Jorge Mateo

Jorge Luis Mateo

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 6' 0", Weight 192 lb.

• Debut August 13, 2020

• Born June 23, 1995 in Santo Domingo, Distrito Nacional D.R.

BR page

Biographical Information

Shortstop Jorge Mateo was signed to his first professional contract by the New York Yankees on January 28, 2012. He was only 17 at the time and spent two seasons in the Dominican Summer League in 2012 and 2013 before moving to the United States in 2014. His first season there was with the GCL Yankees 1, where he hit .276 in 15 games. He graduated to full-season ball in 2015, when he played 117 games between the Charleston RiverDogs and the Tampa Yankees. He put up good numbers, hitting .278/.345/.392 with 66 runs.

In 2016, he spent a full season with Tampa in the Florida State League and hit .254 with 8 homers and 47 RBIs in 113 games. He returned to Tampa at the start of 2017, and after hitting .250 in 69 games, received a promotion to AA, where he was with the Trenton Thunder of the Eastern League for 30 games. His bat picked up there, as he hit .300 during that span. On July 31st, he was one of three players traded to the Oakland Athletics in return for P Sonny Gray, the others being OF Dustin Fowler and P James Kaprielian. He moved to the Texas League and finished the season with the Midland RockHounds, where he continued to hit well, with a .292 average in 30 games. Between the three stops, he played 129 games and hit .267/.322/.459, with 30 doubles, 18 triples and 12 homers. He also stole 52 bases. Most of his power production came in AA, but it was in the FSL that he was a mid-season All-Star, as he had already been in 2016.

Mateo spent the entire 2018 season in AAA with the Nashville Sounds of the Pacific Coast League. However, his production was underwhelming, as he batted .230/.280/.353 in 131 games. He did hit 17 doubles and 16 triples, but just 3 homers. In 2019, the A's changed AAA affiliates, and he had a much better season with the Las Vegas Aviators. He was named to the American League team for the 2019 Futures Game, and improved to .289/.330/.504 in 119 games, with plenty of extra bases: 29 doubles, 14 triples and 19 homers. He also scored 95 runs and drove in 78, and he was a mid-season All-Star in the PCL. In fact, his hitting profile was very similar to that of the A's major league shortstop, Marcus Semien, who had finished third in the MVP vote. So this was both a tribute to Jorge's batting line, but also a problem as his path was clearly blocked at the major league level, especially since he was out of minor league options by that point.

On June 30, 2020, Mateo was the first player to change teams after the freeze on transactions imposed in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic was lifted. The A's sent him to the San Diego Padres in exchange for future considerations (OF Junior Perez was sent to Oakland on November 5th to complete the transaction). He made his major league debut with the Padres three weeks into the season, on August 13th, going 0 for 3 in an 11-2 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers. He appeared in 22 games but had only 26 at-bats that first season, and while 3 of his 4 hits were doubles, his batting average was only .154.

Jorge started the 2021 season with the Padres, hitting .207 in 57 games but only 87 at-bats, as once again his role was confined to that of defensive substitute, pinch-hitter and pinch-runner. His most common positions were center field and third base. On August 5th, he was claimed off waivers by the Baltimore Orioles after the Padres had made some acquisitions at the trading deadline and needed his roster spot. It turned out to be the career break he needed. Over the final two months of the season, he had 107 at-bats in 32 games, and batted .280 with 2 homers and 8 RBIs. He then became a regular in 2022, appearing in 150 games as the starting shortstop. He batted .221 with 13 homers and 60 RBIs and in an unexpected development led the American League in stolen bases with 35. His OPS+ was 84 largely due to a very poor on-base percentage of just .267. He maintained that last figure in 2023, when he batted .217 in 166 games, with 7 homers and 34 RBIs. By then, the Orioles had emerged as one of the top teams in the league, with youngsters like Gunnar Henderson and Jordan Westburg pushing for playing time in the infield, and Jackson Holliday tearing up the minors and waiting in the wings for an infield spot as well. So Mateo's OPS+ of 70 was not going to cut it for long, no matter how good a fielder of baserunner he was. He made his postseason debut that year, going 4 for 5 with 2 doubles while the O's were upset by the Texas Rangers in the Division Series.

In his final two seasons with the Orioles in 2024 and 2025, Jorge had become a utility player, filling in mainly at shortstop or in center field for defensive purposes. He appeared in 68 games the first year and only 42 the second, batting .229 and .177 respectively. He managed to keep his OPS+ at a decent level of 91 in 2024 thanks to good power (for the third straight year, his OBP was .267), but really brought nothing to the table with his bat in 2025, when his OPS+ was 36. In spent some time back in AAA with the Norfolk Tides that final season, batting .318 in 12 games. The Orioles were still a good team in 2024, but he was not used in the postseason, but when they played below expectations in 2025, his days were clearly numbered.

He became a free agent after the 2025 season and did not elicit much interest until the Atlanta Braves found themselves in a quandary in January of 2026. They had signed Ha-Seong Kim as a free agent a few weeks earlier, but he was the victim of a freak injury while spending the winter in his native South Korea, so the team was suddenly short one infielder for the start of the season. That's when they decided to sign Jorge to a one-year deal on January 19th.

Notable Achievements

• AL Stolen Bases Leader (2022)

Further Reading

• Mark Bowman: "Atlanta adds infielder Mateo on 1-year deal", mlb.com, January 19, 2026. [1]

Related Sites

• Jorge Mateo on mlb.com
• BR Minors page