Mariners third baseman Kyle Seager retires at age 34

Seattle Mariners third baseman Kyle Seager of Charlotte, NC retired at the age of 34 according to Rogers Sportsnet on Wednesday. Seager played 11 seasons of Major League Baseball in the Pacific Northwest from 2011 to 2021.

The news of Seager’s retirement may come as a bit of a surprise. That is because he had career highs in 2021 in home runs (35), and runs batted in (101). Despite the increase in power and statistical production in getting runs on the board, Seager had a career-worst batting average of.212, a career-worst on base percentage of .285, and a career-high 161 strikeouts. It was clear that Seager was not hitting the baseball with the same amount of consistency as he did in the early stages of his career.

Seager represented the Mariners in the 2014 Major League Baseball All-Star Game. That year he batted .268 with 25 home runs and 96 runs batted in. During his Major League Baseball career, Seager played in 1480 games with the Mariners, and had 5561 at bats. In 6204 plate appearances, he scored 705 runs, and had 1395 hits, 309 doubles, 14 triples, 242 home runs, 807 runs batted in, 55 stolen bases, 533 walks, 2458 total bases, 63 times hit by a pitch, five sacrifice bunts, and 42 sacrifice flies. Seager also had a career batting average of .251, a career on-base percentage of .321, and a career slugging percentage of .442.

During the coronavirus shortened season of 2020, Seager led Major League Baseball with six sacrifice flies. He had one more sacrifice fly than Mark Canha of the Oakland Athletics, Franmil Reyes of the Cleveland Indians, Yuli Gurriel of the Houston Astros, and Charlie Blackmon of the Colorado Rockies, who had five each.

Seager’s decision means he will not have a chance to play with the reigning American League Cy Young Award winner Robbie Ray in Seattle. The Mariners signed Ray to a five-year deal worth $115 million in the offseason.

Kyle will now have a chance to cheer on his brother Corey next year. The younger Seager brother signed a whopping 10-year contract worth $325 million with the Texas Rangers on December 1 after seven seasons with the Los Angeles Dodgers.