How an even slower Josh Naylor is still getting away with robbery for Mariners

Josh Naylor stole two more bases for the Mariners on Monday, turning what used to feel like a punchline into one of Seattle’s most reliable pressure points. This is still one of the funniest and most useful parts of their offense.  Naylor is not fast. And yet here we are, watching him swipe bags like the rest of the league has collectively decided to ignore him standing on first.

Naylor now has 12 stolen bases this season. Since the start of last year, he has 42. Only nine players in baseball have more over that span.

That shouldn’t make sense when his average sprint speed has actually dipped from 24.4 feet per second last season to 24.2 this year. Only six qualified runners are slower than him this season. Five are catchers. The other is Giancarlo Stanton, which is not exactly the guy anyone should want to be compared to in a footrace.

Yet, Naylor keeps getting away with it. It’s not chaos for the sake of chaos. Naylor has turned into a weapon on the bases. It’s a reminder that baserunning isn’t always about raw speed. It’s about nerve, timing, preparation and knowing exactly when the other team has stopped paying attention.

Naylor is stealing bases because he’s reading the room better than everyone else. He just has to beat the pitcher to the idea first, and somehow, teams keep letting him do it.

Josh Naylor’s stolen bases are becoming a very real Mariners weapon

There is something hilarious about a 235-pound first baseman becoming one of the more dangerous baserunners in the sport, but the joke stopped being the story a while ago.

Naylor stole 30 bases last season and was caught only twice. This year, he’s already 12-for-14. For a Mariners offense that can still spend too many nights waiting on the big swing, his baserunning creates a different kind of pressure.

Eric Young Jr. deserves credit here, too. The Mariners’ running game has become one of the clearest year-over-year changes in their offensive identity, moving from 118 stolen bases in 2023 to 140 in 2024, then 161 in 2025. That last number tied for third in MLB. Naylor is the strangest and most useful proof of concept. Seattle is not just stealing bases with burners. It’s finding ways to turn preparation, timing and aggression into extra pressure from spots opponents still do not fully respect.

Baseball is better when something that shouldn’t work keeps working anyway. Naylor is slower than almost everybody stealing bases at this level, and somehow he keeps turning pitchers into victims. Maybe the league eventually adjusts. Maybe catchers start treating him like the problem he has already proven he is.

Until then, the Mariners should let him keep robbing people blind.

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