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2025 Review<\/p>\nOverview<\/p>\n
Rating: 8.43<\/p>\n
2025 Stats: 4.4 bWAR, .283 BA, 28 HR, .893 OPS, 145 wRC+<\/p>\n
Date of Birth: Oct 12, 1993 (32 YO)<\/p>\n
2025 Salary: $14,000,000<\/p>\n
2026 Status: under contract through 2031<\/p>\n
2025 Review<\/p>\n
2025 was ultimately a tale of two halves for the superstar second baseman Ketel Marte. Before the All-Star break, he looked every bit the MVP candidate who has anchored the Diamondbacks\u2019 lineup in recent years. Despite straining his hamstring just eight games into the season\u2014costing him most of April\u2014and dealing with an unfortunate fan incident in Chicago, Marte still slugged 19 home runs with a .961 OPS in the first half. He was dominant.<\/p>\n
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After the break, however, Marte appeared somewhat affected by lingering off-field issues from that period. While he remained a high-level performer in the second half, his production dipped to a more mortal .816 OPS, well below his blistering first-half pace. Still solidly above average, but it\u2019s fair to speculate that the surrounding commotion may have served as a distraction for the star player\u2014something entirely understandable given the circumstances.<\/p>\n
The tension peaked in mid-August when Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic reported grumbling in the clubhouse over the All-Star break drama and Marte\u2019s requests for days off. My goal here isn\u2019t to rehash old controversies, but context matters: these off-field challenges likely influenced his second-half performance to some degree. After all, we\u2019re evaluating human beings, not robots.<\/p>\n
Through it all\u2014the injury that sidelined him for weeks, the fan incident, and the ensuing drama\u2014Marte still emerged as one of baseball\u2019s elite hitters. He finished with an OPS just shy of .900 and posted one of the top xwOBA marks in the game, a remarkable feat under the circumstances.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, the off-field noise hasn\u2019t fully subsided. This offseason, Marte has been the subject of persistent trade speculation, fueled largely by his impending 10-and-5 rights in 2026 and the Diamondbacks\u2019 tight financial situation amid pitching needs and injuries. Every rumor seems to revisit the midseason clubhouse reports. Here\u2019s hoping GM Mike Hazen doesn\u2019t find a suitable deal, Marte remains a Diamondback, and this chapter finally closes.<\/p>\n
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2026 Outlook<\/p>\n
I\u2019m wholeheartedly hoping Ketel Marte suits up as an Arizona Diamondback to start 2026. He\u2019s a dynamic force who brings energy and presence to the lineup, and he\u2019s simply thrilling to watch. With a clean slate\u2014no lingering off-field drama or trade rumors\u2014I firmly believe Marte could reach even greater heights, which is a terrifying proposition for opposing pitchers.<\/p>\n
If he\u2019d maintained his first-half pace throughout 2025, we\u2019re talking about a legitimate MVP challenger to Shohei Ohtani. For the Diamondbacks to contend and make a playoff push in 2026, they\u2019ll need that version of Marte: the MVP-caliber cornerstone. His underlying metrics remain elite\u2014he barrels the ball with authority, continues improving his plate discipline by drawing more walks and striking out less\u2014and point to sustained excellence.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s to 2026 with Ketel Marte anchoring the heart of the Diamondbacks\u2019 order, burying the clubhouse reports and trade chatter once and for all. Arizona is unequivocally a better team with him in the lineup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Overview Rating: 8.43 2025 Stats: 4.4 bWAR, .283 BA, 28 HR, .893 OPS, 145 wRC+ Date of Birth:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":505849,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2404],"tags":[146,22,4314,5,38,729,4,727,468,2245],"class_list":{"0":"post-505848","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arizona-diamondbacks","8":"tag-arizona","9":"tag-arizona-diamondbacks","10":"tag-arizonadiamondbacks","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-diamondbacks","13":"tag-ketel-marte","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-ops","16":"tag-shohei-ohtani","17":"tag-the-diamondbacks"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115840179958655350","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=505848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/505849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=505848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=505848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=505848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}