Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Emergency Bonus Pod: Mariners Sign Tommy La Stella to MLB Deal

Episode Date: January 20, 2023

The Seattle Mariners have added another utility infielder to their Spring Training roster, giving Tommy La Stella a Major League contract for the league minimum. Colby and Ty discuss first reactions, what La Stella can bring to the table, if he is a lock for this team, and what role he could fill. Unfortunately, the acquisition forced Seattle to DFA Justus Sheffield. Colby and Ty breakdown the timeline of Sheffield and why he was DFA'd, plus where it all went wrong for the promising young arm.Be sure to follow or subscribe to Locked On Mariners wherever you prefer your podcasts! For questions and other inquiries, email: [e-mail] the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @danegnzlz | @CPat11For more of Ty and Colby, check out their Patreon: patreon.com/controlthezone/Join our Slack!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 have added another veteran bat to the fold. Let's talk about them. Colby, hit it. You are Locked on Mariners. Your daily Seattle Mariners podcast. Part of the Locked on podcast network, your team every day. It is Thursday, January 19th, 2023. This is Tadang Azales and Colby Patnaud for an emergency episode of the Locked on Mariners podcast.

Thank you so much for making us your first listen after the Tommy Lestella signing. Subscribe like and turn alerts if you're watching on YouTube or subscribe and leave a five-star review on your preferred podcast platform if you like what you hear. And if you want to hear from us even more, please consider signing up for our Patreon. The link as well as our social accounts is in the description below. The Mariners have announced a one-year major league contract with veteran infielder Tommy Lestella. We'll first offer our reactions to the deal. Then we'll talk about how he fits and we'll wrap things up by discussing Justice Sheffield,

who was DFA to make room for Lestella tonight. But before we get into all that, a reminder, we're giving away a $50 dollar Mariners gift card to one lucky listener. And if you win, but you're outside the state of Washington, you'll instead receive a $50 MLB shop or fanatics gift card. All you have to do to enter is subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you already have, you're already in. The deadline to enter is next Tuesday, January 24th at 1159 p.m. Pacific.

We will then select the winner from our YouTube subscriber list and announce it on next Wednesday's show, which is January 25th. So look forward to that. All right, Colby, let's get into this deal. Tommy Lestella is someone that the Mariners have covered. for quite some time. They were after him during the 2020, 2021 off season. And they did not land him just like Colton Wong, but just like Colton Wong this year, Tommy Lestella is finally joining the Seattle Mariners. So the last two years, Lestella after signing with the Giants over the Mariners, has dealt with some injuries. He posted a 93 WRC plus in 2021, 78 WRC plus in 2022. Quite frankly, this is not a very exciting signing, 33 years old, left-handed hitter, can play around the diamond, has played some third, has primarily played second, has played a little bit of first base as well.

So I understand what the Mariners are looking for here, but my initial thought here, Colby, is this, I really hope this is not the bat that Jerry DiPoto and crew have been talking about. Yeah, my official or my initial thought was first, obviously, championship. Yeah, of course. it's Tommy Lestella, but second was, you know, I called it on my substack, SotoSports, that substack.com.

A few weeks ago, it was, yeah, it was just like the most obvious call, I think in the history of the world because like the Buffalo Bills, Jerry DePoto circles the wagon. They love to circle back on guys. They do. They do. They do.

I guess the new rule from now on is like, if you hear a rumor about a player in the Mariners like two years ago, like you got to pull back your memory banks every offseason here. You could make so many right calls. If you just remember the guys that Jerry went after in the past, because he's probably still interested in them. That's why I'm convinced they would have gotten Jeter Downs

that the Nationals hadn't claimed him. But anyways, yeah, I think I understand, like, the initial, like, I don't want to say, like, there's initial anger on Twitter. At least I haven't seen it. But, you know, there's, like, an initial, like, really, like, kind of like, really, this is what you're going to do. I understand that because Lestella's been pretty bad the last two years. Pretty hurt, which is actually kind of a common theme for Tommy Lestella throughout his career.

But I think the idea that it's a major league deal is a little bit overblown because yes, technically it is a major league deal. But in all practicality, this is a glorified non-raster invite to minor league deal because the Giants are on the hook for $11.5 million of Lestella's contract. the Mariners are on the hook for the league minimum. So essentially what they did to get Lestella to come to Seattle is they gave him a 40-man roster spot, which they happen to have to give, right? The Mariners do not have a 40-man crunch yet. They're getting there, but they're not there yet. They have four or five spots that can easily open.

You know, a little surprise it was Sheffield over Bernardino. That guy's just got nine lives, I guess. Good for Brendan Bernadino. Yeah, it's going to be crazy in October when he's still in the 40 man but yeah so all that's all it takes right to get this guy to pick you over other opportunities and lestella was going to have other opportunities probably other nr i offers but if all it takes for you to get him into your camp and see if he's healthy and see if he can he can help you is to give him a 40 man spot which you have then it's totally worth it so to me i i don't think this is the bat

although we'll talk about that in a minute how it could be because i have some interesting numbers there Okay. But I don't think this is the bat. I think what this is this is Moran, Colin Moran and Tommy Lestella battling for the same spot. For what probably quite literally is the 26th man on the Mariners roster. So that's how I see this. We'll see what Jerry has to say.

He hasn't said anything yet. My guess is that obviously Jerry's going to be optimistic about the signing. He's not going to be like, well, you know, we wanted to do better. but yeah so we'll see what he says i still think moran has a shot to make this team i don't think lestella has any lock whatsoever to make this team because if he's bad um or if you like what you see from moran more or maybe marlowe like explodes and you really like him you just dfam and you're on the hook for 750 grand that's nothing sure yeah so yeah my my i understand some of the like initial like hesitancy at a major

league deal for a guy like Lestella, but I really don't think it is. Like it in all practicality, it's an NRI, even though technically it is a major league contract. Yeah. If Jerry DePoto says, yep, we're done after this, I'm

pretty led down. I can't lie. Especially when it's, when there's guys like David Peralta still out there and I know that's not exactly how it works. You know, David Peralta's also got to be interested in coming to Seattle and all that. But yeah, you know, this is not getting me out of bed in the morning, you know. And also I look at this and I look at the last two years and I look at Lestella's last two years and I look at Moran's last two years.

And I'm confused as to how one guy got a major league deal and the other guy got a minor league deal. Because Moran's just been better than Lestella and he's been healthier than Lestella the last two years. but like you said if this is just this was your only way to land to Tommy Lestella you really like Tommy Lestella you want to see if you can fix him and the only way to do that was to give him a major league contract then fine right because like you said there isn't a 40 man roster crunch yet there are guys that they can still DFA that I'm not losing sleepover so in the end if that's all it is totally fine with the steel however if this is the bet

that they were talking about. The left-handed corner infield bat that they were interested in potentially adding, I'm, yeah, I'm a little let down by that. I'm going to change your mind in the next segment. All right. Well, let's... Probably not, but one of us has to try, right? Yeah, you're going to take the role of the optimistic side here, which is weird.

As I usually do. as you typically do, of course, as everyone knows. All right, before we get into that, let's remind the folks real quick that today's episode is brought to them by bet online. Betonline.net is your number one source for sports betting info, stats, news, and analysis. Get the latest odds and trends for every professional and amateur league out there from pro football to basketball. We've got it all over at betonline.net.

And if you love sports podcasts, you can even find those over at betonline as well. We're always the fastest and easiest way to get your betting info. Head to the website today or use your mobile device to learn more. bet online is where the game starts. And you're listening to the Lockdown Mariner's podcast. Thank you again for making us your first listen after the Tommy Lestella signing. So, all right, Colby, try to convince me here. Has Jerry done it again?

Chills, the answer is yes. Okay. No, so let me ask you something, Ty. Okay. All right. assume this slash line is inserted into the Mariners lineup. Just a slash line, don't think about the player, right? Okay, okay, okay.

279, 347, 438. Where does that guy hit in your lineup? Repeat it one more time? 279, 347, 438. Sitting like 6, 7? Okay, okay. I think that's about right. I think ideally that's where you'd like the guy.

Yeah. So what's wrong with that? You know what? Nothing because that is the career slash line of Thai France, who people don't want to trade for Pablo Lopez, but that is his career slash line. That is Ty France's career slash line. And Ty says he should hit six.

Now, to be fair, I got you. I got you. Now, again. Oh, wow. I've been bamboozled. We've all been. You have.

I'm like Joey on Friends. That's crazy. That's crazy. That was good. That was good. I'm proud of you for that one. Now, to be fair, right? Obviously, Ty France had a chunk of time at the beginning of his career.

His first year up, he played 69 games. Nice. First 200 played appearances weren't great. So let's throw out that first year, all right? So 2020 to 2022, Ty France has played 335 games. and he has slashed 286, 356, 444, that is an 800 OPS, right? Good player, good hitter, right? Sure.

Yep. Tommy Lestella, from 2017 to 2020. Okay. Played in 331 games. Mm-hmm. Slashed 284, 358, 441, which is an OPS of 800. Mm-hmm. Tommy Lestella from 2017 to 2020 was the exact same hitter, almost to the decimal point as Thai France is now.

Nobody wants to trade Thai France. Oh, no, we can't possibly do better than Thai France. Maris signed Tommy Lestella and it's like, well, that's a waste of time. This is so dumb. This is so dumb. Tell me I'm wrong. Okay. So what, no, by the way, guys, what does this have to do with the conversation?

I get the joke. The point is that from 2017 to 2020, Tommy Lestella was basically Typhranz at the plate. Sure. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. Would you like to add another Thai france to this lineup?

I mean, that's great and all, but he's not going to. Okay. Is there a non-zero chance? Let me finish. Is there a non-zero chance that Tommy Lestella can return to those levels? The answer is yes. there is. I mean, he's dealt with injuries, though.

He's been bad the last two years, man. How can he, like, all right, forget, like, getting back to those numbers. How does he even sniff those numbers? How does he even get back to sniffing those numbers after the last two years? Noted beacon of health Thai France. Yeah. Anyways, by the way, because I know you guys are going to say, I know you guys are going to say this in the comments section.

I know you guys are going to say this in the comments section. So I'll just clarify, even though you're not going to hear this part anyways. I'm not saying Tommy Lestell is better than Thai france. He is, but that's not what I'm saying. Everyone's going, you think Tommy Lestella is the same player as Thai France. You want to give Jake, you're the guy that wants to give Jake Lam more at Bats over Gino. Yeah. No, what I'm saying is is that.

This is your new version of that, by the way. Sure, sure. I'm going to push this. I'm going to help. this narrative too on Twitter, by the way. All right. You're just mad. You're just mad because I bamboozled you.

That's true. I got fooled. I got fooled. Right. So look, at the end of the day, again, I think Lestella is here mainly to compete for that last spot. It's worth noting that he is a career 107 WRC plus against DRIES. He's 89 against lefties.

So he's not useless against lefties. Sure. But again, he is an older player. He really shouldn't play second base all that much. And with Colton Wong and Dylan Moore on the roster, I don't think you're going to ask him to. I think you're going to ask for first base, third base, DH, if he makes the roster at all. And there's a chance that he can make that, he can make that roster. And by the way, here's another little fun, fun note on Lestella.

In that time frame that I gave you, 2017 to 2020, right? Four year stretch. He had, as I'm away for this to load, he had. 85 strikeouts in 892 plate appearances he had 84 walks

he does not strike out he sees the heck out of the Z not a lot of home run power but there is double power here so in conclusion Ty France Tommy Lestella

same hitter no okay but seriously I had I had a feeling you were gonna do something like this like I didn't know it was gonna be like this but I had a feeling after we talked about on our Patreon show today that you were yeah yeah there was gonna be something here's a deal real fast on this and I I promise we're not gonna rip and honestly my feeling is is that if Tommy Lestella can return to the 27 2019 right he was really good in 20 and he's pretty good in 2022 sure if he can return to that then the Mariners can give him 350 400 underplayed appearances and he won't kill you he'll be fine you're always going to look to upgrade from that but he's not a black hole right and right now the mariner's dh spot it's kind of a black hole because it requires jared kelnick to play for the dh spot because pollux the dh right so we'll see what the mariners do we'll see if they bring in another bat i think they will uh i just think that maybe now it goes into spring training maybe it's a trade type of thing but i still think they will bring in another bat. But if they don't, Lestella, in theory, is good enough to kind of carry you

until you find that bat. Unscrunch your face. You know I'm right. Don't make me hit you with the numbers again. So I think it's possible. I don't want to bank on numbers from two years ago. I mean, aren't you doing that with Jared Kalnick? Like, aren't you banking on, isn't there a bigger risk that Jared Kelmick is bad? Yeah, but there's more. And you're okay with that. But there's, but there's more upside out of Kellick. Is there? I mean, is there?

Yeah. You think Jared Kellick's going to hit 289? The 23 year old. You guys heard of here first. The 23 year old compared to the 33 year old. Jared Kalick is going to hit 280 this year. But, uh, no. Tommy, Tommy Lestell is not hitting too many.

All right. All right. We've gone off the rails here. I was just demonstrating that in 20 for a good chunk of his career. Tommy LaSelle was a good hitter, right? He's not a great hitter. He's a good hitter. Yeah.

Yeah. And Ty France is, you know, kind of a. fair comp when you look at those numbers. Ty France the last three years is what Prime Lestella was. Cool. That's pretty good bat. All right. So I don't think there's a reason to hate the bat.

Again, I'm with you. Yeah. I want this guy to be a bench bat. And now I don't know what this means, but Divish did say that the mayors have added bench, a bench bat to their lineup. So we'll see. We're still waiting here from Jerry. And honestly, we're probably not going to get anything useful out of him tonight.

Sure. But we'll see what they say about it. To me, it's still a good deal. I think it makes sense. And I think there's a chance that it works out okay. This isn't going to be like Austinola, right? Like, it's not going to be like that. But I think there's a chance this ends up being a good move.

And we look back at it in June and we're like, oh, yeah, that was kind of savvy. Like that Lestella helped. So we'll see how those. It's an interesting flyer for them to take, especially if he's just, just, you know, essentially a non-roster invitee. Right. You know, see what you have in him. See if he can fix him.

Because like you said, he is a good hitter at the end of the day. Or he was. He has been. He has been in the past. Right. And obviously you're not asking him to play every day, right? You can kind of pick and choose his matchups. It's kind of like the AJ Pollock thing, right?

Like, if we don't ask him to play every single day, then maybe he can stay a little healthier and maybe he can produce a little bit more. by picking and choosing matchups too. Right. Right. All right. Let's talk about Justice Sheffield here. So do we have to? It's the end of an era.

I think we do need to talk about him because he was a pretty important part of this rebuild, at least when it began. He was obviously the big piece in the James Paxson trade, which was the deal that marked the beginning of the rebuild for the Mariners. It was the first big trade. Right? I think Zanino was before him, but there was still like, because they traded Zanino from Alex Smith, we were still like, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Is that just a swap or is that a rebuild? Right. Yeah. He kicked it. He kicked it off because I think it was only a week later that Kano was traded and then. Calnick. Yeah, and then the Segura trade. I think was a couple days after.

Yeah, with Crawford. Yeah. So, you know, they tried it for a while there. he had, you know, really good 2020 season where we were saying, you know, he should be getting rookie of the year votes. 2021 was really disappointing for him. Wasn't really able to crack the major league roster in 2022. He made a spot start late in the season.

That was it. The writing was essentially on the wall. You and I talked about this, I think, on our Patreon show on Tuesday. And you were saying, like, you were saying that you thought that justice would be the next guy. And sure enough, he, he. is the next guy to get DFA'd. So why didn't it work for Justice Sheffield here in Seattle? First of all, Pat's on back.

I've been on fire. I got the Sheffield thing. I got the Stella thing. Can you predict Brian Reynolds next? I mean, I could, but I'd be wrong. So. I'd probably be wrong again. I'll take Matt Moore.

That'd be fun. Yeah, yeah. Okay, cool, cool. Thanks. Yeah. Anyways, one of the funny things, one of the funny things I remember, remember about Sheffield, and I'll get to the rest in the second, is that MLB Pipeline, after that trade was made, well, and then after the Kellnick trade was made, Pipeline had Sheffield as a better prospect than Kelnick.

So if you're wondering how valuable prospect ranks are, there you go. But yeah, Sheffield was interesting because he was a big get when the mayor's acquired him. He was supposed to be a three-pitch guy. He had a wipeout slider, good mid-90s fastball. athletic from the left side. But like Ty said, you know, after the 2020 season, which he was really good. And we, we pounded the table for him to get MVP or not, sorry, rookie of the year votes. Yeah.

You know, down ballot, obviously. We wanted Kyle Lewis to win. And it just didn't happen. And then 2021, he took a big step back. And then 2022, he wasn't even good in Tacoma. Like, this isn't a guy who just, you know, got pushed out of the rotation. He lost his spot in the rotation and in the Mariners organization because he didn't perform. The slider really flattened down.

He couldn't figure out any kind of value with the fastball, never figured out how to get the change up to be even fringe average. He just regressed. And, you know, he's a lefty who is athletic. And at his best, he did have a good slider and he did have a good sinker with pretty good control. So there's still, he's still young enough too. I think he's only 24, 25 years old. Justice is still a young guy. He still has a shot at a major league career.

It just wasn't going to happen as a starter for the Seattle Mariners. Now, I think like writing him out of this organization is a bit premature because there's a pretty good chance he doesn't get claimed. If you're going to DFA somebody and get him back, this is probably the most likely time of year you can pull that off because we talked about this the other day. Everybody's 40 man spot. Everybody's 40 man is filled with the exception of like three or four teams. Sheffield maybe appeals to one of those teams. And, you know, the prospect shine that he had a few years ago makes him more likely to be, more likely to be, you know, claimed than somebody like Alberto Rodriguez. But there's not a, there's a non-zero chance he clears.

And if he does, then I think he goes into the bullpen mix. But at the end of the day, Sheffield's not, you know, a part of the 40 man anymore because he regressed from where he was in 2020. The slider got really flat. You know, the fastball, he couldn't pick between the four-seamer and the two-seamer and the two-seamer was pretty flat. And the velocity was down to 91, 92, never had the change up. It just didn't work. It was a bummer. You know, and I wish him well.

And again, I'm not saying he's definitely gone from the organization. But it was definitely time to make that move. And it's not at all surprising that he was near the top of the list for the Mariners because they have pitching depth. They have rotation depth. And Sheffield right now is probably 12th or 13th on the list of, you know, who the mirrors would go to if they needed to start. So it's just, it's a bummer because he was a huge part of, he was supposed to be a huge part of the rebuild.

And it looked like it was on the right track after 2020. And it just, you know, just kind of derailed. And it happens in baseball a lot. But it is a bummer. And the book, technically not closed on that Paxon trade yet. We'll have to see what kind of value they get from Tosker. But once Taya Oscar completes this year,

we can go ahead and shut the door on the James Paxon trade return, which ended up being a couple years of Sheffield, a couple years of Swanson and one year of Tia Oskar Hernandez. Yep. And nothing from Dom Thompson Williams. I was so hyped about that. Yeah. I really thought that they were going to turn him into something.

But no. Nope. So yeah, let's pour one out here for the, for the Otani killer, Justice Sheffield. If you guys are looking for a fun stat that can win a bet, like who's the best pitcher against Joey Otani, who's face at least 10 times? It might be Sheffield, one for 11, like six strikeouts. So you guys want to impress somebody, but just, yeah, you know, Justice Sheffield, man, he was good at getting Otani out than nobody else. and yeah

here's the guy who owns Shoah O Tani so tomorrow we've already recorded tomorrow's episode we did that yesterday

that's coming out in the morning that's actually going to be a premiere on the YouTube channel so if you want to

watch it premiere live live quote unquote but it'll be up on the YouTube channel at 8 a.m.

Pacific time probably be hanging out in the chat. Yeah. And then it'll be on podcast platforms shortly there after. And in that episode, we're making a pretty big announcement. So be sure to stay until the end of the show to hear what that is. All right.

Also, let's do this. We're doing a live stream on our personal YouTube channel tomorrow afternoon. If you guys want to join, it'll be around noonish on the control of zone. YouTube channel. True to the Trident. It's true to the Trident still. I should change that over. It's the True of the Trident.

We'll tweet it out from the True to the Control of Zone account. We'll probably retweet it from the Lockdown Mariners account. That's a lot of fun. Ty and I just talk about literally whatever we want. We answer questions. We mostly interact with the chat. Yeah. It's basically just a hang session.

And things can get a little crazy there. So we've been known to give great advice in love life and stuff like that. we're basically like you know I was going to say Dr. Phil but sure the the live show is definitely not kid friendly by the way so just keep that in mind or work friendly headphones required for this live show folks more than likely yes but we have a lot of fun and we think you will too so be on the lookout for that all right that's going to do it for our show thank you so much for joining us here on an emergency episode of the lockdown mariner's podcast for Colby Pat note. I'm Taday Gonzalez. Be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at L0 underscore Mariners.

You can follow me at Dan Gonzalez, C-A-N-E, G-N-Z-L-Z, and Colby at C-Pad-I-11. That's C-PAT-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. Now make your second listen, Lockdown MLB Prospects. Host a Lindsay 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'll see you tomorrow morning. Peace.