The Kansas City Royals once again invested in one of their young, homegrown players under team control, and fans rejoiced. Third baseman Maikel Garcia’s excellent 2025 season netted him plenty of accolades and that new contract, worth as much as $85.3 million across six years.
It was the latest affirmation of the franchise’s trust in Garcia, who the Royals signed back in 2016 as an international free agent from Venezuela. But even with his ascent, the stats, and the hardware, it still wasn’t enough to overcome… home runs?
MLB.com’s Michael Clair put together his All-World Team following the 2025 season. It’s a worthy exercise, especially with the World Baseball Classic closer than most fans might think. It also highlights just how much baseball talent comes from outside the United States, even as Americans dominate the overall player pool.
There are some no-brainer selections, like Japan’s Shohei Ohtani or Curaçao’s Ceddanne Rafaela. But once you get to third base, Royals fans will certainly say Clair chose the wrong Venezuelan.
Maikel Garcia is the best Venezuelan third baseman, despite MLB.com’s verdict.
Clair named swatter Eugenio Suárez as his third base pick, following Suárez’s 49-homer season with the Arizona Diamondbacks and Seattle Mariners. That was apparently the deciding factor over Garcia, with Clair still giving some love to Garcia’s 2025 campaign. But home runs alone do not make a valuable MLB player, and plenty of fans would tell you the same thing.
Garcia’s 5.6 fWAR was the second-highest among any primary third baseman and notably higher than Suárez’s 3.8 fWAR. Sure, Suárez held a slight edge in wRC+ (Garcia at 121, Suárez at 125), but Garcia was head, shoulders, knees, and toes better than Suárez in the field and on the bases.
Garcia went home this offseason with a Gold Glove as the AL’s best defensive third baseman and only lost out to Ke’Bryan Hayes for best at the position in all of baseball. Meanwhile, Suárez graded out as a below-average defender in 159 games, a departure from what some expected from him at this stage of his career.
Suárez is still seeking a new deal after 2025, and the way his power waxed and waned throughout the year is a massive red flag. After July, he was a below-average hitter by wRC+, and the Mariners were winning in spite of him while he struck out at nearly a 40% clip. That late-season fade put a huge damper on what was otherwise an All-Star campaign from the veteran.
The 34-year-old Suárez was surely a blast to watch as he put nearly 50 balls over the fence for the second time in his career. But if you’re picking a third baseman for a best-of-five series, are you really taking the streaky power over Garcia’s balance and all-around value? Logic, and a look under the hood, says you probably shouldn’t.
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