Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Don't Look Now, But Mariners Closing in on Wild-Card Spot

Episode Date: July 6, 2022

Contrary to a certain host's expectations, the Mariners were able to sweep the Padres in two games down in San Diego. Now they find themselves just one game under .500 and 3.5 games back of the third and final wild-card spot in the American League. Ty Dane Gonzalez and Colby Patnode check in on the standings, discuss Andrés Muñoz's recent hot stretch and recap the action from Tuesday afternoon's 6-2 win in this episode of Locked On Mariners.Be sure to follow or subscribe to Locked On Mariners wherever you prefer your podcasts! For questions and other inquiries, email: [e-mail] up to date with all things Mariners at Inside the Mariners - a FanNation website covering the Seattle Mariners on the Sports Illustrated network.Follow the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @danegnzlz | @CPat11 | @InsideMarinersFor more of Ty and Colby, check out their Patreon: patreon.com/controlthezone/Blue NileMake your moment sparkle with jewelry from Bluenile.com, and LOCKED ON SPORTS listeners get $50 off purchases of $500 or more using code LOCKEDON.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Mariners are now just one game under 500 after sweeping the Padres. Now they're enjoying a much needed day off. But we ain't taking the day off here on the Lockdown Mariners 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.

What's up, everyone? Welcome to the Locked on Mariners podcast. It is Wednesday, July 6th, 22. And thank you so much for making us your first listen of the day. we are free and available in all platforms. I am your host, Taday Gonzalez, joined as always by my co-host, Colby Pat. We cover the Mariners over at Inside the Mariners.com for Fan Nation over on the Sports Illustrated Network. Be sure to follow the show on Twitter at LO underscore Mariners.

Follow Inside the Mariners at Inside Mariners. You can follow me at Dan Gonzalez. That's D-A-N-Z-L-Z and Colby at C-P-E-E-T-1-1. Be sure also check out our Patreon at patreon.com forward slash control zone. We post two additional podcasts. on there every single week. And if this is your first time joining us here on the Lockdown Mariners podcast, welcome to the show. If you like what you hear, give us a follow or subscribe wherever you're listening to this.

And if you're watching us on YouTube, hit the subscribe button, turn on the notification bell and give this video a thumbs up. We greatly appreciate it. We're going to be talking about Andreas Munoz later on in the show, who has been one of the best relievers in baseball for the last five or six weeks. We're also going to be talking a little bit about the standings and where the Mariners sit right now in the wild card race. with 10 games to go until the All-Star break. But first, let's get into yesterday's game because we recorded yesterday's episode before the game happened,

did not do our typical post-game show. Let's look back on this one and take a look at Logan Gilbert, who went five in a third innings and was not very sharp for the second start in a row. He strikes out just one, walks three, gives up two runs, only one of them earned,

the other one coming off of a booted ball by Adam Frazier. But Gilbert was pretty lucky to get out of this one with just that damage done to him, right? Yeah, you know, it's actually been pretty touch and go for the last three or four starts. It's just really started to kind of show up stats-wise in the last two. You know, we've said this before. I guess we'll say it again. Logan Gilbert does not have tremendous stuff.

Not a stuff guy, right? I mean, he's not Sandy Alcantra. He's got a very good fastball that plays up because of the extension he gets. And he's got probably, you know, slightly above that and kind of a fringe average change in curveball. He is not a stuff guy. So what that means is that the fastball, he has to get value out of it because the other off-speed pitches, A, he doesn't control them well enough yet or consistently enough to live on those pitches. And they're also not so filthy that he's going to get a ton of swing and miss on them.

So he has to have the fastball. And yesterday the fastball, it was very clear the Padres had a plan. They wanted to hunt the fastball early in counts because they knew they were going to get it. They took good swings at it. Gilbert was very little command. You know, three walks isn't terrible, but in five and a third is not ideal, obviously. There were a lot of misses. And then when he did throw the fastball for a strike, it was usually in the middle of the plate.

even when it was elevated, it was still middle of the plate. So Gilbert has to have the fastball. He has to have 55 command of the fastball where he's going to struggle like he did yesterday. And, you know, if Gilbert's going to struggle and go five innings and give up one earn, then fine, you take it. That's a pretty good, you know, bad start. But it is something he's going to have to hammer out here. His next start will be against the nationals, I believe, unless the Mariners change things up with their rotation, with the off day today.

So we'll see. He's going to end up with, I believe, two more starts before the All-Star break. We'll see how the fastball control command looks there. But he has got to spot the fastball and he's got to get ahead with it so that the other pitches can play unless, of course, he's going to switch up his style of pitching and start throwing the slider for first pitch strikes, which seems unlikely. So he's got to have the fastball figured out. So any reason to be concerned right now after these last.

last couple starts. No. No. Gilbert is extremely cerebral. He is a worker. It's part of the reason the mayor has found love with him in the draft process. It's part of the reason they called him up after only one AAA start. He's going to figure this out. He's going to make adjustments.

He has throughout his entire career already. You know, we've seen him change grips on the change up. We've seen him throw the slider a little bit harder. We've seen him embrace pitching up in the zone. So, no, there's no cause for concern yet. And, you know, we hear word, oh, well, he's kind of battling some shoulder fatigue or something, then be a little concerned. But for now, no, and it's also worth noting that, you know, Gilbert, you know, hasn't pitched,

you know, for four straight months to start a year, really ever. I mean, remember in 20, I remember last year, he basically didn't pitch in games until May. So maybe there's a little bit of fatigue here. Maybe he needs the all-star break. how he looks with the extra days rest, but no, I don't think there's any cause for concern because, like I said, I mean, if you go five innings and give up one run

against the Padres, and that's a bad start, got to feel okay about your chances going forward, right? Yeah. So, on the offensive end, the Mariners gave themselves enough of a cushion to survive Gilbert's rather poor start, and things got

a little bit interesting there for the bullpen, but they were able to hold it down the rest of the way. But, Yeah, the offense comes through with six more runs. They added a pair of insurance runs in the top of the night. That was huge from J.P. Crawford, a huge triple over the head of Trent Grisham. But I think the MVP of the day for the Mariners was Sam Haggertie,

old old ham Swaggerty, who comes through with his second three hit game since being called back up. He goes three for four, including a home run off of Mike Lovenger to break the eyes for the Mariners. I mean, Haggerty's been pretty good so far, right? Yeah. You know, there seems to be something about Dylan Moore hitting 8th and Haggerty hitting 9th, which causes them both to play well at the same time. Remember the game in Texas that they basically won by themselves.

There was another one on the homestand. I think it was against Boston, I want to say the one game they won in Boston. I think Dimo and Haggerty had a pretty big hand in that. But, yeah, you know, Haggerty does a lot of things well. He makes a lot of contact. He runs very well. He is a competent defender no matter where you put him. There's a lot to like in Sam Haggerty.

There's also some, you know, major concerns you don't want to play him every day because he will be exposed. But he is a part-time player, just like Dylan Morris. You know, you got to give these two guys credit. They're playing pretty well as they're covering for first J.P. Crawford and now Jesse Winker. and the Mariners need it because, you know, this wasn't a game where Julio was the star. Julio went, I mean, Julio went two for five. But they were, you know, two flare hits and he struck out three times. He had a tough time picking up the slider, you know, and Suarez was 0 for five.

And Santana had just a single and Raleigh, you know, one for four. Like there were no big performances with the exception of Dillmore, Sam Haggrey. And then obviously JP. one for four, but obviously the big triple, he did hit the ball hard two other times aside from the table. So JP's come off his suspension and so far has looked very good. So yeah, I believe that's five or six hard hit balls over the last few games. So good stuff from from JP. Good to see that he has a miss a beep.

Actually, you know, it seems like he's kind of fixed some things a little bit because he's Biden there before the suspension. So that's good from JP. But yeah, you know, Haggurty, Haggurty has been a solid player, you know, good bats ball skills, decent defender with some versatility, some good speed, and all that stuff. Like, he's pretty valuable all around. He did have that little interesting MLB the show-esque miscue with the base running. Yeah.

I'm going, like, I don't think that he actually touched first looking back on it. Jason Churchill, Prospect Insider first pointed this out. Does that really matter, though? Yeah, no, no, no, no, not at all. because that was still a really confusing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, let's just call it. It was a dumb decision by Sam Haggerton.

He just started running to third. He was at second. He just reached second by the time that the ball reached second. And then he just kept running. He just kept running and running and running. I guess he thought he could outrun the pitcher at a third base. But the problem was the pitcher was like halfway between third base and the mound. So.

Well, and then Machado was there too, right? Like Machado was the one that ended up putting the, putting the top of it. I thought that was the pitcher. I mean, the base wasn't as uncovered as Haggerty thought it was. Yeah. So I don't know. Maybe he just thought, well, they already, they already booted it once. And then they, the night before they had that interesting throw to third, let's say. And so I'll take my chances, I guess. Yeah, that was weird. But, you know, he hit the home run. I think got 109 miles an hour. So I guess we got this time around. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. I believe he also stole a base. So combo meal for Sam Haggurty Last Sam Haggity with the Flexing the muscles in this game.

How about that? 109 off of the bat. I didn't think that he had that in him. But yeah. Why not? The ball was flying all over Petco Park by the way. But not to center field. Yeah, weird. Probably touched that one up

like the dead center field and it just died before it got to the track. It was weird. But like, you know, the Mariners had 18 hard hit balls on Monday. And then I think combined the Padres and the Mariners had like 20 something hard hit balls in yesterday's game as well. And there was like they had already cracked 10 by the third inning or something like that. Just a lot of hard contact in this in the series. Pretty wild.

Yeah. The Mariners had 10 hard hit balls yesterday. The Padres had 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 13. So, yeah. You know, I mean, it's kind of makes sense. I mean, the Mariners did a lion's share of the hard hits yesterday. but Gilbert was in the middle of the plate. So yeah, he's in, you know, Gilbert's a guy who's usually going to give a kind of hard contact

because he lives on the basketball. So, but yeah, it was, it was nice, you know, and somehow the Mariners score 14 and the, and the Padre's score for baseball. Baseball. And we absolutely love it. And I was completely, completely wrong on our little crossover that we did with Javier and some blocked on Padres. Yeah, yeah.

But I, yeah, I, I unfortunately said on there that I didn't think the Mariners were going to be able to get a sweep. I thought split series at best. And, I mean, to be fair, who can blame me, given the circumstances? But, hey, you know, good, you know, hats off to the Mariners for what they were able to do in the series. They got dominated by Austin Pruitt less than 24 hours before. So, yeah, I think that was a pretty fair, fair thought process. But, yeah, happy to be wrong when the, one of the Marines. Provener proved me wrong. Yeah, and you know everyone across this roster contributing into it just an all-around team series. You know, not to be too cliche about it, but that's kind of what it was. Every single phase of the game was working for the Mariners in this one and every single phase of their roster was really working for them as well.

So another star from yesterday's game was Munoz, who statistically has been one of the best relievers and all of baseball over the last five or six weeks. We're going to be talking about him in just a moment. But real quick, a reminder of this episode of the Lockdown Mariners, is brought by Blue Nile. Whether you're ready to pop the question or you're celebrating a milestone moment, find jewelry as unique as them with the modern convenience of online shopping at Blue Nile.com. Blue Nile has simple online tools that let you choose the diamond shape, size, and clarity as well as setting style. Blue Nile's bench jewelers will then hand craft their per engagement ring, and each ring will be a one of a kind.

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and arrives in discrete packaging that won't give away what's inside. Shop stress-free and find your forever piece. Go to Blue Nile.com today. You're listening to the Lockdown Mariners podcast. Thank you again for making us your first listen of the day. So after Gilbert struggled to get out of the six, he left runners on the corners with one out. And the ball was given to Andres Munoz, who has earned the favor of Scott's service as of late. And he came through against his old team.

He gave up a sacrifice fly, did also walk a batter, but then went on to strike out three over one and two thirds innings pitch. He was dominant. He touched 102 miles per hour on the radar gun. he was struggling quite a bit. He had given up five earned runs against the Red Sox on May 22nd, but since then he struck out 27, walked just three. He's given up just three earned runs on 10 hits. He's been incredible over the last five or six weeks.

What have you seen out of Munoz? What's impressing you about him? Yeah, you know, it's funny because a few weeks ago we were talking about, I mean, Munoz shouldn't be a guarantee to be on this roster. He was struggling that poorly. and he's really turned it around. The one thing for me is that he's getting value out of the fastball. If you remember early in the year,

hitters were torching his fastball, and regardless of it being 102 miles an hour, it was pretty straight, and it was usually in the middle of the plate. And what we're seeing right now from Munoz is that he's still 98 to 102, but he's actually locating it on the corners a little bit. And he's getting some run, some armside run to the pitch, which pre-Tommy John was something he was known for.

The fastball wasn't straight. It did have some run to it. And you were starting to see that again. You saw it on the pitch to strike out Machado. That was a fastball up in a way that had run back into Machado, but it was right on the corner. And that's a pitch that if it is more towards the middle of the plate, it's going a long way. but because it's on the corner, Machado has to be literally perfect with his swing to even touch it.

And, of course, he couldn't. So we're seeing him control the fastball more. We're seeing him get a little more run on the fastball. And it is making the fastball a swing and miss pitch, which is great because the slider was already there. So now you pair a 100-mile-hour fastball with some run. It's not crazy run. It's not Sandy Al-Contra, 100 miles per hour with 20 inches of break.

But it is enough with the, you know, 90-mile-per-hour wipeout. slider to get tons of swings and misses. And that's kind of the role that Scott appears to be using Munoz in. Do I need a strikeout here on the six? And I'm going to use Munoz. And what we are starting to see Scott also do is trust Munoz to go more than, you know, one inning. He's going to ask him to get four outs. He's going to ask him to get five outs when he can. And so Munoz is quickly gaining the trust of, you know, Scott's service, rightfully so. And the Mariners are starting to get back to a point where, you know, they have maybe three guys now where you can hand the ball to in a high leverage situation. And for the most part, you expect them to get it done. Yeah. Seawald,

Castillo, Munoz and Swanson's been a little since he's returned from the IL. Yeah, yeah, he's looked a little shaky. He looked a little shaky yesterday as well. It wasn't great. You know, and Penn Murphy's been pretty good here and there for the most part. They use him in some weird, they use them in some weird scenarios though like down 9-2 against the Orioles last Monday and here comes Penn Murphy for some reason that should be

Tommy Malone so yeah I just you know Murphy's a guy they don't quite trust yet so they're going to use him as kind of their hey let's get out of this inning and then we'll reassess where we are and those are big spots you know you get to the 6th and your guys gone five and two thirds and there's runners

on second and third and George Springer's up, hey, well, you know who's pretty good against Ritey's Penn Murphy? Let's go get to him. And if he gets out of it, great. And if he doesn't, well, we were down, you know, three to two anyways. So we'll save Munoz and all that. So Murphy's still been pretty good. Like I said, Castillo's been very good lately.

Seawald certainly looks better his last few times out. And then Swanson, right now he's just not quite, doesn't quite have the fastball command that he did early. earlier, but I think that'll probably come. So. Yeah. So Munoz is now the American League leader in case per nine, 13.64, surpassed Liam Hendricks yesterday. And then, you know, unfortunately, that was the only revenge game that we got in this series. You know, unfortunately, Luis Terenz, Taylor Tremel, and Thai France, all on the injured list. But, Colby, you put out a tweet earlier today from our Control the Zone account that,

looked at, you know, that trade that brought Terence, Tramel, France, and Munoz over, run the Padres back in 2020 at the trade deadline. And so far, those four guys have combined to earn 8.5 baseball reference for. Now, Austin Nola, Austin Adams, and Dan Altavilla, the three players that went over to the Padres on that deal, have combined for just two and a half beat war. And honestly, yesterday, I didn't even remember that Austin Nola played in that game. The Mariners should go get Austin Nola for like Ken Murphy.

I think that's a fair trade. But yeah, it's worth noting too. I didn't put this in the tweet, but I did find it humorous. Typhrance, this year alone, and keep in mind, he's missed the last two weeks. He's been worth three wins by himself. So, AJ Preller is very bad at his job. Yeah, the first half of 2022 Ty France is more valuable than anything AJ Prellar got back at that deal. That's, yeah, and the Padres didn't end up doing anything in 2020 anyway.

They made it to the postseason, the loss of the Dodgers, right? 2020, yes, and then 2021, the disaster. Yeah, so AJ Proler's terrible at his job. And keep in mind that the Mariners have used, they've just now started to use Munoz. regularly. Taylor Tremel hasn't really gotten an extended look in the big leagues quite yet for other reasons. And Luis Turenz, we'll see. I mean, Trenz probably is the worst piece of that trade, but you got one really good year of production from him and another so far about half year of, you know, a really good backup, high-quality backup catcher. Like, I mean, Munoz and Torens

is probably going to win that trade alone, just those two pieces. But the fact that Thai France has already beaten them, all three of them, in 70 games. It's okay. They have Eric Cosmer. They didn't need Thai France. Dan Altavilla now,

isn't he pitching in Japan or something or Korea? I think so. I don't think he's pitching in the U.S. now. He is not. No. And then Austin Adams, I think, is still with the Padres, right? I believe he's hurt again, though.

Yeah, yeah, that's unfortunate because he is nasty when he's healthy. Yeah, he was a lot of fun to watch when he was with the Mariners. But yeah, chills. Jerry did it again. And that's not even to mention the other trade that he made with the Padres right before the deadline, which brought Matt Brash over for like three innings of Taylor Williams, whatever it was. Yeah. Matt Brash could be a pretty big piece to this bullpen, which is starting to surge a little bit here in the second half of the season. All right, so we're going to be looking at the standings because they're starting to look

a little more favorable for the Mariners after their recent hot stretch and hopefully they can keep it going. We'll be looking at the standings in just a moment. But real quick, a reminder, this episode of Lockdown Mariners is brought to you by BetOnline. Betonline.net is your number one source for all your betting needs and sports info. Find all the latest sports developments, league reviews and news, including this year's NHL playoffs and Major League Baseball. Bet Online is your continued source for all your sporting wagering information, including live betting e-sports and scores and scores. And bet online remains the best spot for all your sports scores, podcasts, and news this season.

It is the fastest and easiest way to check in on all your favorite sports and events, including MMA, boxing, and golf. So head to the website today or use your mobile device to learn more about the trends and action. Bet Online is where the game starts. So the Mariners got even more help yesterday after sweeping the Padres. the Guardians lost in a blowout to the Tigers, which, wow, if you're getting blown out by the Tigers, you should probably look inward a little bit. And then the Blue Jays lost again to the A's, and they're playing the A's right now. But the Blue Jays have lost the first two games of the series.

We'll see how they do to finish out this series and see if they can at least grab one. But right now, the Mariners are three and a half back of Toronto for the third. and find a wildcard spot. And on top of that, they're just one game back of the Guardians. So, you know, now that the,

the Blue Jays are coming to town, there's a non-zero chance here, Colby, that the Mariners are able to play themselves into a wildcard spot. A very, very, very, very, very, very, very small chance. I want to emphasize that as much as possible here,

but a chance nonetheless, that with a sweep, and assuming that they lose to, and if they lose to the A's today as well, the Mariners could actually solely hold on to the third and final wild card spot in the Yale, heading into Washington. So let's be more realistic here, though. You know, we set out our goals for this stretch of games for the Mariners.

But now seeing what they've been able to do, of course, they've got to go five and three over their next nine games. to make it to, sorry, six and four over the next 10 games to make it above it. Thank you. By the All-Star break. Does that goal change a little bit for you? Is it like, do your feelings still stay the same about the Mariners heading into the All-Star break if they are a couple of games under 500? You know, if they stay where they're at right now, if they're, you know, a game under five,

but they go, let's say they go five and five, right? They're a game under 500, but there's still just a game back of Cleveland and three and a half back of Toronto. Then, no, I think you're still right where you want to be aggressiveness-wise. It's still a little bit about what Chicago does behind you and what Texas does behind you and what Baltimore does behind you. Not the Angels, though. They have their own issues. So I just, I don't know. You're going to start a ball.

Two and seven says the brawl, by the way. Yeah, you're going to sign a brawl. You better win. But hey, good for you. You expose yourself for nothing. Enjoy. By the way, fun note, the angels are closer to the tigers and the standings and they are the Mariners now. But anyways, of course I had to throw that in there.

No, I think if you go five and five, you're going to be buyers. And, you know, we talked about, you know, they're going to be buyers regardless, at least for 2023. They're going to try and buy players like that. but if you're right in this range come the All-Star break and honestly probably now, you shouldn't cross rentals off of your your checklist. I mean, if they were where the Angels were and they were seven back with five to pass, then yeah, rentals probably don't make any sense. But because they're only a game back of Cleveland,

because they're only three and a half back as of this recording from Toronto, I mean, they've gained three games on Cleveland and they've gained four games on Toronto in the last week. Yeah. They've also gained, I believe, three games overall on Texas, kind of pushed them further down the standings. And they've gained, I think, two games on Chicago. So they're gaining ground fast.

By the way, nobody in this wild card race is playing that well. The Mariners are playing the best ball right now. Of all the non-division leading teams, the second hottest team right now is actually the Detroit Tigers. who are definitely not I guess Riley Green has just completely changed the face of that organization I guess you know kudos to Baltimore

they've also won three in a row but yeah By the way did you see that game last night I saw the highlights Orioles did a game tying home run in the 7th 8th and night Yeah Odor and the last inning too Because like he he made an error

And it allowed Simeon to get on and then Seeger followed that up with a two-run, home run to go ahead. And then next inning, Odor hits a game-tying home run. It was great. It was amazing. That game was awesome.

Yeah, against his former team, too. And he pointed at the dugout as he was round and third. It was great. I love that. O'Dore is kind of a chump, but he is entertaining a lot of times. I believe it was Jake Mence of

Sesame this BBQ last night who said, this is the most entertaining Zero War Player ever. Yeah, it's probably pretty accurate. But no, yeah, I think the team just has to go five and five, and they'll be in a good position to buy. And, you know, it's, it's, they have a shot here. If they can take three or four from Toronto even, Toronto will still hold the wild card spot, but obviously at that point,

all the momentum is with Seattle. And then, you know, the next weekend, they have a shot to kind of bury the Rangers in a four-game set. They go into, if they go into Texas or Texas comes here. They go to Texas. So they're going, yeah, it's a really, like the scheduling is that it's worst here. So they go to San Diego for two, then come back home for four in Toronto or against Toronto. Then they're going all the way across the country to DC for two against the nationals. Then they're going back to Texas for four in Arlington. And then it's the all start break. And then I don't, I think they're, they're back home after that. But that's, uh, that is my numbing. I don't know what the schedule makers were thinking with that at all.

Why wouldn't they just flip the Texas series and the Toronto series? They're both four games. Whatever. Anyways. Yeah, I don't, I don't know. So if they take three or four from Toronto, they take three or four against Texas.

Not only is Toronto, not only is Toronto collapsing. Not only is that narrative starting. But you also, more or less buried the Rangers, depending on what the Rangers do between now and when you play them.

Because you could, you know, you can add two games, and all of a sudden you could be up by five or six on Texas heading into the break. And it is important, you know,

we focus so much on the teams that are ahead of Seattle, rightfully so, but you also need to pay attention to the teams behind Seattle, which right now is Chicago, Texas, and we'll say Baltimore.

And look, really the only team that I'm concerned, about that group out of that group is Chicago because they have the most talent. They have the most like major league like established talent. It really feels to me like the wild card the three wild card spots are going to come

down to Boston, Tampa, Toronto, Seattle, Chicago. I don't know. I don't trust Cleveland and they're not playing very well right now, but I don't, I think Cleveland's going to collapse a little bit. I don't think they're that good of a roster. Yeah, the roster is just not great. I'm very surprised that they're in the position that they're in right now. Obviously they have, you know, an MVP can.

candidate and Jose Ramirez and they have Shane Bieber who's being Shane Bieber for the most part this year but that's who else in that lineup scares you no one like Amad Rosario's having a good year oh well yeah Andre's Gemenez is having a pretty good year I mean but is a Jimenez yeah Jimenez might be an all-star actually but they yeah like I mean outside of Ramirez Jimenez and maybe you know a couple of other guys like they just it's not a great roster to Franman but they uh yeah like I mean outside of Ramirez Jimenez and maybe you know a couple of other guys like they just it's not a great roster to Fran mill. But even the rotation gets kind of iffy after Bieber. So they got a decent bullpen, but that's about it's just, it's not a very well put together roster. So they're going to, I think they're going to slide in Chicago should be better than they are. But I mean, I think Tony Laruso might be that incompetent.

So the fact that they've also suffered a lot of injuries as well. Like it's just kind of a recipe for disaster. They're getting Eloy back today. So that that should help them. But yeah, I think it's those five teams for those three spots. And then obviously, you know, I think Cleveland's going to slide. I think Texas is going to slide. I think Baltimore is going to slide.

But you never know. Teams tend to stick around and we'll see how the trade deadline, how these teams react to the trade deadline. Do they buy a little? Do they sell a little? Still a lot to be decided. And that's great. Seattle, you know, imagine, you know, two weeks ago, us sitting here saying, well, we're going to be talking about the wild card standings on June 6th because the Mariners are going to have

legitimate shot to go into the break, you know, as the leader of one of those wild card spots. And like you said, it's a very small chance, but it's not zero. It's not zero. Seattle goes in and they go seven and three or something over these next 10. You know, all bets are off. At that point, they've got a decent shot to be in the lead or the very least within a game or two of a team like Toronto who is fading a little bit. They lost five in a row. So we'll see what happens.

Big series, obviously, this weekend. But, you know, I would say they've already avoided the disaster scenario, you know, going one in five or oh and six. So they can just take even two from Toronto. I'd be pretty happy with that. That's a really good week for Seattle. Yeah, that would be massive. Yeah, that would be massive. Yeah, even if they give one, honestly, I feel decent about that.

Just don't get swept, basically. And I think you feel pretty good. And, hey, you know, who knows? Baseball is weird. I had no expectations of them being able to do what they did down in San Diego. So in Toronto, they're catching Toronto at probably the best time, best possible time that they could. So that offense right now,

and we'll talk about it on tomorrow's episode, but the offense right now is really struggling for Toronto. It's really struggling to capitalize. Yeah. And I mean, not to mention they're pitching right, starting pitching right now is in a bit of a flux because Gossman's getting scratched on Thursday.

There's still a possibility he makes a start against Seattle, particularly on Sunday. And the reason Sunday is an issue is because, you say Kikuchi is unfortunately not found consistency with his new team and there's calls to remove him from the rotation already. So, yeah, the Blue Jays rotation kind of up in the air right now. And also Gossman has kind of gone the opposite direction of Robbie Ray over the last, you know, month or so.

So we'll see, we'll see how it goes. But, you know, obviously momentum is only as good as the next day starting pitcher. If the merrars go out there and strike out 12 times against Barrios, then it doesn't matter that the, that the Blue Jays have won. or had lost six in a row or whatever, you know, so we'll see what happens. But yeah, big series, you know, on a big home series against a, I don't want to call them a rival, but some people like to think they're a rival for some reason. Yeah, especially with my personal connection to both teams.

I have a little extra something, something here heading into the series. And also, you know, all the Canadians that come down to Seattle makes it kind of a road game in a way for the Mariners. and that's annoying. I've always been, I've always said next to nice Canadians. That's never been a problem for me, but I do hear a lot of stories about like rude Canadians coming down. I'm like,

okay. Are you just mad because they were there at all? Is that really what it is? That's true. It could be that, yeah. Yes. But yeah, it'll be,

it'll be a good time. Yeah. If you guys are looking for a sign to bring to the ballpark, I would take tie suggestion and just ask them what time the lease game is on. that's a good one that's good one all right well that's going to do it for our show

thank you so much for joining us here on the lockdown mariners podcast for colby pat note i'm tiding gonzalez be sure to give us a follow on twitter at l o underscore mariners you can follow inside the mariners at inside mariners you can follow me at dame gnzalus the c-a-n-z-l-z and colby at c-pat-11 that's cpat-1-1 you can also find all that stuff in the description of this episode and thank you again for making us your first listen of the day

just like you do here every single day now make your second listen of the day locked on MLB prospects. Host Lindsey Crosby is a prospect encyclopedia and he's going deep on the MLB stars of tomorrow. It's free and available wherever you get your podcast just like us. And with that, have yourself a beautiful baseball day. And we will see you tomorrow.

Peace.