Latest Stephen Vogt Mariners rumor creates head-scratching ‘what if’ around his Guardians future 

Last week Stephen Vogt snuffed out all the rumors around his future when announced at his end-of-season presser that he was staying in Cleveland and had no intentions of pursuing the Mariners’ managerial opening. 

But just because he had no intention of pursuing that opening doesn’t mean that everyone else felt the same way. On Monday MLB.com’s Daniel Kramer put out a story about the Mariners opening, where he wrote that the Guardians “were open to allowing Vogt to explore the opportunity with the Mariners, but he quickly quashed it and preferred to stay in Cleveland.” 

An interesting development to say the least. 

While that doesn’t mean the Guardians are trying to get rid of Vogt (plenty of teams offer their coaches the chance to explore other opportunities out of courtesy), it’s not going to do anything to dissuade other teams from reaching out to Vogt whenever they have a managerial opening. 

That said, Kramer also reported the Mariners never reached out to Cleveland to inquire about Vogt’s availability. Although there seemed to be some smoke to the fire of the Mariners’ interest in Vogt given his family lives about an hour away from T-Mobile Park in Olympia, Wash., Kramer’s reporting makes it seem like that never rose about a cursory interest. 

Stephen Vogt's future with the Guardians got a bit more uncertain thanks to latest Mariners tidbit

As of now, the Guardians’ decision to grant Vogt the chance to talk with the Mariners is nothing more than a slight wrinkle in a story that had the happy ending of Vogt staying in Cleveland, but it could also be the first breadcrumb in a path that leads to Vogt ending up elsewhere. 

The Guardians have been pretty mum about Vogt’s contract (teams aren’t required to announce managerial deals), but Jeff Passan reported last year that Vogt inked a new multiyear deal with Cleveland after the 2024 season.  

That deal came after Vogt won his first career Manager of the Year award, and he promptly won another in 2025 after the Guardians went on a wild comeback in the American League Central. He’s not going to win Manager of the Year this year but the Guardians performance under him was just as important given the Guardians held off the White Sox in the AL Central and made it all the way to the ALCS. 

The Guardians are always going to be a contender so long as José Ramírez is on the roster, but Vogt’s presence in the dugout has been just as important to winning. 

He’s not going to be going anywhere next season, but that may not always be the case.

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Follow