Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Good Vibes Only: Mariners Scored Big With Eugenio Suárez

Episode Date: November 3, 2022

The Seattle Mariners were banking on Jesse Winker to provide some offensive punch to the lineup and were really just hoping Eugenio Suárez wouldn't be a drain on the offense. As it turns out, the opposite was true. Colby and Ty discuss the importance of Suárez's big season and whether or not it's fair of us to expect him to do it again! All of this and more on today's 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] the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @danegnzlz | @CPat11For more of Ty and Colby, check out their Patreon: patreon.com/controlthezone/SimpliSafeWith Fast Protect™️ Technology, exclusively from SimpliSafe, 24/7 monitoring agents capture evidence to accurately verify a threat for faster police response. There’s No Safe Like SimpliSafe. Visit SimpliSafe.com/LockedOnMLB to learn more. 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.

A wonderful career in Cincinnati came to a rough end for A Eugenio Suarez, who made his way to Seattle as basically a throw-in in the Jesse Winker trade. But not only was Suarez a bigger part of the Mariners drought ending 2022 season than Winker was. He was overall one of the most valuable third baseman in all of baseball. Good vibes only here on the Locked on 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. It is Thursday, November 3rd, 2022. This is Tiding Azales and Colby Patnode for the Lockdown Mariners podcast. Thank you so much for making us your first listen. Subscribe, like, and turn on 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.

On the show today, we'll be reviewing the 2022 season of A.U. Hennio, Suarez, which came as a surprise to a lot of Mariners fans. But Colby, I'm going to take this moment to pat myself on the back because I do have video evidence and audio evidence of me singing the praises of A. Eugenio Suarez before this season even began right around the time that this trade was made and Suarez arrived in Seattle saying that, you know what? I think the Mariners have something here in A. E. Hennio Suarez. Now, to be fair, I didn't think that he was going to slash 236, 332, 459 with a 131

WRC plus and end up being worth 4.1 F4, which was one of the highest marks for all third baseman in Major League Baseball. He hit 31 home runs, 87 RBI. He did strike out 31.2% of the time, but also walked 11.6% of the time. Overall, great year for Suarez. Also turned things around defensively after returning to third base full time. As we all know, the Reds kind of experimented with him at shortstop in in 2021.

And that kind of derailed things for him. He was also dealing with a shoulder thing, all that. But came back healthy this year, had a mostly healthy season until the end of the year when he had the finger injury that held him out for a little bit before he returned in time for the postseason. But let me start here. There were a lot of home runs, a lot of walk-off home runs,

a lot of good defensive plays, great defensive plays even, and also just the overall personality, the good vibes only, all that stuff. What was your favorite moment from Suarez's 2022 campaign? Yeah, probably the walk-off home run he hit against Toronto. I believe that was a Friday night. It was a stupid Apple TV game. Yeah, I think that one, just because it was kind of in the middle of their win streak, we didn't quite know how good the Mariners were yet.

They had started to play a lot better, but they were still kind of, you know, middling around 500. You know, Toronto came in, you know, as a team that a lot of people thought, second, third best team in the American League and Seattle beat them four times. and that one home run from A. E. E. E. Hino-Swarres, I think, kind of, you know, can be looked at in a lot of ways as a catalyst for how the rest of that month went. It was sweet. You know, the one against Kenley Jansen, certainly up there. But to me, the first one, it was his first ever walk-off home run, too, which is kind of weird for a player of A. E. E. Hineo's status. So, yeah, I think that's probably the moment that stands out to me. and for me i think swores kind of perfectly embodies what a big piece of what jerry depoto and crew look at

when they acquire players when they bring players in from the outside and that's how he fits in the clubhouse he was the perfect fit for this clubhouse it wasn't just the fans that you know he stole the hearts of very early on when he arrived it was very clear that he was very clear that he was very clear that that his teammates rallied around him right from the beginning and then all year long and I think the arrival of Jesse Winker who had played with him and they had been good friends. I think that

also kind of helped with things and helped those guys kind of both of them kind of comfortably fit into the into the clubhouse but you know from having the skunk hair right the one half blonde the one half black and

Scott service saying you know the whole team's going to do it if he hits 50 if he hits 50 bombs, all that stuff. Like I just, the way that he, um, he kind of became one of those, maybe not necessarily a leader in the clubhouse, but a guy that everyone just genuinely likes to be around and likes to play for

and loves when he has success. Um, that's a, that's a great thing, right? That's a great thing for clubhouse chemistry. He was a big part of building this clubhouse into the, uh, family that,

that it really became. came over the course of the year. For me, my favorite moment was also the walk off against the Blue Jays because like you said, you know, in the middle of a of that win streak, you're going into a really difficult series with the Blue Jays who you're neck and neck with for the wild card. And you sweep them. And that was a big, big moment in that sweep because that was a little bit of a comeback for them if I, if I remember correctly, right?

I believe they were down at one point and they were able to come back and they were able to walk that game off. Perhaps I'm wrong. Correct me if I'm wrong down in the comments below. But that was huge. And that set the tone for the rest of that series and for the rest of that win streak heading into the All-Star break, really. Because if you remember, Suarez was a huge part of that win streak overall. And that was certainly his biggest moment. But you know, you got to talk about the solo home run or the yeah, the solo walk off home run off.

of Kenley Jansis as well after Julio tied things up, you know, the Mariners blow that lead against the Braves. We've talked about that game a lot over the last few episodes. But for Suarez to cap that one off, that was the moment really where I was like, okay, the Mariners can do some damage

in the postseason. And it's because of guys like Julio Rodriguez and Ney Junio Suarez. And, you know, towards the end of the year, the Mariners needed Suarez to be that guy. Because, you know, it was really like, all right, they're going to get offense from Julio, but who else? Who's going to be that second guy?

Who's going to be that third guy? And Suarez certainly stepped up. He also had a great postseason. He went seven for 20 with a home run in game two of the ALDS. And so, yeah, it was just a great season for him. Let's talk about him defensively, though, in just a moment. But real quick, a reminder of this episode of Lockdown Mariners is brought to you by SimplySafe. If you've thought about securing your home with home security,

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Get 50% off any new SimplySafe system at SimplySafe.com slash Lockdown MLB. This is their biggest discount of the year, so don't wait. That's SimplySafe.com slash Lockdown MLB. There's no safe like SimplySafe. You're listening to the Lockdown Mariners podcast. Thank you so much for making us your first listen. So Colby, Suarez, now you look at the defensive metrics on fan graphs. they're not super favorable for him

but the eye test will tell you that Suarez was a really, really good defender this year on the hot corner. Let's talk a little bit about his defense. What did you see from Swares this year? He was certainly better than advertised.

I think we knew that the defensive metrics he put up at shortstop or solely because he was playing out of position. He's not a shortstop. We all knew. that. So I didn't really think there was much to that. But at third base, he was kind of average-ish. He was always okay, right? But he's playing third base because he can hit a lot of home runs. That's the idea, at least. And he came over to Seattle, and, you know, I don't think there was

really anything about his game that was particularly surprising. We saw the power. We saw the strikeouts. We knew he could take some walks. We knew offensively he had this type of season in him. But we didn't know anything really about the glove. And it turns out the glove was just as big of a factor, maybe not as big, but a pretty big factor in his value. And you look at, you know, how are the Mariners going to replace Kyle Seeger? They did it and they got better as a result. I mean, A.U. Hounios Juarez was a better defender this year.

And then Kyle Seeger has been really at any point in the last three years or so. the Mariners got better defensively with AUNYos-Wares Manning the Hot Corner Seeger probably about average towards the end Gino's probably just a little bit better than that so you know you got to give credit to him and you got to give credit to Perry Hill but it certainly was a nice little bonus for the Mariners

Yeah you know back when we were talking about this trade Before the season began you know I was saying I think he can at least be Kyle Seeger You know 2021 Kyle Seeger I think you can at least get that kind of production out of a e. Johanio Suarez and then you know he comes through and and blows us out of the water with that. But yeah, defensively speaking, he was at least as good as Kyle Seeger towards the end of Seeger's career. But I agree with you.

I think he was at least a little bit better there. And I, you know, I think he should have gotten some gold glove nod as well for his play over there. But, you know, you look at the the numbers here like negative point three defensive. war on fan graphs like that's come on come on with that he was way better than that and third base is usually a place that has you know because defensive metrics in general are not perfect by any stretch of the imagination but third base is usually one of those positions that's a little bit more accurately graded so that's surprising to see stuff like that but overall again a great defensive year for swarez now do we think he can keep this up and specifically can he keep

up the offense moving forward because you know the last two years were awful for him 2020 he he slash 202 312 470 with a 100 WRC plus and 58 57 of the 60 games then 2021 he slashed 198 2826 428 with an 84 WRC plus you know this year of course was back to his you know earlier numbers he was more in line with his earlier numbers the average was a lot lower than maybe his career norms during you know the 2016 to 2019 stretch the strikeouts have continued to go up

this was a career high in strikeouts for him he was I believe was close to the league lead in strikeouts overall and but you know and and this has been a thing that is kind of of crept up since 2020 as well or since 2019 rather because he from 2015 to 2018 he was having around you know 23 and a half percent strikeout rate and was still walking around a you know a 10 10 and a half percent clip uh walk rate um but since 2019 he was so 2019 he was 28 and a half 2020 he was 29

2021 he was 29 point eight and then this year 31 point two percent So in terms of sustaining the success that he's had, does the strikeout rate concern you? Or is the fact that he is able to hit for so much power and is able to walk at an above average rate enough for you to think that he can continue this moving forward? I feel pretty comfortable expecting him to repeat what he did last year going forward. He's going to strike out. That's just going to be part of his game. but he's going to draw walks. The power is very real.

And as long as he can continue to play pretty good defense, there's really no reason for him, you know, not to hit somewhere in the middle or back middle of this lineup going forward. I think ideally you'd like him to hit, you know, sixth for you instead of third or fourth. But yeah, I don't see any reason why you can't repeat what he did this last year. You know, he's always going to be a bit of a streaky hitter. He's going to strike out.

But he'll be able to carry you for weeks on end. So I feel pretty comfortable, you know, putting Gino in the lineup pretty much every day next year as my third baseman, D.H, first base, whatever. Yeah. And so, you know, there might be an opportunity. We'll see how they construct the roster over the next few months. But there may be an opportunity for Svarez to kind of move around a little bit and maybe DH some, maybe play a little first. space like you're talking about. We'll see what they, you know, want to end up doing and how things all kind of come together.

But, you know, Suarez is creeping up there in age now. He's 31 years old. He'll turn 32 next July. So maybe if he can take some of the, uh, the innings off of him at third base and give him some more DH days that would, that would help out of it. He played 150 games and really only missed, uh, action because of that finger injury. Uh, so he missed 12 games despite having basically a, broken finger for the for the end of the season that's you know that's another thing too right like

we talk about the personality and everything hey oh hennino sweros is a tough you know what right like being able to go through that and play and be able to play third base by the way because that was a really surprising thing you know i remember uh when he was coming back you know and they were working tie france over at third and all that you know we're talking about oh swarez is probably not going to play third base again this year and lo and behold there he is playing third base like his second game back and so that's uh that's pretty remarkable and that's something that you know that clubhouse is going that's going to win that clubhouse over forever right so um you know that that that just that's a testament to just kind of who swore as is as a baseball player as a person uh and so

you know but overall kind of just going back to what i was saying uh about kind of limiting some of the And I think it'll be good for him to maybe, you know, get some more time off over the course of a season and at least defensively and just let him DH a little bit there to kind of take the brunt of the workload off of his shoulders. Because it's a long year and, you know, it's even if he is, you know, basically an Ironman, right? Like guys still need, you know, a blow here and there. But yeah. So overall, you know, you got to feel incredible about what Suarez was able to do this. year and even if he does regress some, I think, you know, you'll take that player.

Even if he's like a 115, 120 WRC plus guy, like that's still a really good player to have. And if he can at least be averaged defensively on top of that and give you 25 to 35 home runs, you take that any of the day of the week. That's one of the best third basemen on all baseball consistently. And I think there's enough here to suggest that he is going to be able to sustain this because also you look back at the last couple of years, he was dealing with a gnarly COVID. ballot in 2020. Then the next year, you know, he had shoulder surgery after having a freak accident in a pool. Like there were outside factors. And on top of that, you know, he got moved to

shortstop, which is ridiculous. You don't see guys get moved from third base to shortstop. You see guys get moved from shortstop to third base. You know, so there were a lot of outside factors. I think were contributing to him struggle to his struggles over the last couple of years. And I think this being more in line with where he was pre-COVID, pre-injury, suggests that this is probably more so who a Eugenio Soros is rather than what we saw in 2020 and 2021. Now, before we hop off of here, I want to cover a couple small items. One, the Mariners, DFA Drew Ellis, at some point,

they didn't actually announce it, I don't think, but they announced today, Mariners PR announced today that he, he cleared waivers and was outright at two Tacoma. So he is now off the 40-man roster. The Mariners 40-man roster is now at 41 players. So they do have to clear one more spot in order for both Tom Murphy and Casey Sadler to come off of the 60-day IL. Now, that doesn't really matter because in a matter of days,

whenever the World Series ends, Adam Frazier, Kirk Casale, Matthew Boyd, Mitch Hanager, and Carlos Santana. are all going to be coming off of the 40 men because they're free agents. So that's not a huge deal. But Colby, I mean, they're really, there's a bunch of options for them to clear 40-man roster spots still. Brennan Bernadino, 1-10, Justice Sheffield. There's no roster crunch here, right?

No, not yet. You know, Brian O'Keefe is another one. There are probably guys you don't want to move on from. Evan White, Taylor Tremel, Justice Sheffield, but you can. Those are just names right now at this point. And there's plenty more. The Mariners aren't going to have any kind of issue. You know, basically maneuvering their roster any way they want.

They're going to have to add, I think probably at least two or three guys to protect them from the Rule 5. they'd be pretty shocked if they didn't add Cade Marlowe. You know, I think there's a couple of reliever arms that are really interesting, like Isaiah Campbell. Joseph Fernandez. So, yeah, I mean, we'll see. But, yeah, they're not going to be in any kind of a crunch whatsoever. Those decisions are going to come here pretty soon, though. I think you have to have your 40-man set for the off-season,

i.e. you have to protect your guys from the Rule 5 draft by November 20th. So here in, you know, a little more than two weeks, we'll know who's going to start the year on the 40 man. So, yeah, there's no roster crunch. Like you said, we could, I bet we could probably get 20 names deep before we're like, no, he's absolutely has to be on the roster. Like, you're not DFA in that player.

It's probably no joke, 12 to 18 guys who you can, could conceivably DFA and be like, yeah. Okay. Yeah. And so, you know, and that's not to even mention guys like Ryan Buraki, Luke Weaver, who was just added. Alberto Rodriguez, who's still a ways away from the majors. Diego Castillo. Even someone like Diego Castillo, even someone like Ryan Perrucke, you know, the list goes on and on and on. Kyle Lewis, Evan White, et cetera.

like, you know, if you want to get deeper into your bag, but like the Mariners are are not going to add a ton of players, I think, to the 40-man roster over the course of the off-season. I think what ultimately happens here is that when the Mariners do add, it's going to, you know, it's going to turn some heads, right? They're going to add impact, right? That's how they're going to do the bulk of their off-season. And, you know, they're going to still do like the minor league ads. And, you know, if there's someone that hits waivers, that's interesting. Like they'll kick the tires on that. But ultimately, I don't think we're going to see a lot of players added to the 40-man roster.

We're just going to see a lot of impact added to the 40-man roster. And therefore, there aren't going to need to be too many moves made to clear space. But again, you know, five spots are going to open up when the Mariners Free agents officially become free agents. And they still have some what I would consider to be obvious. Nuffeus names that they can also DFA in order to create more space and they will do that over the course of the winter I don't think that they need to do the rule five stuff until December So they might hold off on that Because the the winter meetings aren't until

what December 4th December 5th and that's when the rule 5th so I think maybe they can hold off on that until the start of December we'll see though They might just jump the gun on that and just do it now if they know who they want to add and that way they can just kind of put things into a clear picture speaking of the winter meetings we are doing a giveaway if you've missed it that is running until the end of the winter meetings so the day after the winter meetings ends is December 8th and that's when our giveaway ends just to refresh everyone on what we're giving away we have already hit our mark to give away a tailored dollared autographed So we're going to be given that away next month.

That was 4,000 YouTube subscribers, which we've moved on past. We're closely, closely approaching the 4,200 submark. Our next goal is 4,500 YouTube subscribers. At that point, we will be given away a Taylor-Tremel autograph card. And with 4,500 YouTube subscribers and 3,000 Twitter followers, we still have a ways to go on the Twitter followers. So if you have a Twitter or... or if you want to make a Twitter and follow us on there.

Check us out at Lockdown or sorry at L.O. underscore Mariners. Give us a follow. And if we reach 4,500 YouTube subs and 3,000 Twitter followers, we'll give away a Jerry Kellnick autograph card. We're also giving away a Cal Raleigh. Yes, big dumper autograph card at 5,000 YouTube subscribers. And then our last couple of prizes, they're a little pie in the sky.

but I think we might be able to get to one of them if you guys help us out. If we become the most sub-subscribed to Locked-on Meriner or Lockdown MLB podcast on the Lockdown MLB Network. We're second right now, by the way, trailing Locked-on Astros. So if you also want to beat the Astros and something, you know, help us out.

I'm just saying. If we do that, if we surpass them by the end of the winter meetings, we will give away. a very nice autographed Mike Cameron card, which is what? It's like something out of 75 total cards that were made. So all of these are Colby's cards, by the way. So if you also just want to win Colby's stuff, you know, if you just want to do it from that aspect, do it. Lastly, we're giving away a Logan Gilbert autographed and graded 9.5 from Beckett card at 10,000 YouTube subscribers. I don't think we're going to get there.

But, and we're not advocating for bots, but if you want to tell your friends, if you want to tell your family, if you want to tell your enemies, literally just go out in the street and yell, hey, people of planet Earth, subscribe to Lockdown Mariners. We won't. We certainly welcome. Whatever. It's just, it's just nice to know that I'm going to get to keep all these cards, except. for the Taylor dollar because the listeners have locked on have gotten lazy so fine by me I will happily keep my Cal Raleigh card in my Logan Gilbert and my Mike Cameron and my Jared Kellnick and I will laugh along the way he's he's using the same strategy that he used to get you guys

to submit videos for what the drought work what ending the drought would mean to you and it did it did it did so hopefully similar success comes our way and with that that's going to do it for our show. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Lockdown Mariner's podcast. For Colby Pat Note, I'm Tadane Gazzalas. Be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at L0 underscore Mariners. You can follow me at Dan Gonzalez. It's D-A-N-ZL-Z

and Colby at C-Pat 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 to your first listen for your next listen. Check out the Locked-on Sports Today podcast featuring the biggest stories of the day plus instant reactions, big game recaps and the take of the day. It's available

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