{"id":87632,"date":"2025-08-22T14:02:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T14:02:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/87632\/"},"modified":"2025-08-22T14:02:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-22T14:02:07","slug":"orioles-rookie-samuel-basallo-reportedly-agrees-to-8-year-67-million-extension-with-team-days-after-mlb-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/87632\/","title":{"rendered":"Orioles rookie Samuel Basallo reportedly agrees to 8-year, $67 million extension with team days after MLB debut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Baltimore Orioles catcher Samuel Basallo has been in the major leagues for less than a week, but the team already likes what it sees from the young star. Basallo reportedly agreed to an <a data-i13n=\"cpos:1;pos:1\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/JeffPassan\/status\/1958881906327523565\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:eight-year, $67 million extension;cpos:1;pos:1;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">eight-year, $67 million extension<\/a> with the club Friday, according to ESPN&#8217;s Jeff Passan.<\/p>\n<p>The deal \u2014 which goes into effect next season \u2014 can max out at $88.5 million based on incentives, and is the largest pre-arbitration extension ever given to a catcher, per Passan.<\/p>\n<p>The contract also reportedly contains a club option.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>The move comes just days after Basallo, 21, made his major-league debut. The young catcher entered the 2025 MLB season as a consensus top-15 prospect, but the Orioles opted to wait until late August to call him up to the majors.<\/p>\n<p>Basallo has acquitted himself well since his call-up, and is hitting .300 in his first 11 plate appearances. Prior to his promotion, Basallo hit .270\/.377\/.589 over 321 plate appearances at Triple-A in 2025.<\/p>\n<p>The reported extension seems to suggest the Orioles view Basallo as their catcher of the future. That could put former top prospect Adley Rutschman in a tough spot once he&#8217;s ready to return from an oblique injury.<\/p>\n<p>Rutschman, once considered the top overall prospect in the game, got off to a tremendous start early in his career. During his first two years in the majors, Rutschman slashed .268\/.369\/.439. But injuries have limited Rutschman&#8217;s effectiveness over the last two seasons, where he&#8217;s posted a .242\/.315\/.385 slash line.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Rutschman, who has battled oblique injuries all season, was placed on the Injured List on Thursday due to yet another oblique strain. The move puts Rutschman&#8217;s 2025 season in jeopardy and opens the door for Basallo to serve as the team&#8217;s primary catcher down the stretch. While the Orioles aren&#8217;t playing for a spot in the postseason, Basallo now has multiple weeks to prove he deserves a starting spot on the team&#8217;s roster next season.<\/p>\n<p>Basallo&#8217;s promotion and extension doesn&#8217;t necessarily mean the team has soured on Rutschman. The Orioles could rotate both players next season, or use one as its primary DH and the other as its starting catcher.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>But if Basallo produces during his 2025 audition, the Orioles could have some interesting roster decisions to make in the offseason.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Baltimore Orioles catcher Samuel Basallo has been in the major leagues for less than a week, but the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87633,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[44663,64,63,65379,37757,31391,591,33725,5129,65377,85,65378],"class_list":["post-87632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-adley-rutschman","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basallo","tag-extension","tag-jeff-passan","tag-mlb","tag-next-season","tag-orioles","tag-samuel-basallo","tag-sports","tag-the-orioles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}