During the first day of the MLB Winter Meetings, Jerry Dipoto, the Seattle Mariners President of Baseball Operations, said, “We feel like we got the No. 1 trade target on our list. If we could dream the dream — who would you want to acquire? This was the guy.
The Mariners targeted Jose Ferrer aggressively, making the first move of the Winter Meetings in Orlando by acquiring him from the Washington Nationals. Part of the return for Ferrer was one of the top catching prospects in baseball, and one of the best in the Mariners’ farm system, Harry Ford. The Mariners have conviction that this trade fixes a flaw in their roster that they believe cost them in a title run. It provides valuable insight into how the front office plans to approach this offseason and which areas of the roster they will prioritize. This is a team and city that suffered heartbreak. They stood on the cusp of something the franchise had never achieved. They are not willing to make the same mistake twice.
The organization highly regarded Harry Ford as a top-50 prospect. It’s a steep price on the surface for a left-handed middle reliever. Dig a little deeper, however, and the deal begins to make more sense.
Breaking Down the Mariners’ First Big Offseason Trade: Jose Ferrer for Harry Ford
Ferrer
With Gabe Speier as the only left-handed pitcher on the roster, the Mariners had to address this role in the offseason. Jose Ferrer makes the Mariners better in 2026 simply by meeting that need. He is a power left-hander who can top out near 100 mph and regularly sits at 97–98.
On the surface, Ferrer’s 2025 was average at best. He relied heavily on his sinker, throwing it 71 percent of the time, and worked with a limited three-pitch arsenal. While he did not generate a great deal of swing-and-miss, the underlying profile is more encouraging. Ferrer posted an elite ground-ball rate, ranking in the 99th percentile at 64.3 percent. He was almost impossible to square up, finishing in the 93rd percentile in barrel rate. That profile, paired with one of the league’s worst defensive units, contributed to a ballooning ERA. In addition, he throws a ton of strikes and does not walk batters often. This is an important caveat for pitchers who rely on groundouts, as you expect hits to come, so keeping men on base is paramount. This is a pitching profile the Mariners like to target.
Seattle’s infield defense was not much better in 2025, but it is an area the club expects to improve significantly in 2026. That matters for a pitcher like Ferrer, whose success is built on weak contact and ground balls rather than strikeouts. His high ERA and bouts of inconsistency will raise concerns, but this is where the Mariners’ confidence in their pitching development comes into play.
Ferrer leaned on his sinker on almost three out of every four pitches in Washington. However, that usage is unlikely to remain the same. His secondary offerings, particularly his slider, generate strong whiff rates despite throwing them just seven percent of the time last season. The Mariners, as an organization, heavily emphasize slider usage throughout their bullpen, and they have a track record of reshaping pitch mixes — most notably turning Luis Castillo from a changeup-heavy starter into a fastball-slider pitcher. There is a clear vision here for Ferrer’s development. The expectation is that his slider usage will increase and unlock more swing-and-miss over time. Park factor is another consideration. Washington plays as a hitter-friendly environment, and Ferrer’s home-road splits in 2025 already reflected stronger performance away from home. Seattle’s pitcher-friendly ballpark should provide a more forgiving backdrop for a ground-ball-heavy left-hander.
Initially, the Mariners are unlikely to use Ferrer in a high-leverage role. After ending last season as a closer, he now projects more as a fourth or fifth option in the bullpen and the second left-handed arm. Early usage is likely to be matchup-driven, particularly against left-handed hitters, a role in which he excelled last season.
Bullpen arms are inherently volatile, and nothing can be penciled in with certainty in December. But this is a gamble rooted in conviction and development rather than desperation. Even with an imperfect track record — as the Caleb Ferguson experiment showed — the Mariners are betting that Ferrer’s raw traits and underlying metrics give him a higher ceiling than his surface numbers suggest. The deeper you dig, the clearer the logic behind the move becomes.
Ford
The other side of this deal is prospect Harry Ford. A first-round draft pick in 2021 (12th overall), Ford performed exemplarily during his time in Seattle, and for many Mariners fans, the surprise was not the trade itself but the return for one of the jewels of the organization’s deep farm system. Teams across the league viewed Ford as a top-50 prospect, and expectations around his value grew accordingly. He currently ranks as the No. 42 prospect league-wide, per MLB Pipeline.
However, his pathway to meaningful playing time in Seattle was increasingly unclear. With an MVP runner-up firmly established behind the plate, Ford was rumored to be included in deadline discussions — most notably in talks surrounding Jhoan Durán. Initially, his stock was viewed as high enough to headline a one-for-one trade. More recent reporting, however, suggests that was never truly the case, and that he would have been part of a significant package to the Minnesota Twins for their star closer.
Within Mariners circles, there was frequent discussion about moving Ford off catcher to create a clearer route to increased playing time. But in reality, that always felt like an attempt to force a solution where one might not exist. The Mariners tried Ford in the outfield during his time in the minors, but the experiment was short-lived.
Mariners GM Justin Hollander on the difficult decision to trade MLB’s No. 42 prospect Harry Ford for Jose Ferrer:
“Harry’s path for development in the Big Leagues was going to be tougher and we love Jose Ferrer.”
MLB Network + @SageUSAmerica pic.twitter.com/QKZVDUS4pp
— MLB Network (@MLBNetwork) December 12, 2025
What this trade ultimately revealed was how the league viewed Ford as a prospect. Teams likely viewed him not as an elite catching talent, but as a solid, intriguing one. He profiles as a hitter with strong on-base numbers, high athleticism, and modest power. But with questions about his defensive ability behind the plate, this made him valuable, but not universally coveted. Some front offices, such as the Nationals, strongly valued his athleticism at the position. Other teams did not view him as a realistic option at the price Seattle would have sought. This limited his list of suitors, and with his pathway to playing time constrained in Seattle. The rest of the league understood the Mariners’ position, and this ultimately suppressed his trade value.
Ford remains a top-100 prospect and should receive a genuine opportunity with the Nationals. He has the tools to carve out a productive big-league career. But his value was always going to be defined by how teams viewed his position, defensive ceiling, and overall projection. The return Seattle received made that valuation clear, even if fan expectations were higher.
The Last Word
The reality for the Mariners is simpler. Seattle came within eight outs of a World Series, leaning on too small a group of reliable bullpen arms. In a seven-game October series, opposing lineups can exploit bullpens, even after excellent regular-season performances. Jose Ferrer will hopefully help alleviate some of the pressure on the rest of the Mariners’ bullpen, including Speier, Eduard Bazardo, and Matt Brash. For a team that believes it can win now, it will certainly not be the last bullpen addition they make.
Main Photo Credit: Rafael Suanes-Imagn Images
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