The A’s have been the most active team in baseball when it comes to extending young players over the past year and are still trying to ink a few members of their young core of hitters to long-term deals. In addition to their recent extension offer to reigning AL Rookie of the Year Nick Kurtz, the A’s have made some efforts to sign catcher Shea Langeliers, reports Jon Heyman of the New York Post.
Athletics general manager David Forst and his staff have reached long-term deals with outfielder Lawrence Butler (seven years, $65.5MM), shortstop Jacob Wilson (seven years, $70MM), outfielder Tyler Soderstrom (seven years, $86MM) and designated hitter Brent Rooker (five years, $60MM).
Langeliers, 28, is a fairly natural extension candidate but also could be tougher to sign than many of his teammates. Unlike Butler, Wilson and Soderstrom, he’s already reached arbitration and commanded a notable year-one salary, agreeing to terms on a $5.25MM for the upcoming season. With another pair of arbitration raises looming before he reaches free agency in the 2028-29 offseason, Langeliers could realistically take home between $25-30MM over his three arbitration season.
Langeliers is also represented by the Boras Corporation, and while the narrative that Boras clients don’t sign extensions is a bit overstated, there’s no denying that such occurrences are rare. As can be seen in MLBTR’s Contract Tracker, there have only been seven extensions of three or more years for Boras clients over the past decade. There haven’t been any extensions for Boras-repped players in Langeliers’ service class (between three and four years) that have bought out free agent seasons in that time (Contract Tracker link).
[Related: What would it cost for the A’s to continue their run of extensions?]
Acquired from the Braves in the trade that sent Matt Olson to Atlanta, Langeliers has steadily improved his offensive profile each year in the majors. He’s fresh off a breakout .277/.325/.536 batting line (132 wRC+) with a career-high 31 homers and a career-low 19.7% strikeout rate. Langeliers doesn’t walk a ton but tied with Colorado’s Hunter Goodman for second-most home runs among all big league catchers in 2025 (trailing only AL MVP runner-up Cal Raleigh). He also ripped 29 home runs in 2024, and his combined 60 round-trippers over the past two years give him sole possession of second place among all catchers in that regard (again, trailing Raleigh).
Defensively, Langeliers is somewhat lacking. He posted quality caught-stealing rates in the first few seasons of his career but dropped to a career-worst 15.6% in 2025. He improved upon what were previously poor grades for blocking balls in the dirt and framing pitches, but Statcast still ranked him average or slightly below in both categories. The 2025 version of Langeliers wasn’t a liability with the glove, but he’s pretty firmly established himself a bat-first option at the position.
Sorting our Contract Tracker for extensions among catchers who have already reached arbitration reveals a few recent comps of note. Langeliers probably wouldn’t be enticed by Alejandro Kirk‘s five-year, $58MM deal at this juncture, and the A’s would presumably balk at locking him in for the $105MM guarantee ($99.4MM in new money) that the Mariners gave to Raleigh. The man he replaced behind the plate for the A’s, Sean Murphy, signed a six-year, $73MM deal that might be more in the ballpark of market value for Langeliers.
It’s not entirely clear whether Langeliers is amenable to an extension, but it’s somewhat notable that they’re still working to get their most prominent unsigned regulars locked up on long-term deals.
Beyond Langeliers and Kurtz, the A’s don’t have any clear extension candidates. If they want to be especially aggressive, they could take a run at top pitching prospects Gage Jump and Jamie Arnold before either makes his MLB debut, although the latter has yet to even pitch in a professional game after being drafted with the No. 11 overall pick last summer, so that’d probably be a discussion for next spring rather than this one. Jump, 23 next month, was the No. 73 overall pick in 2024 and now ranks as a consensus top-100 prospect. He was excellent between High-A and Double-A last year and should be in line to make his major league debut in 2026.
I just assumed everyone except Kurtz has been extended at this point.
Seems like a a catcher an extension is a better idea than any other position, except maybe pitcher. Lots of injury risk.
Oddly it feels like the reverse, a lot of catchers seem to have shorter time frames where they are good. Look at Murphy, the drop off a catcher just comes so much sooner.
Catching is rough. You wear down quicker.
That is why I think an extension is more beneficial to the player. Sorry if my post wasn’t clear I missed an s in as a catcher. I think guaranteeing a few years of payday may be worth more to the player.
I was thinking the exact same thing. I’ve seen so many catchers fall apart at pretty early ages. I remember looking through a bunch of top hitting catchers a while back and nearly every one of them was done as a standout offensive performer by the age of 32. Many of them declined before that, but that was cut off point that nearly all of them failed to get past.
The A’s look like they could be very interesting to watch for the next two years before they move to Vegas. Even without extensions to Kurtz or Langeliers they have a nice controllable core. Considering the AL West isn’t exactly the strongest division at the moment they could serious challengers soon.
Feels like the A’s trying to take a page out of the Braves book and while this won the Braves a WS, things don’t look so great atm with that team and all the locked up players.
@LFGM31: It’s not a good strategy en masse but rather selective with a couple you trust will keep the motor going. Too many extensions and you have a lot of fat/happy guys who get paid a big fixed amount no matter how they perform instead of players busting it to up their arb numbers and having a direct interest to avoid much IL time.
Braves won WS in spite of extended Acuna being out and hating the deal he signed right away. FAs to be like Soler/Rosario/etc helped them in huge way even though one of their weaker teams on paper heading in. Atl position players lot more content than they otherwise would have been. Human beings respond/perform best with “incentives” rather than guaranteed outcomes in most professions and facets of life.
I think it’s a solid strategy, theoretically, to lock up all of these core players to long-term extensions. We’ll see if that comes back to bite them a few years down the road, but for now, the A’s look like they could the frontrunners for the AL West soon.
I think the Athletics will try to extend him, but as a catcher he’s going to have a ton of value as a free agent if he puts up numbers anywhere near his last two years. I think he tests free agency.
He’s a Boras client. Yes, there are exceptions. Very few of them. He’s not signing an extension.
The players see the bright future of the team and the Vegas move. The A’s are going to be a team where free agents want to go. Fisher knew what he was doing all along. Brilliant business man. Genius owner
Ok, you’re laying on the sarcasm pretty thick….right?
It’s a completely new era for them. I’m not saying this year or even the next, but within 5 they will be winning the division and within 7 a WS
Or he’s laying on the early afternoon vodka & dro “pretty thick” too, would be my first guess.
In all seriousness, though, they could have a pretty nice core for when they arrive in Vegas.
Hes no genius…. hes a scum bag like most believe
His team does have a bright future but I wouldnt give him too much credit like hes the main reason. Hes a factor most Def
Great season last year from Langeliers in ’25, cut his strikeouts down and hit for contact, great power hitter.
A’s would be wise to sew him up.
With Boras it’s always about the greed and love of excessive money
They are building up a solid base of hitters, they just need to get a collection of pitchers to round out a solid playoff team. But will they continue to keep them for longer period than in past.
As an A fan i hope you they trade him. Guy isn’t good
It’s still crazy the Braves traded him, and Contreras, and ended up with arguably an even better catcher in Baldwin. Good scouting and development at the position.
Baldwin could end up better but right now hes definitely not