Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Do the Mariners Have Their Outfield of the Future Already in Place?

Starting point is 00:00:00 Four series remain, 12 games to go. Do the Marrars have one last push for the playoffs in them? We'll answer that and more coming up here on Mailbag Monday. 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 Monday, September 16th, 2024. This is Tadda Gonzalez and Colby Patnaud for the Lockdown Marys podcast,

Starting point is 00:00:31 part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team. every day. On today's show, we'll be opening up the mailbag like we do here every Monday and answer some of your mariner's questions. But before we do that, shout out to our title sponsor today. Price Picks. Go to Pricepix.com slash locked on MLB and use a promo code, LOC, KED, O N, MLB. That's all lowercase to win $50 instantly when you play $5. 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 we're going to kick off Mailbag Monday here with a question from Chum the Hammerhead. Who wants to know with the hot stretch recently and the twins playing the Guardian seven times and the Houston series coming up. Simple yes or no.

Starting point is 00:01:17 Playoffs? Question mark. No. No. It's over. You're not going to be the ray of sunshine. We all view as? No.

Starting point is 00:01:29 The fat lady has sung. It's over. you shy yourself in the foot when you lost five of six to the tigers. Like it's over at that point. Because not only do you have to make up, what is it, two and a half games over the next 12, it's actually three and a half because you don't have the tiebreaker against Detroit or Minnesota. So you have to essentially be four games better than them over a 12 game stretch. Not going to happen.

Starting point is 00:02:00 That's not going to happen. and the Astros, you have to be five games better than over a 12-game stretch. Not going to happen. Like that we have entered miracle territory. Well, your best hope here is that you pick up one game in this Yankees series while the Astros are playing the Padres. You pick up another game when you're playing the Rangers on the Astros again. And then at that point, you're within two and a half games and you're relying on sweeping them. or at least winning two of the three picking up another game there

Starting point is 00:02:32 and then hoping that Cleveland takes care of business against them in that final series while you take care of business against Oakland. I still think that's the likeliest path here to making the playoffs is by winning the ALS. And again, because you actually have an impact on that. You have the potential to pick up three games right then and there in that series, but you still need to get within striking distance.

Starting point is 00:02:54 And right now you're not. So you got to win this the series against the Yankees You got to probably sweep the Readers And then you're going to have to sweep the Astros Now if all the while while you're doing this The twins keep losing and the tigers Look the tigers have the Royals and the Orioles coming up So it's possible that they'll lose a few games here

Starting point is 00:03:19 But it's possible that you also have that that back way into the playoffs as well with the wild card. But still the likeliest path here is the division by far. Yeah. They have 12 games left. It feels like to me for us to think there's any reasonable

Starting point is 00:03:35 shot, they have to win at least nine of these last 12 games, probably 10. They've won 8 of 11. So they're playing good ball. The offense has been really good. I talked about this on the post game show

Starting point is 00:03:49 on the Patreon on Friday or Saturday. Saturday, I think. you know, since Edgar's taken the gig that day, August 23rd, the Mariners are, I believe, fourth in runs, and that's not counting what they did on Sunday when they put up seven. So they're fourth in runs, and fourth in WRC plus, and we've talked about runs being such a valuable, or such a misleading stat when you're looking to compare offenses because the Mariners play in a really difficult ballpark. Well, that's still true, and yet they still ranked fourth in runs over the last three plus weeks. So they've rode that offense to an eight to an eight and three stretch here.

Starting point is 00:04:30 They probably need to do it again. And at that point, you're talking about winning 16, 17 of your final 22 and still needing a lot of help from other teams to get in. It's just, it's not, it's not likely. It is. So it is, I would say there is less than a 1% chance that this breaks away that the Mariners needed to. And it's their own fault. It's their own fault. like it's very clearly

Starting point is 00:04:54 someone doesn't believe in the power of the city connects no I don't believe in witchcraft next question here from bring back our sonics love the name absolutely bring back our sonics two questions can Julio keep up what he did this weekend the entire rest of the

Starting point is 00:05:11 season and two will Luis Cassio return before the end of the regular season one absolutely Julio can do that because he's Julio Rodriguez and we're seeing some really good things out of him right now two Will Luis Castillo return before the end of the season? Probably not.

Starting point is 00:05:27 Justin Hollander did leave the door open to the possibility that he could come back at the end of the 15 days, which is still before the end of the season. But I would say that if we're going to see Luis Castillo again this year, it's because the mayor has made the playoffs. And he's able to get healthy by, I mean, that might even require them winning a playoff series before you factors into the equation there as well.

Starting point is 00:05:49 Yeah. It's a hamstring injury. So those are always pretty fickle. they can kind of go either way. I think if the Mariners really thought that they could get Castillo back and it would matter, they would have just carried him on the 28 man roster and just played a man down. But instead they put him on the IL. Basically, he can't come back until that last series against Oakland.

Starting point is 00:06:11 That's if he stays the minimum. So no, he's almost certainly not going to pitch. And if you're eliminated by the time he's eligible to return, there's no reason. Yeah, it's just, it's a waste. So, no, we're not going to see Castillo. You know, could Julio do what he did? I mean, he had the six hits in a row, and then he had a pretty mediocre day yesterday.

Starting point is 00:06:34 So, you know, two or three really good games, followed by a bad one. Like, could he do that for, yeah, sure. I mean, there's only 12 games left. Julio was one of the best hitters we've ever seen for an entire month last year. And he's been very good since pretty much July 1. So, yeah, you could, certainly do that, but I think to expect him that, you know, three, four, or five hits and over the next 12 games, he's going to hit eight home runs or something like that.

Starting point is 00:06:59 It's, I mean, probably not, but it is good to see. It could be, but it's not going to happen, but, yeah, you know, Julio is swinging the back right right now, and it's actually fun to watch Julio hit. So at the very least, even though this season is heading towards a disappointing end, it's nice to see Julio really get back on track here late and just give you some good vibes heading into the off season. And hopefully he can carry over his July, August, September performance. Hopefully he can carry that into next year and actually have the breakout year a lot of a thought he was going to have this year.

Starting point is 00:07:38 Yeah, to be nice if he actually finished on a strong note because you look at his last two seasons for his first two seasons. He didn't end those on strong notes, right? He had the big August last year and then had a pretty mediocre September. And then obviously in 2022 didn't have the playoff run that he was hoping for, especially in that last game and game three. And he just kind of had to hold that for a whole off season. So if he's able to actually end what has been overall pretty disastrous season for him,

Starting point is 00:08:09 if he can end that on a high note, I think that would be great for his mental. I had an end to 2025. All right. So we're going to answer a few more of your questions here in just a moment. But first, reminder of this episode of the Lockdowneer's podcast is brought to you by Fanduel. You've heard me talk a lot about Fandul, which of course is America's number one sportsbook.

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Starting point is 00:08:54 Just visit fandwell.com slash locked on. That's LOC KD-O-N to download America's number one sportsbook. And you're listening to the Lockdown Merrers podcast. You can catch all the action between the Marys and the Yankees tomorrow night on the Mara's hometown broadcast with Sirius XM via the XXM app. All you have to do to find that is search the word. bearers. Josh wants to know. If he doesn't decide to retire and he actually wants to resign, would you guys be opposed to bringing Justin Turner back in 2025? Yeah, you know, he's certainly been pretty good for the last couple of weeks. And, you know, his line drive approach, his contact heavy approach is certainly one that, in theory,

Starting point is 00:09:36 fits T-Mobile Park a little bit better. My question is, where does he play? Like, how do you, is he going to be your first basement next year? Because then you're taking that bats away from Luke Rayleigh and it's like do you really want to do that. Rayleigh's been insane since August and just really good overall. Do you want to, do you want him to be the DH? Like you want a DH who's going to pop maybe eight, nine home runs? And that's if he doesn't lose any more bat speed and anything like that. So like, I mean, it's not the worst thing in the world, but like we're talking about

Starting point is 00:10:10 spending nine, ten, eleven million bucks to bring him back to be a part-time player. No, it doesn't make sense. At that point, I'd rather just go sign Carlos Santana, who's also old, but at least has power still, at least plays good defense at first base still. I just think there's going to be other options. And obviously, it has the connection with Julio and all that, right? Sure. Right. But honestly, again, like, if you're going to go spend money on a first basement, DH, go spend it on a good one, like a really good one.

Starting point is 00:10:42 Don't, don't, you know, try and be like, oh, well, you know, we're going to spend $7 million. at first base. It's like, what you go spend 20 at first base? I can't imagine that 40 year old Justin Turner though is going to command much on the market. No, I mean, like I said, every every player who doesn't have off the field issues, uh, has a number where it's like, okay, at that price, that makes sense. But I think the likelihood that that number is going to get low enough that when you look at the Mariners roster, you're like, yeah, Justin Turner easily fits here at this number. I just don't think that's going to happen. No, he's, he's not plan A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L MN O P.

Starting point is 00:11:21 He might be, like, plan V here, but, yeah. Disrespect of QR-S-T-U. Right. Yeah, so, like, sure, if he happens to come back, is it the worst thing in the world? Probably not. I'd have to see what the rest of the roster looks like, but no, you should be aiming a lot higher than Justin Turner. And it feels to me like Turner is probably most likely. to retire than he is to play another season but uh you know we'll see uh obviously it's up to him

Starting point is 00:11:51 if he wants to play i just don't think it's going to be for seattle yeah there's just too much regression risks there at that age right like i was able to overlook the age this season because he was already hitting the season right like like we talked about in the episode when they traded for him it's like i just need him to be as good as he was yesterday today right but then with you know a layoff in between playing time for him. I don't know how that's going to translate from age 39 to age 40 so we'll see. But yeah, if I had to guess he's probably going to retire

Starting point is 00:12:21 but in the event that he doesn't I'm mostly out, right? That is the fallback of my fallback of my fallback of my fallback. Kizamu wants to know if they can get all or if they can all get going at the same time is it worth it to keep

Starting point is 00:12:38 Robles Rodriguez, Randy together in the outfield. Feels like they are feeding off each other's energy. you should keep those three guys absolutely right because moving off of one of those guys moving off of two of those guys if you moved off of rubless and randy obviously they're not going to move off of julio

Starting point is 00:12:54 just creates more work for you you should add to that group or you should be willing to add to that group because you're not taking away playing time for any of those guys because you have the dh wide open so yeah add to the group but don't take any of those guys out

Starting point is 00:13:14 of it. Absolutely. I mean, you're seeing what the what the ceiling is essentially for all three of those guys when they're all cooking. Like it's a lot of fun. This team wins games when those guys are cooking. So I mean, Victor Robles by the way, Colby has been, I didn't even know this until this morning. So over the last 30 days, so dating back to August 16th, Victor Robles is the most valuable hitter in all of baseball by WRC Plus. More valuable than Aaron Judge. Right. Guess who's number two? Aaron Judge. Luke Rayley.

Starting point is 00:13:50 Yeah. Guess who's number three? Aaron Judge. Lawrence, by the. But guess who's number four? Aaron Judge. Eh, Eugenio Soros.

Starting point is 00:14:01 Guess who's number five? I'm done. Aaron Judge. There you go. It was number five. Yeah. But so yeah, it's obviously you're keeping those three guys.

Starting point is 00:14:14 There's no reason to move off of them. You know, again, assuming Randy's checking out in the clubhouse and all that stuff, like he's, he's there and, you know, that's stuff. And he's, you know, excited to be the blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, off the field stuff with Randy that I'm not too concerned about. It does seem to be settling in. And he's hit really well at T-Mobile Park, you know, since joining the Mariners.

Starting point is 00:14:36 And that's not something you really want to move on from, right? You want to get guys who can hit at T-Mobile Park. And he's certainly one of them. So, yeah, those three guys are going to be. fine and then uh you know Luke Rayley figures into the mix too as well Rayleigh right now probably the first basement but he could slide though so yeah your outfield's in really good shape

Starting point is 00:14:54 yeah yeah you have to keep those guys together because again you're just creating more work for yourself if you don't right Randy's a really good hitter and he's proven that he can hit at T-Mobile Park why would you pass up on that it's like one of the few guys that you've actually hit on offensively it seems so like yeah don't don't move off of that that would be stupid uh I know he's making And, you know, he's going to make, what, $12 million in arbitration this off season?

Starting point is 00:15:18 Doesn't matter. Yeah. Randy is like a $20 million player that you're paying $12 million to. Yeah. I mean, consider that like Max Kepler is probably going to make 16 to $20 million a year as a free agent this year. And you're probably never going to pay Randy that much in the next two years of arbitration. He's a bargain.

Starting point is 00:15:42 Yeah. But if you want to go out and, you know, pay a guy that can play in play an outfield spot but also can dh like anthony santander go for it absolutely and you know on the days that santander plays out in the outfield robles can be the dh randy can be the dh julio can be the dh doesn't matter really so and that's also the beauty of of having robles is robles can play center field for you so on the days that julio needs a need a blow or he just you know needs to dh like you're more than fine with Victor Robles out in center field.

Starting point is 00:16:17 You even have a third option. Rayleigh, not terrible. Yeah. Yeah. So. Luke really second best hitter in baseball over the last 30 days. There we go. Since August 1,

Starting point is 00:16:27 he has like a 190 WRC plus. It's been really good. Luke Rayling better than Aaron Judge. 150-ish at home this year. Ballpark, nobody can hit in. Luke Rayley, 150-ish WRC plus. Clearly, you just need to get guys from Tampa Bay.

Starting point is 00:16:47 They got to figure it out. That's the solution. Jose Siri breakout is going to be insane next year. 30 bombs, gold glove defense, 190 batting average, sure, but 30 bombs and gold glove defense, like Jose Siri to the Mariners. I hit a Joey Gallo with significantly better defense.

Starting point is 00:17:09 Don't disrespect Joey Gallo's glove. Dude to play. He's an athlete. Yeah, yeah. All right, we got a couple more questions of yours to answer here in just a moment. But first, a reminder of this episode of the Lockdown Marries podcast is once again brought to you by prize picks. Prize picks is the easiest, the most exciting way to play daily fantasy sports. Unlike other apps on prize picks, it's just you against the numbers.

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Starting point is 00:18:37 All you have to do to find that is search the word Marriers. The Collins It Like It Is podcast. I've been on that podcast. Once to know, does Victor Roe, Robles going on another hot streak change expectations going forward. No. Really? Seeing that he has, like the league has adjusted to him and he's adjusted back and he's found success again.

Starting point is 00:19:02 That doesn't change anything for you? No, because my problem is, is that like, basically he's been the best hitter in baseball or the worst hitter in baseball. And like, where is just like the consistent like stretch where he's just, you know, a 115 WRC plus. guy for a month. I mean, there probably is that if you like set the filters right now. Yeah, but right now it's just the streakiest hitter in baseball and the streak is good right now. So we're all feeling great. But, uh, no, like I think the idea that, oh, he's been really good for what eight of the last, you know, 11 weeks, give or take. And the other three weeks he was terrible. Like I'm supposed to be this guy is all of a sudden something he's never been before.

Starting point is 00:19:44 No, I'm not going to buy that. If he does, if he does anything. close to this next year, then yeah, obviously things change. But no, until I see him do it over the course of a full season, no, to me, I'm looking at Robles and I'm going like, yeah, he's probably best suited to be a fourth outfielder. But obviously he's going to get a shot to start next year. He should. He's earned it. But he's probably ultimately a fourth outfielder who is going to play, you know, should get $350,000 played appearances. He's going to put up solid numbers.

Starting point is 00:20:16 He's going to steal some bags. he'll do some fun things on the bases. He's kind of a weird, weird cat, right? Because he doesn't really fit into what the Mariners have typically brought in, right? He swings at the first pitch a lot. Like, he bunts all the time. Like, he chokes up.

Starting point is 00:20:32 He steps forward way in the box to the point where he's almost out of the box when he makes contact. Like, he's kind of a weird, like, it's not a traditional offensive profile. Like, for a guy who's hitting like, Victor is. You think of like Juan Soto and like Aaron Judge. Like that's the level he's been at for the last few weeks. And those guys don't do anything close to what or they don't do it anywhere close to how Robles does it just in terms of style and and you know actual substance. So it's a little difficult for me to say that, you know, because it's not like Robles is hitting the ball incredibly hard every single night. It's he's staying up the middle of the field. He's going gap to gap. He'll pull the ball. He'll hit doubles down the line. sure, absolutely. But a lot of it is, you know, infield singles and bunts singles and flipping balls into

Starting point is 00:21:22 center field and, you know, just kind of this, it's just a very almost each year like a way of hitting where it's just kind of like, yeah, like my only goal is to like, is to put the ball in that one spot because I know nobody will be able to get over there in time and he just does it. I feel like it's more Jean Sagura. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:21:45 He reminds me a lot of Jean Sagura. I mean even even the stent even the stances the whole gene's cigar yeah I mean Cigra certainly stockier but yeah yeah yeah he was hitting really well before he got hurt last year he's had other stretches over the course of his career where he has hit well I don't think that it's really that far fetch to think that he maybe he's just a late bloomer and he's only 27 years old right and what he initially was as a prospect as a higher rate of prospect than even Juan Soto in the National's farm system wound up not being who he's or what he's best at. Robless to me, I think he's a, I think he's a useful player.

Starting point is 00:22:30 I think he's going to be a bargain at the contract the Mariners gave him. And sure, there's a, there's a shot that he is more than what I think he is. But it's just such a unique style. And it's just such a, you know, different brand of hitting than we've seen that only a few guys have been able to pull this off and very few of them wear the Mariners uniform. And I'm just sitting here like, you know, cool, I'm happy. I'm excited. Like he's a fun player. I love watching him play. Even with the obsession with bunting with runners in scoring position, whatever. You know, he's obviously endured himself to the fan base here and the clubhouse. So I'm excited for Victor. I'm just not going to play the expectation game that this guy's, you know, that the Mariners

Starting point is 00:23:12 have essentially gotten the Josh Donaldson of the outfield where it's like, oh yeah, this guy's just going to come out of nowhere in his late 20s and be a five-win player. Like, no, I'm not going there. Although he's basically been a five-win player since he joined the Mariners. Last question of the day comes from Reagan. What are some creative trade approaches the front office could take to get a prohibitive or potentially prohibitive contract? Some examples given here, Hanniger, Garver, JP, maybe, off of the books.

Starting point is 00:23:42 It's not really that many creative ways to do it. Either you take on a bad contract. like the Hanager for Robbie Ray swap. So either you make another trade like that, or you do what they did with Marco Gonzalez and Evan White, and you attach a prospect or a young major leaguer to that grouping to get those contracts off your books. Like, that's pretty much the way you do it, right?

Starting point is 00:24:09 You either add a player to the expensive contract and just lose the deal outright like that, or you swap the high contract for another high contract, and you just kind of roll the dice and see how it works out. The Mariners did both of those things last off season. Wouldn't be shocked to see them do one or both of those things again this winter. Unfortunately, they might be in a position where they have to because ownership didn't step up. So, yeah, I don't really know there's any more creative ways to do it

Starting point is 00:24:41 than either attaching a prospect or a young major leaguer or just finding another contract for a player that that team wants to get rid of and saying, hey, you know, we have this outfielder. You guys need outfield help. You have this bullpen contract. We'll take a shot on your bullpen guy and want to swap contracts. And I think that's pretty much your only avenue. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:25:01 Yeah. That's really it. It's very straightforward. It's essentially, I mean, with Hanigur, it would be solved with Kelnick getting Evan White and Marco Gonzalez off of the books or, at least. pretty equal to that. Garver not as much because Garver can at least catch. So there's some value quote unquote to that. And it's only 12 million bucks for a year. Right. And the other thing that the mayors could do is they could eat some money. They could just say, hey, you know,

Starting point is 00:25:34 you don't want to take, you don't want to take Hanager at 17 million. Would you take them at seven? and sure we have to eat 10 million bucks, but we also save $7 million in our payroll. But even doing that, you're probably still attaching a prospect or a player to make the medicine go down, essentially, that that player is a sweetener to make the deal more likely to go through.

Starting point is 00:25:58 So it's really it. Either you swap bad contracts, either you add a really valuable piece to a bad contract and just expect nothing in return or you pay down some of the remaining salary that's owed to the contract you want to move and that will make the player you give up in theory a little bit less painful of a guy to give up those are your options all right that is going to do it for our show but before we get out of

Starting point is 00:26:26 here a reminder that locked on 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 locked on sports today is here for you 24-7 covering the top sports stories of the day with the local experts of locked on plus our national shows covering every league find locked on sports today now available on the free fire tv channels app thank you so much for joining us here on the locked on mariner's podcast for colby pat node i'm ty dan gonzalez be sure to give us a follow on twitter at l o underscore mariners you can follow me at ty dain gonzalez and colby at cpad 11 that's cpat 1-1 you can also find all that stuff in the description of this episode now have

Starting point is 00:27:04 yourself a beautiful baseball day and we'll see you next time Peace.

Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Do the Mariners Have Their Outfield of the Future Already in Place?

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