Mariners' Luke Raley has 2 swings most players only dream of

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May 9, 2026 - 02:53

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Mariners' Luke Raley has 2 swings most players only dream of originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

Luke Raley wasn't supposed to make it to the major leagues, let alone have a night like the one he did Friday for the Seattle Mariners.

Raley was a standout at Medina Highland High School in northeast Ohio, but not enough to end up with a Division I program.

Instead, he went to Division II Lake Erie College, a program known as the Storm.

Raley did enough there -- .424 average with 12 homers as a junior -- to earn a seventh-round selection by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 2016 MLB draft.

Still, though, guys like Raley don't get lots of chances. They're passed over by flashier draft picks in the years after them.

That is, if they don't hit.

But if there's one thing Raley has done since the moment his hands got onto a baseball bat, it's hit.

He hit while climbing up the Dodgers system, then was traded to the Twins, then was traded back to the Dodgers.

He debuted for the Dodgers in 2021, then got a couple chances in the next two years with the Tampa Bay Rays.

By 2024, Raley was heading to Seattle in a deal for Jose Caballero, and he hit 22 home runs that season.

Injuries hurt Raley's cause in 2025, and he had just four home runs in 73 games.

This season? Raley's bat is working again, never more so than Friday night.

He slugged a grand slam, and as if that wasn't enough, he added a three-run homer.

Luke Raley is the first @Mariners player with a grand slam and 3-run homer in the same game since Nelson Cruz on July 23, 2016 at Toronto.— Mariners PR (@MarinersPR) May 9, 2026

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The smooth lefty swing of the kid from northeast Ohio was more than enough to push aside the Chicago White Sox -- despite a first-inning home run from rising star Munetaka Murakami.

This was Raley's night, and it's the kind of moment that makes you realize all that goes into a baseball journey.

Raley passed so many players along the way who never made it -- some who never were supposed to, but also some who had higher expectations than himself.

Sometimes, the best way to the big leagues is to just keep swinging, and swinging well.

Raley is proof of that.