Baseball fans, gay and straight, unite in swooning over ‘Big Dumper’

Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh has produced a scintillating first half of the 2025 season. At an offensively challenged position, Raleigh has crushed a league-leading 36 home runs and cruised to a starting berth on the American League All-Star Team.

His power surge has drawn attention throughout all of baseball. Which also means that thousands of fans from around the game have also learned about the 2024 Platinum Glove Winner’s — let’s go with “colorful” — nickname. Raleigh is known by teammates as:

“The Big Dumper.”

Is it because of his fondness for the type of trucks that haul refuse?

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Is it due to his habit of reading environmental impact studies about landfills?

Dear reader, it is not.

All you need to do is watch one Seattle game to understand that Raleigh is called The Big Dumper because the only bigger clutch performer than the M’s catcher is his pants.

This past Tuesday night’s Mariners versus New York Yankees game, Raleigh stood on first base after a walk. During a break in the action, Yanks broadcaster Michael Kay began telling the origin story of The Big Dumper’s nickname as the telecast began zooming in on the Big Dumper in question.

If the camera got any closer, the YES Network would’ve had to put up a splash page asking “Are you over 18?”

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Kay’s partner Paul O’Neill realized what was going on and began chortling, “We’re getting a close up!” This is why the Steinbrenners pay O’Neill the big bucks to be an analyst.

“I don’t know if we need that, guys,” Kay told the crew, “Goodness!” 

Raleigh’s posterior had inspired another baseball first: turning a New York broadcaster into a Tennessee Williams dowager.

Perhaps inspired by Kay’s case of the vapors, the YES cameraman went for a close up on The Big Dumper two more times. Somehow the Cockyboys logo did not spontaneously appear in the lower right corner.

It’s clear that Raleigh and his moniker are an MLB sensation. The nickname was originally popularized by Raleigh’s former teammate Jarred Kelenic. Upon getting the news that his minor league buddy was promoted to the Mariners, Kelenic tweeted, “Big dumper to the show.”

And a superhero had his origin story.

When Kelenic was asked how he got the inspiration, his explanation was blunt: “Big Dumper began when he was born. That’s pretty obvious.”

Initially, Raleigh resisted his new sobriquet. But as he began showing his power stroke at the big league level, Mariners fans started using it with love and Raleigh gradually embraced it. Then when his 2022 walk-off home run ended the M’s 21-year playoff drought, Raleigh officially became a Seattle hero and the nickname really took off. 

Now Mariners fans wear number 29 BIG DUMPER jerseys in the stands at T-Mobile Park. In April, the M’s held a Platinum Dumper bobblehead promotion. And Raleigh himself took center stage in a Mariners “Big Dumper Trucking” commercial.

At this point, Raleigh’s nickname has done more to promote baseball than Rob Manfred has in his entire life.

All that’s left is for the Mariners to ask Raleigh to someday get behind the plate for a Randy Johnson first pitch.

As any gay can attest, if the catcher is The Big Dumper, the pitcher needs to be The Big Unit.

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