{"id":361641,"date":"2025-12-22T12:12:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/361641\/"},"modified":"2025-12-22T12:12:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:12:10","slug":"the-most-underrated-2025-26-mlb-free-agents-still-available","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/361641\/","title":{"rendered":"The Most Underrated 2025-26 MLB Free Agents Still Available"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">2025 Stats: .259\/.324\/.404, 12 HR, 46 RBI<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Career Stats: .244\/.321\/.371, 58 HR, 247 RBI<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">For any team looking to sign a catcher this winter who is going to be the starter most of the time in 2026, it&#8217;s looking a bit like J.T. Realmuto or bust.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">However, for teams that could use an upgrade in the No. 2 catcher slot and\/or back-up first baseman role, Victor Caratini really ought to be a prime target.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Houston even used Caratini as its designated hitter 30 times in 2025, in what was his third consecutive season with an OPS of at least .711, which is darn impressive as far as catchers go. At any rate, he is one of only seven catchers riding a three-year streak of at least 200 plate appearances and an OPS of at least .711, the others being Cal Raleigh, Will Smith, William Contreras, Sal Perez, Ryan Jeffers and Gabriel Moreno.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">He&#8217;s not exactly a negative on defense, either. Among the 35 players with at least 1,000 innings logged at catcher since the beginning of 2023, Caratini ranks 18th in <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/baseballsavant.mlb.com\/leaderboard\/fielding-run-value?gameType=Regular&amp;seasonStart=2023&amp;seasonEnd=2025&amp;type=fielder&amp;position=2&amp;minInnings=q&amp;minResults=1000\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Fielding Run Value<\/a>. (Formerly a two-time Gold Glove winner, Realmuto is 30th, rated as a terrible pitch framer.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"2025 Stats: .259\/.324\/.404, 12 HR, 46 RBI Career Stats: .244\/.321\/.371, 58 HR, 247 RBI For any team looking&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":361642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-361641","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=361641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/361642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=361641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=361641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=361641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}