-Armstrong went deep. Ian Happ added one too. By the middle innings, the Mariners were staring at a game they badly needed to win. They sat 4.5 games back in the AL West.
Raleigh stepped in with runners on base. Whatever the season number said, this at-bat said something different.
He hit a three-run home run.
That swing did not fix his mechanics. It did not change his August average. Still, it put three runs on the scoreboard when the Mariners needed them most. After that, Seattle held on in extra innings. Leo Rivas singled home the walk-off run in the bottom of the tenth. The Mariners won 6-5.
The 2025 Home Run King showed up when the game asked him to. That is who he is: AL MVP runner-up, the first catcher ever to win the Home Run Derby, the only catcher in history to hit 60 in a season. A season average does not change those credentials. Neither does a slump.
So Raleigh’s average will not remember Friday night. A season average is a long count of everything — the slumps, the adjustments, the days the mechanics cooperate and the days they don’t. But Friday night was one at-bat. And catchers, more than anyone else on the field, know the difference between a season and a moment.
A catcher calls 150 pitches in a game. Each one is its own decision: what does this hitter chase, what does my pitcher throw best right now, what does this game need? The at-bat works the same way. When Raleigh stepped in with runners on base, his season average was not the tool. His hands were. His eye was. Above all, his willingness to stay present — to compete even when the season feels diminished — was the whole job.
That is the part of the position that does not fit in a box score. But it is the part that wins ballgames.
Try this at your next practice
- Pressure at-bat simulation. In your next round of batting practice, call “runners on, two outs” before you step in. Then swing with the situation, not just the pitch. The mindset changes everything.
- One-pitch focus drill. After a rough game or a tough week, take one round of BP with a single goal: hit this pitch hard. Not the next ten. This one. That is how Raleigh’s 14th home run happened — not by fixing a season, but by winning one at-bat.
- Season-and-moment journaling. After each game, write down one thing you did well behind the plate — a pickoff, a framing sequence, a pitch call that worked. Your value doesn’t live in one number. Neither does Raleigh’s. Sweat the gear and never fear.
Sources: Cal Raleigh Goes 1 for 4, Homers In Win Over Cubs (FanDuel Research) · Mariners rebound from tough start, walk off Cubs in 10 (SouthernSportsToday) · Mariners’ Cal Raleigh: Big blast in win (CBS Sports) · Cal Raleigh crushes a three-run home run (MLB.com)