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ELÍAS DIAZ
- Position(s): Catcher
- Bats / Throws: Right / Right
- 2025 opening day age: 34
- Height / Weight: 6-foot-1 / 223 pounds
- How acquired: Signed as a free agent in January 2025
- Contract status: Will make $3.5 million on a one-year deal this season; there is a mutual option for 2026
- fWAR in 2024: 0.5 WAR
- Key 2024 stats: .265 avg., .313 OBP, .382 SLG, 6 HRs, 39 RBIs, 27 runs, 20 walks, 69 strikeouts, 0 steals (96 games, 351 plate appearances)
STAT TO NOTE
- 4 — Díaz’s fielding run value as a catcher in 2024, up from minus-6 and minus-5 in 2022 and 2023, respectively. Fielding run value captures a player’s defensive value on a run-based scale and Díaz maxed out at fielding run value of 7 in 2021 before falling off considerably in the next two seasons. Plus values in framing runs (2) and stealing runs (2) contributed to a defensive rebound in 2024.
TRENDING
- Down — While Díaz never generated a ton of momentum for his career in five years in Pittsburgh (.656 OPS), he hit a career-high 18 home runs in 2021 in Colorado, drove in as many as 72 runs in 2023 and was a .253/.305/.403 across five seasons with the Rockies. Díaz was not only an All-Star in 2023 (14 HRs, .725 OPS), his game-winning home run had made him the Midsummer Classic’s MVP. Díaz signed a three-year, $14.5 million extension before the 2022 season, but he lost time in his walk year in June to a left calf strain, was not moved at the trade deadline and was released in August by the Rockies, looking to play prospect Drew Romo, amid a .270/.315/.378 season after going unclaimed on waivers. The transaction allowed Díaz to get claimed by a playoff team and the Padres, looking for a better defensive option to pair with Kyle Higashioka than Luis Campusano, quickly signed him to a minor league deal and brought him up in September. Díaz got up to speed quickly, homered once among his 12 appearances in the final month of the season (.190/.292/.429) and got the nod over the younger Campusano as the second catcher on the playoff roster behind Higashioka. Díaz struck out in his one plate appearance in the postseason, the first playoff experience of his career after a decade split between the Pirates and Rockies.
2025 OUTLOOK
- Higashioka signed with the Texas Rangers this winter, leaving Díaz to compete with Campusano and Brett Sullivan — the only other catchers on the 40-man roster — for primary catching duties. Martín Maldonado, a 38-year-old veteran in camp on a minor league deal, could also factor in the competition, but Díaz is closer to his prime and has the best track record of anyone currently on the depth chart, meaning he’ll likely have a significant role on the team even if he’s not able to hold off Campusano in a stop-gap year as the team awaits the arrival of top prospect Ethan Salas.
Roster rankings
- 3. RHP Michael King
- 4. RHP Dylan Cease
- 5. OF Jackson Merrill
- 6. RHP Yu Darvish
- 7. INF Luis Arraez
- 8. INF Xander Bogaerts
- 9. RHP Robert Suarez
- 10. INF Jake Cronenworth
- 11. RHP Jason Adam
- 12. RHP Joe Musgrove
- 13. Adrián Morejón
- 14. RHP Jeremiah Estrada
- 15. RHP Matt Waldron
- 16. INF Eguy Rosario
- 17. RHP Randy Vásquez
- 18. RHP Bryan Hoeing
- 19. LHP Yuki Matsui
- 20. RHP Sean Reynolds
- 21. C Luis Campusano
- 22. RHP Jhony Brito
- 23. RHP Alek Jacob
- 24. C Elías Díaz
- 25. OF Tirso Ornelas
- 26. RHP Ryan Bergert
- 27. RHP Henry Baez
- 28. LHP Omar Cruz
- 29. OF Brandon Lockridge
- 30. LHP Tom Cosgrove
- 31. RHP Stephen Kolek
- 32. RHP Juan Nuñez
- 33. RHP Ron Marinaccio
- 34. C Brett Sullivan
- 35. UT Tyler Wade
- 36. LHP Wandy Peralta
Originally Published:
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