To retire or not to retire: Dodgers’ Hamlet Marte wearing many hats

LOS ANGELES ― In act 2 of “Hamlet,” Shakespeare’s title character pontificates that “there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so,” a nugget of wisdom that can serve a man well under ambiguous circumstances.

Hamlet Marte is not well-versed in the philosophical musings of his famous namesake, but he is naturally adept at taking things as they come. He is currently a minor league catcher for the Tulsa Drillers, the Dodgers’ Double-A affiliate. In the last month, he’s also pitched for Tulsa and traveled with the Dodgers as one of their two major league bullpen catchers. Soon, he is planning to return to the Dominican Republic to attend the birth of his first child.

“The readiness is all,” said the fictitious Prince of Denmark.

“Whatever (the Dodgers) want me to do, I’ll do it,” Marte said in a recent phone interview from Tulsa.

Marte’s unusual journey began on Jan. 23, when he re-signed with the Dodgers on a minor league contract. More accurately, the event that set his season in motion happened months earlier, on Nov. 1 of last year, when Dodgers bullpen catcher Francisco “Chico” Herrera had surgery to fuse the L5 and S1 vertebrae in his back. He would need at least six months off to recover.

Enter Marte, who had spent four seasons (2017, 2020-22) catching at various levels of the Dodgers’ organization. The 2022 season was already a transition year for him. He spent most of the season on the development list at Triple-A Oklahoma City. When he wasn’t catching bullpens, Marte appeared in just seven games. A .181 hitter between the Double-A and Triple-A levels, his future as a major league player was dimming.

Marte ended up spending the first three months of the 2023 season in the big leagues, wearing a uniform and traveling everywhere with the team, until Herrera was cleared to resume his bullpen catching duties.

“I thought maybe my career was done after that, I won’t lie to you,” Marte said. “They were like, when Chico gets better, you will go back to the regular plan: be with a minor league team, practicing, everything. If something happens you will play. I appreciate that they were clear with me.”

The next chapter of Marte’s career brought a twist worthy of a Shakespearean comedy: he was needed at Double-A Tulsa … as a pitcher.

Marte made his first career mound appearance on July 1 in the eighth inning of a game the Drillers were trailing 10-8 in Amarillo. Their starter, Nick Nastrini, lasted only two-thirds of an inning. After drilling through five pitchers, Tulsa’s emergency catcher had become its emergency reliever. Marte allowed two runs in his only inning of work.

From there, it was back to catching. Marte has only two hits in 23 at-bats through the weekend, although one was his first home run in two years. (Marte also homered in a Dominican Winter League game with Toros del Este this past offseason.) If it’s the final home run of his career, Marte will not suffer from existential angst.

“I had a pretty successful career,” he said. “This is my 13th season. I signed in 2011 with the (Colorado) Rockies. I really like to play. I still have fun. I haven’t played in the big leagues, but I’ve done everything a player wanted to. If it’s my time to be a coach or be a bullpen catcher in the big leagues, I have no regrets. I’m really thankful for that.”

There was even a time, perhaps when the Dodgers’ team plane reached cruising altitude, when the desire to return to minor league ball felt foreign to Marte.

“I didn’t want to go back,” he said, “because everything there is very organized. Everything is comfortable. The hotels, too, I’ve never been in hotels like that. I’ve never traveled that much in my life. I was like, ‘I can get used to this.’ If they want me to retire from playing, doing that, I’m in.”

Instead, Marte is playing out the string on his playing career for however long he can – a Michael Jordan-like turnabout, minus the press release.

The closest thing to any public recognition Marte received came from Steve Cilladi, the Dodgers’ regular bullpen catcher, who addressed the team to explain the circumstances that led Marte to put his playing career on hold simply to help the Dodgers’ pitchers warm up.

“Just to give him props,” Cilladi said. “I thought he handled the situation really well.”