Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Blue Jays Reportedly 'Open' to Trading Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Should Mariners Do It?

Episode Date: May 22, 2024

The Mariners have secured at least a series split with the Yankees following a 6-3 win on Tuesday night. Ty and Colby recap the big nights for Dylan Moore and Bryan Woo, discuss their concerns with Seattle's bullpen, and once again touch on the possibility of trading for Vladimir Guerrero Jr. after report came out indicating the Blue Jays are open to the possibility.Ask us questions!Follow the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @TyDaneGonzalez | @CPat11 Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!DoorDashGet all your Mother’s Day gifts, all in one place and get 50% off your next order, up to $15 when you spend $15+ on your next flower, convenience, grocery, or retail order now with code LOCKEDONMLB. That's LOCKEDONMLB. Order using DoorDash today. Terms apply. Monopoly GO!Get in the game and join your friends. Click HERE to Download MONOPOLY GO! now free on The App Store or Google Play. PrizePicksGo to PrizePicks.com/lockedonmlb and use code lockedonmlb for a first deposit match up to $100! eBay MotorsFrom brakes to exhaust kits and beyond, eBay Motors has over 122 million parts to keep your ride-or-die alive. With all the parts you need at the prices you want, it’s easy to bring home that big win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONMLB for $20 off your first purchase. FanDuelFanDuel, America’s Number One Sportsbook. Right now, NEW customers get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS with any winning GUARANTEED That’s A HUNDRED AND FIFTY BUCKS – win or lose! Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Blue Jays are apparently open to the idea of trading Vladimir Guerrero Jr. We'll talk about that and the mayor's big win over the Yankees coming up here on the locked on marries podcast. Colby hit it. You are locked on mariners. Your daily Seattle Mariners podcast. Part of the Locked on podcast network. Your team every day. Ahoy, sailors.

It is Wednesday, May 22nd, 2024. This is Tiding Gazzalas and Colby Patnaud for the Locked on Marers podcast. part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team, every day. On the show today, we're going to talk about the Mariners 6 to 3 win over the Yankees last night. Big Knights for Dylan Moore and Brian Wu. We'll also talk more about Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Just like we did on Monday, who the Blue Jays are apparently open to trading now. But before we do that, shout out to our title sponsor today, eBay Motors,

from brakes to exhaust kits and beyond, eBay Motors has over 122 million parts to keep your ride or die alive. With all the parts you need at the prices you want, it's easy to bring home that big win. Keep your ride or die live at eBay motors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. EAP guaranteed fit only available to U.S. customers. And if you want to hear from me and Colby even more

and help support the show, check out our Patreon. The link is in the description, and you can sign up for a free seven-day trial. So Colby, let's talk about last night. Marys win six to three over the Yankees. They had some really nice at bats against Clark Schmidt and the Yankees pitching staff. And I think most importantly here, when the Yankees punched back there in the seventh inning with the big three run home run from Claibor Torres, the Mariners were able to respond to that and add a couple of insurance runs to give Andres Munoz more of a comfortable ninth inning, a lot more comfortable than his previous outing the night before, which he absolutely dominated.

And he was really good against again last night. Dillamore was the MVP, offensively speaking, for the mayor's last night. Two home runs. He continues his red hot road trip. He's seven for 15. Three homers, three doubles, six RBI, including four last night. Awesome game from Dylan. And Luke Raley stays hot with an insurance home run.

Ty France with a big home run as well. Just a really good night for the offense. What did you think about the bats last night? Yeah, pretty good. They were able to get Schmidt out of there pretty early. they got his pitch count elevated and he was getting a lot off the off the inside corner arm side he was getting a lot of those calls so the fact that they were still able to put up good at bats and drive up his pitch count i mean dillimore hit a home run kind of because the umpire was not calling

the strike zone properly like smith threw four consecutive balls two of them were actually called strikes and that extended the abat and demo went yard as a result right so not a lot of damage done against Schmidt, but that's fine. He's been pitching really well. He's having a great year. So like we talked about this a little bit yesterday, like hopefully you can find a way to scratch a run or two off of him and get the pitch count elevated, get to the bullpen in the sixth and then try and do your work against the bullpen. And that's exactly what the Mariners did. So, uh, you know, it was a really good night. Obviously the four home runs is, is a big takeaway here. And that's great to see. But, you know, a guy who had a really good game last night that is

getting a little bit overlooked because he didn't go yard. How about Mitch Garver going two for four? Yeah, with, you know, almost one yard. Yeah, it was very close to being in the fifth home run. So, you know, we talk about this all the time. Like right now you have Dylan Moore who's pretty hot. You have, you know, Luke Grayley, who's continuing to do good things at the plate. Like if you could get somebody else in the middle here who can just kind of, you know, carry this weight a little bit. And Garver's been much better in May than he was in April.

Still a long way to go. And we've seen Garber had games like this before. And then the next day, he's 0 for four with three strikeouts. And you're just kind of scratching your head trying to find some. consistencies. But yeah, Garber had a great game last night. You know, I think just about everybody in in the offense had at least a good at bat or two. Julio, for example, had the two hardest hit balls on the night and they were both outs. So, you know, get that ball elevated a little bit and same conversation we've had for the last seven weeks, but whatever, he's still hitting the ball hard. So

that's better than, you know, having bad at bats and popping out to the catcher. So I think just about everybody else had a hit or they got on base or they had a hard hit ball. except for Cal I believe wasn't over but yeah it was just a really good attack plan and we've seen Seattle be very consistent at this over the last week or so get to the bullpen if I can get to the middle of your bullpen I can do damage off of it

and apparently based on Monday night if I can get to the back end of your bullpen to your high leverage arms I can do damage against them too so it's been a very consistent I don't want to call it a game plan it's more of a consistent like outcome when the Mariners score runs, they really attack your bullpen. And the way they do that is they get your starter out early.

And if you do that enough times in a series, particularly a four-game series, then you're going to see more of the middle of a team's bullpen than the back end of it. And that's when you can do a lot of damage. And that's what the Mariners did yesterday. They score four runs off of the Yankees bullpen. They score four runs the night before off of the Yankees bullpen. And they've won the first two games of the series. And the next two games are absolute gravy.

I mean, obviously, you want to win both of them. but if you don't, you've still accomplished your goal for the series. And you know, you can take a few more risks like tonight. Andreas Munoz probably available. He hasn't thrown a ton of pitches the last two days. But you still have another, you know,

what, 12 games in a row after this or whatever, 11 games in a row after this. So maybe you say, you know, let's not use Andres tonight. And then we'll have them for tomorrow and Friday. And, you know,

they can be a little bit more careful with how they use guys. And so they can, they can take a few more chances in the series because they've got the you know series secured and if they win today they find a way to win today and they have like the series win in their back pocket they can be super careful how they roll out their lineup tomorrow we can give guys days off they can you know just say you know what munoz is absolutely not available no matter what because they won the series and so you don't want to necessarily ever punt games but like the goal at the beginning of every series is to win the series is to win the series. And if you have a four-game series, the goal is to split. It's really hard to beat any team three times and four days. Very difficult, particularly on the road and particularly against a really good team that's playing good baseball. So Seattle right now, they're they got the first two, which is huge.

They can kind of manage the next two as a result of that to kind of have an eye on the big picture. But yeah, the bats last night were really good. you know it was it's a continuation of how they were in the ninth inning of the night before which is funny because it didn't start out that way because the Mariners Bap Bid luck in the first inning was awful and they just started hitting the ball over everybody's head anyways and it didn't matter what the Bap Buc was like so offense was really good and it has been much better in May we're still waiting for like can we get like a week straight where the team's scoring like five runs a night like that'd be great instead of this four

five six one one three, nine. How about just five a night for like a week straight? I'll take the nine run games. Don't get me wrong, but like I'll trade the nine run games for just consistently scoring five every night.

Yeah, that'd be great. You mentioned Mitch Garver since hitting that walkoff against the Braves. What was that, April 29th? 228, 318, 439, 119 WRC Plus. Yeah, not great, but serviceable. Yeah, average, not really where you want it. and strikeout rate still 36.4%.

He is counteracting that a little bit in the walks, 10.6% walk rate during that stretch as well. So, yeah, not a perfect product, but a lot closer to the guy that you thought you were signing this winter, and it seems like he's starting to turn the corner a bit more. So that's nice. This bullpen, though, is, it's terrified right now. This team really needs to just go out and trade for Austin Adams or whoever.

Just name a high leverage arm, right? Or just a mid to high leverage arm. It doesn't even need to be a straight up higher leverage arm right now. Eventually, eventually by the deadline, yeah, you need a high leverage arm. But like just right now, like, can you just get another mid to high leverage guy? Because like Trent Thornton yesterday, Gabe Spire got in trouble. He was accredited with two of the three runs on the on the Claiborres home run.

Stanick, I mean, he got the job. He got the job done last night. But he also left a pretty. appetizing slider out there for Aaron Judge who just missed it and got pretty lucky there. So yeah, I feel terrified when anyone not name Andres Munoz comes out of the bullpen right now. Yeah, Spire, unfortunately. Like, we never really got Spire and Munoz both being like great this year. We got it for like a week.

And then like Spire his last, you know, pretty much all month. He's had like one really dominant outing, one pretty good outing. And then the rest are just like, like he's walking guys. He's not close to the strike zone. So you hope there's nothing wrong there. And if there was, I'm sure it would have put him on the IL.

There's something like physically wrong with him. Right. But yeah, you just don't have that guy right now. You have Munoz and then you have a bunch of guys that you're just praying, holding hands and prey that like you can find a way to get the ball to Munoz with a lead. And if you do that, you have pretty good chance to win.

But, you know, it's, Stanick's been okay this year. Spire has been pretty good overall, but pretty rough lately. And you know, Thornton and both have both been actually pretty good this year. Like it's not like they're not good. It's just that like you don't want any of these guys pitching with the game on the line in the seven days. Trent Thornton should not be throwing high leverage innings with consistency.

Like the occasional high leverage inning, fine, right? When like a guy is down or a couple of guys are down fine, right? But I mean like like he's like the fourth guy that they go to right now. Up four to nothing. you know, with two, or I guess there was one out at the time, runners on first and second to the bottom of a team's order. It's not a terrible time to use Thornton. Sure.

But it is, but it is the Yankees in that ballpark, that Mickey Mouse ballpark. And, you know, he has had home run issues in the past. But like, if you're not going to Munoz in that situation, who are you going to? They feel better about than Thornton. Yeah.

You really feel that that much better about. But that's the problem, right? It's not really a Trent Thornton issue or Gabe Spire issue or Ryan Stanick issue. It's a Mariners bullpen issue. They just don't have enough guys that you can really, really trust in those kinds of moments. They are surviving right now. And I think that's the best way to, you know, kind of. He did what I was hoping he would do and just kind of challenged Torres.

Just Torres put it in seats. Don't let the tie and run come to the plate. Yeah. You know, because you walk a guy. Like if the guy hits the home run, fine, whatever, we reset. But if you walk the guy and now the bases are juiced and, you know, the grand slam ties it, yeah, it's not great. So they'd have to go get somebody and people, you know, just to get out ahead of this, Santos does not count because A, you don't know if you're getting him back. B, even if you tell me that you're guaranteed to get him back, we don't know when.

And C, we don't know how effective he's going to be. Yeah, we don't know when. We don't know if he's going to be effective. We don't know if he's going to be able to stay healthy. Right. There's just too many questions. So, like, you need two high leverage arms. And it's possible Santos is one of them.

It's possible. Sure. You can't assume that, though. You can't assume that. If you're the Mariners, if you're Jerry DePoto and Justin Hollander, you can't assume that. Right. And even if you want to, and even if we give it to you, like, yeah, okay, fine, Santos is a high leverage arm.

You're still one short. Sure. So, yeah, the Mariners are going to have to do some bold. shopping and I don't think this is the kind of thing where they could just go look on the waiver wire or go look you know and we really like this guy's stuff we think we can get the most out of

them like you should still do that and maybe you do it on one of those guys. Right and then they can they can build themselves into being a highlight like Paul Seewald he was not a high leverage reliever when they called him up. He was the guy who pitched when you were down by two or whatever. And then he became that because of his

production. You could still do that and you still should do that by the way because you can get better in the middle too. That's not a bad thing to have better middle relievers. But I think you're going to have to pay up for something closer to the Santos range like you did this winter sometime in the summer. But yeah, really good win for the Mariners last night. They at least split the series with the Yankees, which is huge. They're now five games over 500.

They're three games up on the Rangers in the A.L. West standings right now. So good stuff all around. And shout out to Dilly Rolls. We'll see if Jorge Polanco gets in the lineup tonight. But who knows? Who freaking knows? this point. That's been really weird situation. Lefty on the mound. I'm interested to see, do they sit JP?

Because you're not taking Dillmore on the lineup, particularly against a lefty. So do you take Luke Rayleigh out of the lineup right now? He had a home run against the lefty last night. He's been good against lefties. Do you take him out for the sake of Mitch Hanager? No. I think I'm taking Canzon out. Sure. And that can be Hanager. But you're not taking Garber out against the lefty, I don't think. Right.

So are you taking Ty France out against the lefty? Maybe Dimo plays third instead of Aureas. Yeah, it could be. So we'll see. I mean, the lineup might actually be out right now. Let me check, but we'll talk about that after the break. Yes, and we'll also talk about Brian Wu in just a moment. But first, a reminder of this episode of the Lockdownerrace podcast is brought to you by price picks.

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and use the promo code Locked on MLB for a first deposit match up to $100. That's promo code locked on MLB for a first deposit matchup to $100. Pick more, pick less. It's that easy. And you're listening to the Lockdown Mariners podcast. You can catch games three and four with the Yankees tonight and tomorrow morning on the Marriss hometown broadcast with Sirius XM via the SXM app. All you have to do to find that is search for the word Mariners.

And after tomorrow's game, we'll be recording a postgame show. So you can catch us in the afternoon recapping the series finale between the Yanks and the M's. So like Colby teased towards the end of the first segment there, we actually do have the Mariners lineup for tonight. So we're going to talk a little bit about that real quick before we get into Brian Woo. So what's the lineup looking like, Colby? Yeah.

So they decided to take Luke Rayleigh out of it against the lefty, which I hate. But not a fan of that. No, but some good news. Jorge Polanco is back in the lineup. There we go. So he's playing second base. He's hitting seventh. The lineup tonight goes Crawford, Rodriguez, Garber, hitting third, D-Hing tonight.

Cal Raleigh hitting fourth. Dylan Moore hitting fifth and playing left field tonight. Ty France, Jorge Polanco, Mitch Hanigar and Wright, and then Luis Urias at third. So Rojas getting the night off, oh, getting the first couple of innings off in theory. And so is Rayleigh. And that's how they're navigating this lefty matchup. So. All right.

So let's talk about Brian Wu. He was awesome last night. And he's now thrown 11 and a third in Yankee Stadium in his career, all scoreless. Seven strikeouts last night, no walks, just a couple of hits allowed. He was smoking one Soto last night. It was a lot of fun to watch. So what did you think about Brian Wu's night last night? It is interesting.

that arguably Brian Wu's two best starts of his entire career have come at Yankee Stadium. He was just dicing guys up yesterday. And it was, you know, it's Brian Wu. He's throwing 95, 96 and like he'll challenge guys right down the middle of the plate and they can't touch it. Like Brian Wu has this insane ability to like throw a fastball down the middle of the plate in counts where you know a fastball is coming. And that's pretty much every count with Brian Wu because I think he was 80% fastball last night. So like you know fastball is coming. as soon as you leave its hand, you're like, oh, this is down the middle.

I'm going to crush this. And then nope, nope, you can't even foul it off. He just blows up by you. So Brian Wu might have one of the five best fastballs in baseball. I think right now Mason Miller is probably ahead of him on that list. And Spencer Strider, a healthy Spencer Strider is ahead of him on that list. I don't know if anybody else is because I. Paul Skeens.

Yeah, there you go. Paul Skeens probably right now. And all those guys, it's funny. All those guys have like elite velocity. And Wu can rush it up there. Don't get me wrong. But he sits 94, 95. He doesn't sit 97, 98.

And yet he's still blowing fastballs by Judge and by, you know, Soto and all that. He had a 45% whiff rate on his on his fourseamer yesterday. 45%. For context, like 25%. Pretty good. 30% really good. Last year, Luis Castile, minimum of 200 batters faced. I looked this up last night.

Last year, Luis Castillo led all of baseball in whiff percentage on his four-seamer, 33% on the year. Last night, Brian Wu was at 45 on the four-seem fastball. That is insane. That is unheard of. Like that, that is nuts. And so Brian Wu right now, I mean, he's looking like a number four, number three right now. And that's with literally one pitch. Although the slider was pretty good last night, too.

Don't sleep on that slider. It was pretty good. It was pretty nasty as well. So Wu just dominated. He throws a ton of strikes, which I mean, if you're going to be a Mariners starter, you have to throw a ton of strikes. Like there's very few exceptions to that.

Like Luis Castillo is the wild one in the group, and he's averaging like three walks per nine. Like that's the highest you can go and be in consideration to be a mariner starter. And Wu just throws a ton of strikes. And he gets insane fastball value. Like his fastball might be the single best. pitch in the Mariners organization.

Like it's right there with like MapRash slider, Andres Munoz slider, like his fastball. When you add up the velocity and you add up the rise and you add up the command and, you know, just the effortless. Yeah. Yeah. The effortlessness of that delivery is like like that has to look like it just explodes out of his hand. Yeah. Because there is no effort in his delivery whatsoever.

It is one of these smoothest things I've ever seen it. And Wu was sensational. And, you know, there'll be times where, you know, the Velo, drips a little bit and like he's not hitting that top line he's kind of down more thigh high with the fastball and not on the corner and that's when he'll get hit right like the fastball at the top of the zone if he gets it above the belt it's a really difficult pitch to square up if he gets it on the corner it's a really difficult pitch to square up your best shot to hit his fastball is that he throws you something you know kind of middle of the plate but below the belt

about thigh high like at that point you're going to have enough time to put a good swing on it in theory easier said than done but Wu has been, you know, great since coming back. And, you know, there were no like long breaks in between any of the endings this time around. So he was fine with that last time, you know, when, you know, obviously the starting, his first start, they took him out, blah, blah, blah. The next start, there were two long layoffs.

And he was fine. He was 93. Like the V-Lo was fine. His command wasn't as good, the, that sixth inning against the, the royals. Right. But, you know, this time out, there wasn't really a long break. the third inning, I guess, was a little bit longer, but came out. He looked fine the entire night.

And he probably could have gone a seventh pretty easily, but they decided not to push it, which. His pitch, his pitch limit was 85 last night. I think he ended the night, what? 77, I think. 77. Yeah. So, let me check here. It was seven, 77.

Yeah, 58 strikes, by the way. dude's insane so yeah yeah like well and the fact that he like he had Juan Soto and Aaron Judge looking lost last night right I'm just on fastballs yeah like it's not like yeah the nasty slider that nobody had ever seen before anything like that nope here's 96 down the middle hit it and by the way it's not like you're like catching those guys at like a good time or anything like that like Aaron Judge has literally Aaron Judge has literally been the best hit around the planet in the month of May so yeah right and so right and so like like you're getting whiffs on fastballs in the middle of the plate against like judge and Soto that is an elite pitch like Brian Wu's fastball is the closest thing to 80 grade in the entire system on any grading like Brian Wu's fastball is the closest to 80 as any other individual tool in the mariner system like it's closer to 80 than Claise's speed for example like it's just it's an insane pitch and it's the reason why you know we didn't really want to trade him this this winter it's the reason why you know oh what do you do

do with hancock when woo is ready you send hancock down because brian woo is significantly better because brian woo with one pitch on a forcing fastball no less is significantly more likely to dominate than somebody like hancock who pitched well is with you know 55 60 command and four pitches like it's just nuts if brian wu ever like finds a consistent slider maybe a curb like If Brian Wu could like, if you told me right now, next year Brian Wu was going to have a 50 slider, like on average for all of his starts and like a 50 change up, he's a he's my Cy Young pick.

Like I would legitimately bet on him to win the Cy Young because the fastball is that good. And he's going to throw more than enough strikes. So Brian Wu has been exceptional and it's great. You know, it's great because, you know, Logan wasn't great. His start, obviously Miller wasn't great.

Kirby wasn't great. Even Castillo, he put up a good stat line. but, you know, he was really trying to work through some stuff. And, you know, Brian Wood just went out there and just made it look so easy. And that's a lot of fun. Yeah, it was a lot of fun to watch. Speaking of good fastballs, we're going to have Brody Hopkins here on the show on Friday.

Favorite prospect of mine. That was a really fun conversation. You might have already seen the screenshot, the little teaser that I put up on Twitter. But, yeah, I had a fun, kind of short-ish conversation with him. So you guys will be able to check that out on Friday. We actually weren't supposed to have a show on Friday, but now we will for you guys. So yeah, so be sure to check that out. All right.

We are going to talk a little bit more about Vladimir Guerrero Jr. We got asked about him during our mailbag on Monday. And now we actually have a report that says that he could actually get traded this summer. So we'll get into that in a second. But first, a reminder, this episode of the Lockdown Airs podcast is brought to you. you buy eBay Motors. Passion, drive, and patience. What brings home the winning trophy is also what keeps your ride or die alive. eBay Motors has everything you need to maintain your vehicle and level it up to peak performance. From superchargers, roof racks, exhaust kits, LED headlights, and more.

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Eligible items only, exclusions apply. eBay guaranteed fit only available to U.S. customers. And you were listening to the Locked-on Mariner's podcast. Once again, you can catch you. Game 3 and game 4 with the Yankees tonight and tomorrow morning on the Marrers hometown broadcast with SiriusXM via the SXM app. All you have to do to find that is search the word Mariners. And once again, we'll be joining you tomorrow afternoon after the game for the locked on Mariners postgame show. So be sure to check that out.

But now let's talk a little bit about Vladimir Guerrero Jr. once again. We talked about him a little bit on Monday because we got asked about him. but now we actually have a report that says Vlad Jr. could actually be available on the trade market this summer. Per Mark Feinson, a American League executive told him that the Blue Jays would actually consider

not just trading Vlad Jr., but also Beau Bichette saying, quote, I don't think they're opposed to it. Interesting. Now, that kind of contradicts my feelings that I shared on the situation on Monday where, you know, again, I talked about, you know, Ross Atkins, their GM, Mark Shapiro over there. Like, they have essentially built the identity of their regime around Bo and Vlad. And I would be surprised if they essentially waive the white flag there because,

I don't know, to me, I feel like that ends up with them getting fired. Now, maybe this is the powers above them that are saying, like, hey, we need to hit the reset button. Who knows? right but I'm a little bit surprised that the the Blue Jays are actually open to doing this but if they are Colby I mean you already kind of shared your feelings on this in general but let's talk about this a little bit more what do you think about the idea of trading for Vlad Jr. Yeah. Don't love it. You know he's not really having much of a power heavy season right now and I feel like the Mariners need to add some thump if they're going to add a first basement but also Vlad Jr. is kind of of an overrated player. He had the one superstar year where did he win MVP that year?

I don't think he won MVP, but he was really good. He was up there. Right. He had the one superstar year. And then last year he was, he's okay. And this year he's been pretty good, but with almost no power. And like, you're not getting anything. You're not getting anything. And by the way, you could stuff the gold glove talk. We know gold gloves don't be anything when it comes to defensive value. So we know he's not going to get anything base running wise either. I mean, more than Thai France, but that's not really a high part of clear now, is it? So to me, I look at Vlad Jr. a year and a half of him roughly. And I just go, you know, sure, but like at what cost?

And to me, I'm not willing to give up, you know, Emerson, Ford, Young, Las, Phelman. And like, if we want to talk about like Thai Locklear and Thai Pete, then like, okay, like I guess that would be fine. Like I don't hate it. I understand what you're going for there. But I don't think that the Blue Jays are going to be interested in that idea at all. And like, I think they're going to want, they're going to be like, okay, we'll give us Colt Emerson. And right. And going back to the whole Atkins-Shapiro conversation here, if they're essentially like working for their jobs, right?

they're going to need to knock this trade out of the park. And I assume they're going to ask for the world for Vlad Jr. and Bobichet. Like I don't think this is going to be, hey, give us Johnny Farmello and Jeter Martinez and Jonathan Clase. Like that's not what's going to happen here. They're going to ask for, I mean, it's probably, yeah, it probably is going to start with Wu and Miller. And obviously the answer is going to be no from Seattle. And then at that point Toronto will probably go okay.

That's fine. But we want cold Emerson and Las Montas and Jeter Martinez or Logan Evans or whoever on top of that. Right. Somebody today pitched a camera who it was a reporter or something pitched Laz for Vlad straight up. I don't think the pot are I don't think the Blue Jays would do that. But also I don't know if I would like I'm just not sold on Vlad being, you know, the fix here. And let's go over the numbers a little bit more specifically here.

So like you mentioned, 2021, he was insane, like 6.3 win player, 166 WRC plus. He hit, what, 48 bombs that year? And then the next year, he was really good again, like 32 home runs, not as good as he was in 2021, but still really, really good. 133 WRC plus 3.4 win player. Then 2023, he was fine. He was fine. like 26 home runs, 264, 345, 444, 118 WRC plus, 1.3 win player.

But that's just, that's a fine player, right? That's a fine hitter. It's not a great hitter. That's not an elite hitter. That's not a star hitter. No. And then this year, 279, 374, he's been a 123 WRC plus, but there's that 385 slugging percentage.

It only has four home runs this year. I just, I see a lot of red flags with this player. and again, you know, power-oriented players now having to play half of their games in T-Mobile Park. How did they translate? You know, again, like I said on Monday, I think he's one of those guys where like his power plays anywhere. But still, like you do have to worry about that, at least to a certain degree, how he translates to play in half of his season in the city of Seattle. I just for a year and a half and or not even a year and a half, like a year and a couple months, at that price point too. because again, like the big factor here, right, is also John Stanton.

Is he going to be willing, you know, in that ownership group in general? Are they going to write that check? Because Vlad's already making quite a bit of money in arbitration this year. So whatever that's prorated to by the deadline or whenever you acquire him. Plus, he's probably getting like 25 million in arbitration next year. Yeah, maybe 30. So yeah, I don't, I just don't see it. like if I'm going to go get like a big asset this summer like Vlad would certainly be considered a big asset.

I kind of want that guy to be able to help me in more than just the batters box because if he doesn't help me in the batters box, at least I'm getting like, well, I'm still getting defense. I'm still getting base running. Like I'm still getting something here. So that's why I'm more open to the idea of Boba Chet. Right. Yeah. If we're talking about Blue Jays players that are going to cost a lot, Dolton Varshow and Boba Shed are higher on my list than Vlad Jr. right. Right. Right. And so and that's with Boba Chet not really hitting yet. He's starting. to hit a little bit, but he's having a really down here and like, yeah, well, what do you do with JP? Well, I mean, Bouchette can move. J.P. can move. Like, you have potential. That's not an issue. Yeah, you have potential holes at second and third base. And, you know, Bichette doesn't steal as many bags as he used to, but he's still a good base runner. He still has speed. He's still a good defender. And I think we know he's a better hitter than this. So, you know, if I'm going to pay the freight for one of the Blue Jays guys, it's probably going to be Bichette.

Yeah. And, you know, I just, to me, I look at Vlad Jr. and I go like, that's like the idea that people think is really good. But when you really break it down and you look at the, the fit, the actual fit in this ballpark and with this payroll and, you know, going forward, it's not really a slam dunk. I mean, like, would Vlad help? Sure. Yeah. I mean, like, he's certainly an upgrade over Thai France. You know, what is there a point? Like, is there a reasonable point that we can get to? you're just like, yeah, I mean, Vlad makes a lot of sense here. Yes, I mean, they're absolutely as a price point. I don't see the Blue Jays because the Blue Jays have to sell this to their fan base. And like, I think the way they do that is- Again, Atkins and Shapiro have to sell this to their bosses. Right. I think the way they do that is by bringing in like really good major league players now

or guys who are like elite prospects who are close to the big leagues. And I don't think any team's going to give them that for Vlad Jr. to be honest. Maybe they can get that for Bichette, but I doubt it. Like you're not getting Bryce Miller. You're not getting Brian Wu. There's not a player who will be traded this summer that I would give up Bryce Miller or Brian Wu for. So just cross them off the list entirely if you're thinking about it.

And I really don't want to give up Emerson. Like I would for the right player. Like I'd give up Colt Emerson if I could get Isok Paredes, but I'm not giving them up for a year and a half of really anybody, let alone a non-superstar. Vlad Jr. is not a superstar. He had one superstar year. and he's been slowly declining since.

And, you know, for him to be a superstar again, to be a six-win player, he's got a, he's got a slug. He's a star really only in name, not production. Right. His, right. And like, again, like, would he help? Sure. Yeah. But if you're telling me, hey, you have to give up, just hypothetical here, you have to give up Johnny Farmello for, for Vlad, which, again, it's going to cost more than that, I think.

Maybe I'm wrong. or you can give up Ty Locklear for two months of Pete Alonzo, which I don't want to do either. I would go take Pete Alonzo. So I just don't see a fit with Vlad really at all. Again, there's a point where the cost is so low and maybe we're overestimating everything here. It's certainly possible,

but I don't see a way that the Blue Jays are going to trade you either of their two faces of their franchise. I don't see a way they do that without getting Wu or Miller, which is not going to happen, or a package that has to involve Colt Emerson. And that should not happen because it's only a year and a half for two guys who are not performing as we think they should. I mean, even though Glad's been good overall,

he's not the player we think he should be. And Bichette hasn't hit at all. For me, if you want me to even consider that cost, you're also going to have to throw in Jimmy Garcia and probably Jordan Romano as well. Right. There are ways to make this work. Like, if you can, like, hey, would you give up Colt, Emerson or let's just would you give up Johnny Farmello or let's say Laz and Johnny Farmello, right?

Just land on a price. It's like, I mean, are you also giving me Garcia and Kiermeyer, Garcia and Swanson are like, you have to give me something else. Swanson's been terrible. It might be Romano though, because like Romano might be more of a throw in at this point because he's been pretty mid this year and he's making money. Right. And so we'll see.

I mean, like it's possible. I don't want to say that the Mariners shouldn't have any interest in Vlad. But for me, when I think about what is it likely to cost Seattle specifically to land Vladimir Guerrero Jr., I'm out at the price point I'm perceiving. Like, again, if hypothetically we get to July and they trade Las Montes for Vlad, am I going to be furious? No. Am I going to be like, like this is the, oh, they smoked them.

Like this is such a great deal for it. there's no downside of this. Absolutely not. There's a big downside to trading for Vlad. So, you know, at the end of the day, I'm open to it, certainly. But I don't think that the Blue Jays price and what the Mariners are willing to pay are ever going to line up on this particular player. Yeah. And going back to the money situation, right?

Again, the mayor should be willing to add as much payroll as Jerry DePoto and Justin Hollander need. Right. John Stanton, Chris Larson, the rest of the ownership group. should be willing to write that check, right? Especially if this team is in the same position that it's in right now by the trade deadline where they're, you know, three games up or whatever on the division. Right,

they should be willing to do anything it takes to elevate this team into a true World Series contender. But if they do that, I don't think this is the player they do it for. I just don't, I don't see it. No, I agree. Because I know that Jerry's going to have reservations about Vlad.

I know that Justin, Hollander is going to have reservations about Vlad. And if they only have one shot to add a player that's making some money, I just don't think they're doing it for Vlad. No. I don't see it. So there is an outcome here where they trade for Vlad and I can talk myself into it and I'm excited, all that.

I just don't think that's possible. I don't think it's likely. So we'll see. you know it's you know it's tough to judge these things until we actually see like what it looks like uh and obviously things good like if if lad goes on a tear here and and we look up in july and he's you know same batting average roughly the same on base and he's slugging 460 now like yeah that changes things a little bit but i i glad is not the type of guy i would target um i talk i'd be interested i'd listen but he's not the guy i'm going after

like if the Blue Jays call, I'm immediately being like, okay, what about Bichette instead? Let's talk about Bo. Let's talk about Bar Show. Let's talk about because the Blue Jays, if they are sellers, do make some sense for Seattle. They have multiple pieces besides Vlad. That makes sense for Seattle. So not saying no. You know, I'm saying that I doubt it would get to a point where I would love the cost it would take to acquire the guy.

Now, also on the money front real quick before we get out of here and we're going way too long here. But just one final thought on this. to offset some of the money you do have some levers you can pull Thai France could be in this trade Jorge Polanco could be involved in this trade Hanager although I doubt it Luis Sirius even though you're probably just not tendering him at the end of the year He could be in the trade

Ryan Stanick But at that point that's only like a million and a half or two million dollars You can you could probably shave like it'll be half And then you could probably if you throw in like For example Thai France you could probably shave another three million bucks off of that So you might be down to like $7 million the rest of the year, but then you still have to pay the $25 to $30 million in arbitration next year. And you're not trading for Vlad Jr. and then non-tendering him, not happening.

No, no, no. And I think if you're trading for Vlad Jr, I think they're at least exploring the idea of extending them. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, you, yeah. Which again, doesn't factor into the trade costs. Shouldn't factor into the trade costs. We say this every year.

Yep. You're not giving up. Oh, I'll give up cold. Emerson because then I'll just sign them to an extension. It's not how that works. No, you are trading for a year and a half. Yep. That's all the trade cost is.

Yep. Yep. All right. That's going to do it for a show. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Lockdown Merritton podcast. Before we get out of here, a reminder that Lockdown has launched the first ever national sports 24-7 streaming channel on YouTube. And now it's also available on Amazon Fire TV and the free Fire TV channels app.

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