His Major League career has been like a merry-go-round but Tyler Heineman does not mind one bit. On December 1 he was claimed off waivers by the New York Mets and should he see action it would mark the fifth MLB team for whom he has played since making his debut on Sept. 4, 2019. The 32-year-old catcher has previously played for Miami, San Francisco, Toronto and Pittsburgh. In 104 MLB games he has a .218 batting average with 54 hits, 15 RBIs, 25 runs, 20 walks, 11 doubles and one home run.
A Palisades native, Heineman grew up on Radcliffe and starred at Windward High in Mar Vista before playing for John Savage at UCLA .
He was drafted in the eighth round (249th overall) by the Houston Astros in 2012. After signing he played for the Tri-City ValleyCats of the Class A-Short Season New York–Penn League and batted a league-best .358. He played for the Lancaster JetHawks of the Class A-Advanced California League in 2013 and the Corpus Christi Hooks of the Class AA Texas League in 2014, after which he got assigned to the Salt River Rafters of the Arizona Fall League. In 2015 he played for Corpus Christi and the Fresno Grizzlies of the Class AAA Pacific Coast League, batting .285 with three homers and 30 RBIs. He remained in Fresno in 2016 and hit .259 with three homers and 14 RBIs.
He got dealt to Milwaukee in 2017 and the Brewers sent him to the Colorado Springs Sky Sox, for whom he hit .281 with 20 RBIs. In 2018 he signed a minor-league contract with Arizona and opened the 2019 season with the Reno Aces, batting .325. He got traded to Miami in June and played five games that year. He played in 15 games in 2020 with San Francisco.
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