From Football's Graveyard to the Top: Written-Off Real Madrid Star Tears Up the League Again

His start to the current 2026/27 season has been nothing short of breathtaking. In the opening match against Getafe (3:0), he came on in the 57th minute with the score at 0-0 and immediately changed the game. He first set up Nahuel Tenaglia to score, then finished off a textbook counter-attack with a superb strike from outside the box, and capped off his phenomenal evening with a second assist for Mikel Rodríguez. In under half an hour, he tallied a dazzling one goal and two assists.

A week later, with Alavés trailing away at Rayo Vallecano (1:1), Mariano Díaz was brought on for the final 30 minutes. In the 84th minute, he pounced on a poor back-pass from a home defender and coolly finished the one-on-one to secure a valuable point.

"I've had some tough times. You always want to play, and now everything is starting over. I hope I can keep scoring goals and help Alavés. My main objective is for the team to achieve its goals. I believe that through this, the best will happen on an individual level as well," the emotional striker confessed immediately after his first league goal in four years.

The career trajectory of the Barcelona native has been full of extremes. He joined the famed Real Madrid from Badalona in 2011 as an 18-year-old talent. Four years later, he was dominating the third tier, banging in 27 goals in 32 games for the reserve team, Castilla.

This offensive force could not be ignored by Zinédine Zidane, who handed him his first-team debut against Celta Vigo in August 2016. Shortly after, Mariano Díaz made history in a cup tie against Cultural Leonesa. According to Opta analysts, he had the best start in the club's history, notching 4 goals and 1 assist, including a fabled hat-trick on the hallowed turf of the Santiago Bernabéu.

He concluded the 2016/17 season with 5 goals and 2 assists in 14 appearances, also getting a taste of the Champions League and celebrating his first La Liga goal against Deportivo La Coruña in December.

A Spanish newspaper at the time offered an interesting glimpse into the player's psyche, quoting his remarkably confident words to the French coach: "Coach, I know there's competition here. But give me a chance at Real, and I'll win the Ballon d'Or."

Despite his immense ego, he followed his coach's advice and left to get more playing time at French club Lyon for €8 million. There, he truly exploded. In the 2017/18 season, he helped the team qualify for the Champions League with 18 goals in 34 matches, placing him in the top five of the Ligue 1 goalscoring charts, just behind superstars like Edinson Cavani, Florian Thauvin, Neymar, and Memphis Depay.

Former Lyon president Jean-Michel Aulas was full of praise at the time: "Díaz is great. Mariano has shown what he can do. He has excellent physicality and a huge desire to reach the top level. He can also play in tight spaces, even though everyone said he couldn't. I want to thank one person from Real – Karim Benzema, who told us we had to sign him."

The Spanish giants didn't hesitate to activate their buy-back clause for €21.5 million. Mariano Díaz even dared to take the iconic number 7 shirt, previously worn by legends like Raúl and Cristiano Ronaldo. However, what followed were five years of frustration, bench-warming, and losing out to internal competition, although he did get on the scoresheet in the prestigious El Clásico in March 2020, against AS Roma in the Champions League, and twice against Villarreal.

His progress was hampered by around 20 minor injuries, but the real reason he was reluctant to give up the white shirt was his astronomical annual salary of €4.5 million. No other interested party, including Lyon, who tried to bring him back three times, could guarantee him such terms.

Although he ultimately departed with 13 major trophies, including three Spanish titles and two Champions League winner's medals, his individual record was tragic. He featured in just 70 matches, scored a paltry 7 goals, provided a single assist, and even set an unwanted club record, suffering an incredible 18-month goal drought before scoring against Cádiz in May 2022.

An even steeper fall to rock bottom followed. As a free agent, he signed a one-year contract with Sevilla in September 2023, where he played a mere 13 matches with a desperate zero in the goals column. His only bright spot was winning a penalty, ironically against his future employer, Alavés.

He made more of an impression on fans for an unpleasant training ground conflict with teammate Hannibal Mejbri. After his contract expired, he was left completely without offers, a huge psychological blow for a striker then approaching his 32nd birthday. He had to take a full year off from football, dedicating himself solely to intense training with a personal coach.

Just when it seemed he would hang up his boots for good, he remembered his roots. Although his father is Spanish and he had always hoped for a call-up to the Spanish national team, his mother's heritage opened the door to the Dominican Republic national team.

A lot of water had passed under the bridge since his single introductory cap in 2013, but in March 2025, he returned to the international stage in style, scoring the winning goal in a 2-0 victory over Puerto Rico. In 2026, he added appearances against Panama and El Salvador to his collection, with his current international record showing 3 goals in four matches. It was this Caribbean revival that breathed new life into his career.

The decisive turning point in Mariano Díaz's arduous journey came in the summer of 2025, when his close friend and Deportivo Alavés's sporting director, Sergio Fernández, extended a helping hand. He invited him to pre-season training, without a contract, to see if his footballing instincts were still there.

The trial went better than expected, and the club secured his services with a lucrative contract until June 2027. However, the path to glory was not paved with gold this time either. He spent most of the last league season in the stands or on the bench. In ten appearances, only three of which were starts, his stats once again showed a glaring zero. A hat-trick in the cup against semi-professionals from the sixth tier was little consolation.

Frustration reached a boiling point in December when, after being left out of the squad for a cup match against Sevilla, he left the training ground without a word. For this, the then-Argentine coach Eduardo Coudet suspended him without compromise.

However, fate played one last card in March 2026, when Quique Sánchez Flores took the helm. The experienced manager knew his former charge from Sevilla well and knew exactly what approach to take. Under his guidance, Mariano Díaz underwent a tough but cleansing summer pre-season, which transformed him back into a predatory goal hunter. The striker, whom many experts had written off, is now proving that true talent never completely fades.