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The Brewers have agreed to terms on a deal with veteran catcher Gary Sánchez, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post. The MDR Sports client will be guaranteed $1.75MM on the deal.
Sánchez, 33, spent the 2025 season with the Orioles organization but was limited to just 30 games and 101 plate appearances due to wrist inflammation and, more seriously, a sprain of the posterior cruciate ligament in his right knee. He was reasonably productive when healthy, popping five homers and turning in a .231/.297/.418 batting line (100 wRC+).
This will be Sánchez’s second stint with the Brewers in the past three seasons. He spent the 2024 campaign in Milwaukee as well, hitting .220/.307/.392 with 11 homers in 280 plate appearances. He served as a backup to William Contreras and a part-time (40 games) designated hitter that season and figures to reprise that role in 2026.
A former top prospect and an All-Star earlier with the Yankees early in his career, Sánchez has settled into a backup/part-time role in recent seasons. He appeared in 128 games and totaled 471 plate appearances with the Twins in 2022 after being traded from the Bronx to Minnesota, but he’s taken only 648 plate appearances combined in the three subsequent seasons (albeit, in part due to last year’s injuries).
Sánchez developed a reputation as a defensive liability earlier in his career but progressed to the point that he turned in solid defensive marks behind the dish in both 2022 and 2023. He was closer to average in ’24 and slipped back below average in 2025, per both Defensive Runs Saved and Statcast, though that was obviously a small sample (175 innings). He’ll return to a Milwaukee club where he’s familiar with some members of the staff (e.g. Brandon Woodruff, Abner Uribe, Trevor Megill, Aaron Ashby, Jared Koenig), but the Brewers’ staff has turned over a fair bit even in the roughly 18 months since Sánchez’s initial departure.
The Brewers recently signed veteran catcher Reese McGuire to a minor league deal and invited him to spring training. He’d been in line to serve as the backup to Contreras but now seems likely to be ticketed for Triple-A Nashville — if he doesn’t have an out clause in his contract that allows him to explore other opportunities late in camp.
The addition of those two veterans gives the Brewers the ability to be more patient with top prospect Jeferson Quero, who is widely regarded as the heir to Contreras behind the plate but still has just 59 games and 251 plate appearances of Triple-A ball under his belt. He could push his way into the mix with a big enough season in Nashville, and it’s feasible that he’ll be ready for a full-time look in 2027, when Contreras will be entering his final season of club control (and likely be an offseason trade candidate, as is often the case with top Brewers players who are a year from reaching free agency).