Joe Mack Catching Runners Stealing: Marlins Rookie Goes 4-for-4
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Joe Mack’s June 9 game against the Diamondbacks showed what five years of minor-league work buys a catcher: the trust to stay in the lineup when it matters most.
No MLB catcher had reached double-digit caught stealings this fast in modern baseball history. Joe Mack was about to become number thirteen.
The game was tied 6-6 in the sixth inning, runners on, the Arizona Diamondbacks pushing for the lead. Miami won an ABS challenge — baseball’s new system that lets players contest a ball or strike call by tapping their helmet — and escaped the jam. Then Mack kept hitting.
By the final out of a 10-6 Marlins win on Tuesday, June 9, the 23-year-old rookie had gone 4-for-4, a career high. He had already thrown out a basestealer in the second inning, his eighteenth caught stealing of the season. The box score looked like a different catcher’s night. It was Mack’s Tuesday.
The catcher Miami waited five years to start
Joe Mack was the 31st overall pick in the 2021 MLB Draft, chosen by Miami out of Williamsville East High School in Buffalo, New York. He did not take the fast path to the majors. He spent five seasons in the minors, learning the position from the dirt up — working his mechanics, studying hitters, building the reputation that earns a manager’s trust in a 6-6 tie.
In 2024 he won the Minor League Gold Glove — the award given each year to the best defensive player at each position across the minors — at catcher. MLB Pipeline ranked him the No. 41 overall prospect entering this season. He made his big-league debut on May 4, 2026.
He has not wasted a day.
On the night he went 4-for-4, Mack became the youngest catcher in Marlins history to record four hits in a game. His season numbers at the time of that game tell the story:
| G | CS | HR |
|---|---|---|
| 28 | 18 | 9 |
The home run total turns heads. The caught-stealing number is the one that changes a franchise.
Mack reached double-digit caught stealings in just 28 games — making him the 13th catcher in MLB history to get there that fast. His manager left him in the lineup against a left-hander in a tie game. Mack rewarded the faith with two key hits in his final turns at the plate.
What a catcher can learn from this
Every caught stealing Mack recorded in the minors was a deposit. The quick exchange drilled in Double-A. The footwork out of the crouch in Triple-A. The throw’s accuracy to second, dialed in over thousands of reps that never appeared on any leaderboard. That was the ledger — and June 9 was a withdrawal.
The ABS challenge mattered too. Under the MLB’s system, each team starts a game with two challenges; win one and you keep it. Mack used one in the sixth inning to help Miami escape the jam. Knowing the rules, knowing when to use them — that is part of the job now at every level. The cerebral part of catching is expanding, and the catchers who study those rules gain an edge nobody else on the field can provide.
Here is the irreducible truth behind Mack’s season: catchers who control the running game force managers to keep them in the lineup. You do not have to hit .400 to be irreplaceable. You have to be the catcher nobody wants to take out. Mack made the case for himself with his arm long before he made it with his bat.
The work you put in behind the plate today is prodigious — a word for doing more than seems necessary, more than anyone is watching, more than the scoreboard will ever reflect. Mack did it for five years in the minors. Now the scoreboard is catching up.
That could be you.
Try this at your next practice
- Quick exchange drill. Set up a partner with a bucket of balls at catcher’s distance. Catch, transfer, and throw to a bag as fast as possible — time yourself with a phone. The drill trains the muscle memory Mack built over thousands of Minor League reps. Goal: get your exchange under 0.6 seconds.
- Pop time circuit. Have a partner throw you pitches from 30 feet (or use a pitching machine). On every third or fourth pitch, a coach or teammate calls “runner” — you pop, transfer, and throw to second. The random trigger forces you to stay ready on every pitch, not just the ones you expect.
- Runner-on-second read drill. Practice identifying the count and the game situation before each pitch. Before the ball is thrown, ask yourself: should I look the runner back? Is a pitch-out the right call? This is the cerebral preparation that lets a catcher use an ABS challenge at the right moment — it starts with reading the game, not just receiving the pitch.
Sources: Joe Mack leads Marlins past Diamondbacks with 4-hit game, elite defense · Marlins’ Joe Mack Is Flashing His Mitt as Much as His Hits (SI) · Joe Mack Showing Marlins Why He is Their Catcher of the Future (SI) · Joe Mack — Wikipedia)
