Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Mariners Content Creator Spotlight: Marine Layer Podcast

Episode Date: February 15, 2024

Our Mariner Content Creator Spotlight series continues as Ty sits down with Lyle Goldstein and TJ Mathewson from the Marine Layer Podcast.Ask us questions!Follow the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @TyDaneGonzalez | @CPat11Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!eBay MotorsWith all the parts you need at the prices you want, it’s easy to turn your car into the MVP and bring home that win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase.FanDuelNew customers, join today and you’ll get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS if your first bet of FIVE DOLLARS or more wins. Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) 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.

It's time for the second episode of the Mariners content creator spotlight. This time we got TJ and Lyle from the Marine Layer podcast. It's going to be a lot of fun. Let's sail. 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 Thursday, February 15th, 2020. For the Locked on Mariners podcast, brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use the promo code locked on. That's L-C-K-D-O-N for $20 off your first purchase. Thank you so much for making us to your first list and 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're part of the crew and rock with us every single day, let us know in the comments below.

And if you want to hear from us even more, please consider signing up for our Patreon. You can now get a free seven-day trial to check out the show. The link as well as our social accounts is in the description of this episode. And this episode is the second episode in our Mariners Content Creator Spotlight series. This time I have T.J. Matthewson and Lau Goldstein of the Marine Layer podcast. Join to me to talk all about their podcast, their creative process, what it's been like being involved in the Mariners community. And then we're going to talk some ball. It's going to be a really, really fun conversation.

and think you really enjoy it. So let's get into it. I am here with Lyle Goldstein and T.J. Matthewson. They are the host of one of my favorite Mariners podcasts out there, the Marine Layer podcast. Guys, thanks so much for being here. How are you doing? I'm good, Ty.

Thanks for, thanks for taking some time to fit us into this creator spotlight. It's a real pleasure. You guys do a really good job with Lockdod. So it is... Thank you so much. I'll speak for Lyle on this part. It is an honor here to be on the Locker's, Don Mariners podcast.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. It's great to have you guys. I've been listening to your show for a while now. Love it. Absolutely love it. Wow.

How are you doing? Good. I mean, I guess TJ kind of took the words out of my mouth. But when we saw you guys were doing this creator spotlight thing, we were, we thought it was pretty cool that one, you guys wanted to start this because I think it's cool how the community is starting to come together a little bit. It seems like everybody's starting to get familiar with each other, probably even more than

they were so before in terms of the people creating content, but also that you guys wanted to invite us on. We think this is really cool. And it's, yeah, we really appreciate it. Yeah, when I came up with the idea and, well, I came up with the idea a while ago, but when I decided it was time to finally execute the idea, you guys were one of the first ones that I thought to reach out to. So I'm really happy that we're able to finally come together and finally able to do this. So I want to know how your guys is a Mariners fandom began. Lyle, I'll start with you.

I have been a Mariners fan for as long as I have memory. I'm one of those guys. Like I wasn't one of those people that when I got to be nine, 10, 11 years old, I started to pick up baseball. It's like, no, from as long as I have memory, not only have I been loving baseball, but watching and playing, but it was the Mariners, like my first game ever. This will be a deep cut for people, but Carlos Kian hit a home run at the first game I was ever at.

And from there on, he became my favorite player for the next few years until he went to Detroit. And ever since then, I grew up with going to Mariners games and watching every night on TV, whether it was listening to Dave Nehouse or Rick Riz and Ron Fairley. And through all this time, I've stuck with it because I don't have a greater passion than Mariners baseball and baseball in general. Like I've absolutely loved it. And over the years, you know, there's been a lot of hills and valleys and certainly some valleys,

as we all know, over 21 years. But I still wouldn't trade it for anything because it's kind of made me who I am being a Mariners fan. Absolutely. T.J. I don't have one specific memory like. Lyle does. But I think my fandom really grew when

I was, I'm going to say, between the ages of 5 and 10 else, maybe a little bit less than that, but regardless, we had season tickets to the Mariners at this point. It was section 3.28 on the upper level. And we would do pretty much the exact same thing, like multiple times a week during baseball

season. I mean, we would be down at the ballpark. We'd get pizza from this very specific place on Occidental Avenue. Don't think it exists anymore. But it was always good. We always got it. We always brought it into the ballpark. And then we would go up to Section 328 and you walk up behind home plate where Section 328 is, there's this giant purple arrow pointing at that entrance to Section 328. And you go in and we sat at our seats and we watched countless mid-2000s Mariners games. And that memory, it just burned into my

head so much that, you know, it was the repetition over time that really gave me the the strong Mariners fandom. And if it was always like Lyle, the joy of playing baseball growing up, it just so happened to also be my favorite sport to play. And even though, again, the Mariners on the field didn't do their part in terms of like,

yeah, this is something to really get excited about. We're really blowing this thing out of the water and getting you excited. But it's still, they still managed to, to turn me around. And it ended up working out,

okay, because, you know, look at us. Here I am 15 years later, still, still doing it. So can't complain too much.

So either one of you can tackle this, but how and when did you guys meet? And why did you guys start the podcast? So the two of us met when we got to school at ASU. So I grew up in Kirkland, T.J. grew up in Ballard, which was a little far growing up to ever really cross pad. So we didn't until we got to school. But the two of us went to school for sports journalism at Arizona State. And there are a decent amount of kids that come to school from out of state.

But at least in our program, there wasn't a ton of Seattle kids. A lot of the Seattle kids that were there weren't major Seattle sports fans the way the two of us were. So we pretty easily connected on that. Our first conversation about the Mariners must have been the first or second time the two of us ever met. It led to us and our big group of friends staying friends all throughout college. And the two of us specifically, always being the Seattle sports people and baseball specifically being our favorite sport. We'd kind of thrown the idea around for a while of starting a podcast. but we really wanted to make sure we had the time and the vision to really make sure we got the most out of it when we started.

Because we didn't want to be one of those podcasts that did a couple episodes and then just kind of let it go. We wanted to do a lot with it. And I think that's one of the things we're both really proud of that after the 2022 season, we got it going. And yeah, we've kind of kept it going ever since and wanted to keep it going for as long as we can. I'll let T.J. fill in any of the blanks I miss there. And I thought we had some, you know, there's always some good inspiration along the way, right? Whenever someone starts a podcast, there's usually a reason they do beyond just Phantom. Like, Lowe and I are very passionate Mariners fans.

We think we know a lot about the game. We like to use advanced analytics. It's what we use on the show to talk about the team and rationalize our decisions. But of course, there needs to be some, like, some inspiration along the way. I mean, I think about during COVID when everyone was home and there is, you know, a lot more time for people to think, people to operate, and stuff like that. We saw the company, we were currently partnered with Just Baseball, really start their growth. And they started off their main show, the Just Baseball show.

And they made a heavy emphasis to post on social media and especially short form video on TikTok and Instagram and grow that way. And I said, oh, that's really cool. That seems like a lot of fun to do it that way. So when you combine the two on top of the most exciting. Mining Mariner season of our lives. It's almost the perfect storm as like, we got to do this now, don't we?

Like, and we're like, all right, we're going to sit down. We're going to make this happen. After the Mariners got eliminated, after the Astros win the World Series, we're going to sit down and we're going to put our full effort into this thing. And it has turned out here through now 14 months, pretty good. And I can't say we're excited for everything that's happened in the past and everything that's going to happen here in the next 14 months as well. I do want to throw one more thing in really quick, just in terms of the

namesake. So back in our freshman year at college, TJ and his identical twin brother, fun fact, did a couple episodes of a Mariners podcast together. It was just on audio platforms and they just kind of talked and got their thoughts out there. They did it a few times and eventually it kind of stopped. But back then, they called it the Marine Layer podcast. But it just, you know, it never really went anywhere past the first five or ten episodes. And when the two of us started thinking about the names when we decided we wanted to do a podcast, I remember saying to TJ, I always like that name. I always thought Marine Leyer.

Like nobody really has that name. It's very, very unique to Seattle. I was like, we should keep that. And lo and behold, we have. So is your twin brother like the, the Squidward watching Patrick and SpongeBob from his window, you know, having fun. Is that meme?

Kind of. And he's not as much of a, I'll say outgo, like, like not like perpetually online enough. Well, he is online a lot. He just doesn't, he is not a bit, not a big tweeter. So he's not going to, he's not going to put his takes out in the public all that often. But lo and behold, I mean, he's like, he's, I would say pretty pretty near to the level of knowledge that my brother and I are at.

So, I mean, he's, he's a good person to bounce the knowledge off of, though I will give him credit. He is along a different line of thinking of some baseball fans. And, you know, like, it gives good conversation for, for to, to talk with him. because he sees the meritors and how they should operate differently than Lyle and I do, which is totally okay, but makes for good content as well. Might have to eventually, if we really, if we're really struggling for content ideas, we'll honor them and get them on the pot and give them, give them 10 minutes to, to start, start spewing a little bit.

Yeah, yeah, I want to hear that. I want to hear that for sure. More from my conversation with Lyle and T.J. in just a moment, but first, a reminder, this episode of the Lockdown Merritt's podcast is brought to you by game time. Buying tickets to your favorite events. shouldn't be stressful. Game time is a fast and easy way to buy tickets for all the sports, music, comedy, and theater near you. And with killer deals on last minute tickets in their

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the lowest price guarantee. So kind of speaking of, you know, how you guys look at the Mariners, you know, I feel like content creators, us as content creators, you know, covering a baseball team, we all kind of have our own individual philosophies of what we would like to see from the Mariners,

how we would like to see them build out their roster, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Where did you guys? both of you kind of find common ground with that. And what are some areas where maybe you guys butt heads a little bit, if at all? Yeah, that's a good question. You want to tackle that first while? Let's see.

Well, at least in terms of the common thinking, I would say both of us. I think both of us have kind of grown into the wave of analytics together, so to speak. I don't think either TJ or I back in our freshman year of college when we met were insanely tuned in on Sabermetrics. Like we knew a little bit about it. I was, I was big on war back then, but that was about the extent of it. I think we learned more and more about it as time went on. And we just started to realize, like, especially when we had more time to learn about it,

like over COVID when you didn't have that much to do. And over the last few seasons, when this Mariners core really came together, we just started to sit there and say, like, I think we got to get people past batting average. Because batting average, look, it has its purpose. But what it essentially tells you is a single and a home run. are the same value, which is obviously not true. So things like WRC Plus, even something a little more basic like OPS,

and there's a bunch of other things you can look at too. We just started to realize, I think there's way better stats out there for this. And we said if we're going to start this podcast, I think we could do our little part to just help push people toward that more because I think the game needs to grow in many ways. And I think that's one of them. So at least in terms of like our like-minded thinking, I think that's how it started. I think it was a gradual progression over time. And the two of us bounce things off each other constantly.

Honestly, I'd say we're both pretty analytic heavy. I'd honestly say TJ's probably even a little bit better with it than I am. But all the time, the two of us will bounce things off each other. And I think it makes for a good conversation when we get on the air because when we send each other things over messages or on camera before we start recording, it helps the two of us. And I'll see where we see differently. So allowed it a very good job there of highlighting sort of how we, how we, how we, grown into this. But a podcast where two people agree on everything is, is, is not good.

It's not good content because there's no, there's no, there's no actual discussion being generated. It's just throwing ideas out there. It's like, yep. Mm-hmm. Great. And that's certainly not what like Lowe and I do. We, we have our differences. Like, I would say overall our podcast is, is optimistic. We like to see the positive side of things. It's more fun that way, you know, living in the negativity is detrimental on the, it affects your mood. and stuff like that. It's just not all great to sort of live that way. So we try not to be that way. But, you know, Lyle's a more optimistic person than I am for sure. Like Lyle, do you agree with that? Like you're a little bit more on the optimistic side of a lot of things, especially individualistic player things,

opposed to me, a bit more of a pessimist on that side. And we'll have our disagreements on the podcast on how things are in that way. I would say it's like sort of the biggest thing on that. But I think that adds dimension and helps increase the sort of the discussion of the podcast a little bit. Wow, do you have anything else to add for that? I think you hit that pretty well that I'm probably a little bit more optimistic on the player side of things. What's that? Oh, Jared Kelnick. Well, that's a good one.

Yeah. I mean, I thought the guy was the absolute second coming when he was coming up. And I never lost fate, like especially, oh, that last April, I was like on top of the world. And I learned one of the mojo, I think, I think it's Joe. One of the mojo guys is, I guess, a big Kelmic fan too, which maybe we'll have to connect on that. But yeah. So, for example, like that, I'll get very, very invested in player success. And TJ's kind of the one that's sometimes like, all right, I'm going to bring you back down from planet Mars here.

I'm going to drag you back down to Earth a little bit. So that, in that sense, that'll happen sometimes. or like, I mean, I guess the show hey thing too, where like I really tried to speak it into existence, even though I probably knew it was never, it was never, look, it was never really going to happen. But I said it was not a fun way to be a fan if you just gave up on the idea back in, I don't know, August, September, whatever, where TJ sometimes was the one to drag me down from it a little bit. It's like, yeah, you might want to lower your expectations sort of thing. Look, I'm a little, I'm a little delusional on this show. I don't care. I'm more of the fan than Colby is.

Colby is very objective and he has to bring me down to earth a lot of the times. He's, you know, it's very much, I don't know if you guys have ever seen Parks and Rec, but a lot of the times people have made the comparisons between us and Chris Trager and Ben Wyatt where, you know, I'm Chris and I'm very optimistic and happy go lucky and I don't want to break bad news to anyone. And then here comes Colby who's like, everything is awful and everyone sucks. And, you know, I think you need someone. like that to bring you down to reality a little bit,

especially with things like when it comes to like the Otani thing where it's like, okay. Yeah. Otani's not signing here. He's not he's not signing here, but the one year $65 million deal sure sounded good. Yeah. That sounds fun to talk about three months.

Right. That set me into a frenzy when I saw that report. But anyway, and even like off camera too and we're not talking baseball, like I'd say the two of us have disagreements all the time about the way we want to structure things or how we want to post things, but not in ever a way that it's like, it actually leads to some argument or something like that. It's, they're healthy disagreements, which I think are good, because similar to if you have

the same takes on all your podcast that doesn't make for a good product, I think if you have two equally like-minded people that think the exact same way on the same wavelength all the time, I don't think that makes for a good, for a good product either. Like sometimes DJ's right about some things. Sometimes I'm right about some things, but that's why we talk it out with each other a lot of the time. And I think that's what helps us. And I think it helps that we've been friends for so long, too.

It's not that hard for us to have disagreements. More from my conversation with Lyle and T.J. and just a moment. But first, a reminder, this episode of the Locked-on Airs podcast is brought to you by Fandul. With football officially in the books and some time before baseball gets underway, why don't you try your hand at betting on some hoops? Get buckets with your first bet on Fandul, America's number one sports book. Because right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with

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Thank you again for making us your first listen. We're here with T.J. and Lyle from the Marine Alleyer podcast. This is great podcast. You can find it on all podcast platforms. You can find it on YouTube. It's part of the Just Baseball conglomerate. We're big fans of Just Baseball over here. Just Baseball has quite a few current locked on hosts and former locked on hosts.

Obviously, Aram is over there and Javier is over there. I think Ryan Biglin is over there too. Yeah. So quite a few guys over there. I want to know what your overall. creative process is like and what your main objectives are when you go into creating a podcast, creating a short, all that. I think our creative process, let's just say we're, let's base everything off the podcast

when we want to create something. So first of all, it starts with the podcast, right? We get, we need to sit down and we need to record a podcast because in the end, that's the main product. So we're going to do, we're going to focus on that first. But off of that podcast. We're going to try and think of how many different ways can we market ourselves off of this podcast. How many different ways of content can we get out of this? Okay, so we're already, of course, like locked on. We're on all the audio platforms and we're on YouTube. Great start.

That's where most of the latching on comes from. If people are going to actually tune in and listen to you week after week after week, it's probably going to come from the podcast, probably not going to come from the short form. But how many different ways can we get this content to somebody? Okay, so we're going to, we decided, listen, we're going to go, we need to post something about this on TikTok, on Instagram, on YouTube shorts in case someone doesn't have an hour and 20 minutes to sit down and watch our whole podcast. Okay, here's our best moment in 60 seconds. Please watch that instead. Then, you know, we post it on Twitter as well.

All these different ways to get people in. Okay, are we going to cut something else from the show as well? another different topic that somebody can engage with and comment with and just see sort of the just the let the algorithms do work really I think of what it is because we you know we started from zero like ground zero no backing nothing like we're like we need to grow this ourselves what is the best way to do it well we're not just going to post this on Twitter and retweet it and expect a bunch of people to see it and start listening to our podcast episodes and they shoot through the roof.

No, we got to force this into people in front of people and get them interested and have them come back and keep watching. YouTube algorithm helps, but then the short form stuff, the reels and the TikToks really do, really do a number. So we just want to find the right mix of,

so A, creating a good podcast and B, marketing and branching content off of the podcast in as many, in many ways as possible. I would say this, like going to journal, journalism school has helped us in some ways in terms of how to structure podcasting. Because even though this wasn't our main focus when we were in journalism school, because we're

in the field and want to be in sports media for our careers, like we've been forced to pay attention to how the field changes. And we've seen it in the last few years, how much it's changed to things like this. It's YouTube. It's podcasting. It's short form content. And you hear so much nowadays that for a lot of people, especially if you want to start a podcast in today's day and age, that you have to do a lot.

through the short form stuff because what happens is if you're some new podcast that people haven't heard of, they're probably not going to sit down for an hour plus and listen. What you have to do is what people talk about is you're going to have to build up a following through short form. And if people see enough of your 60 second clips and say, oh, I kind of like these guys. Well, maybe we should check out their full podcast. And lo and behold, very, I guess, lucky for us and fortunately enough for us, that seems to be how we've grown at a decent amount is people have seen enough 60 second clips from us really optimizing short form content and saying, oh, I like these guys.

They seem cool. They seem to know what they're talking about, I guess. Let's check them out for the full podcast. And I think that's kind of how things have generated over time. So with that, in terms of creative process, I think the two of us are always trying to think about not just show topics that make sense for the full podcast, but what would be good in a short form aspect and how many different show clips you can get from each show or other different pieces of content that we could create.

And with that, again, continue to kind of build an audience that way, if that makes sense. Just because, yeah, again, so like having to build up our following from scratch, that seems to be what's work best for us. And I would say along with that, the two of us are pretty organized with things too. Like, I think one of the things the two of us have taken pride in is since we started this podcast and started the social platforms, we posted something every single day. And I think we, and that's something we really wanted to do is we didn't want to skip days. we wanted to always try to optimize opportunities to get content out there. Even when there's not much content to have, like think of something, even if it's short, do something.

And the two of us are always texting back and forth? Are you going to edit something today? Are you going to post something today? And I think, again, that it's just another way that the two of us have worked really well together. And we're pretty proud of the work we've done so far. Just to, I'll say, last point on that. And I think the best thing is just holding each other accountable.

I think that's the best way when we, are essentially co-owners in this thing. We need to, like, splitting at 50-50 and essentially have as much of a democratic process in operating this podcast as possible, I think leads to the most efficient outcome. That's great because if it's only one person's thing, you know, like what if said person gets lazy and forgets on this something? Oh, I'm busy today. I can't post anything on social.

Well, when you have two people, it's like, well, each other kind of, like, find a way to do this. It's find a way to do that. Let's find a way to schedule this person. Let's find a way to talk about this. Like all these things. It just, it really helps the dynamic with two people,

opposed to someone starting their own podcast by themselves. So I was going to ask you guys if you had any advice to someone that's trying to get into the space that's trying to start up a mariner's podcast or just create any sort of content around the Mariners. But a lot of the stuff that you said, I feel like is good advice to someone looking to do that. Is there anything else, though, that you would say to someone that's trying to get into this? Be yourself, most importantly. Yeah. I think that one's huge because I think the two of us have really found a place where we feel like we can do that. Like I've done some play-by-play broadcasting, which I really liked.

And that's what the two of us thought we were going to do coming out of school. And I was like doing that. Like I would still take opportunities today if opportunities come up to do it. But I would say where I've really most felt myself in a sports media environment. Maybe that's because I've always loved the Mariners, but it's through this, through podcasting. I really feel like the person I am talking about the Mariners with TJ, like that's me. If you met me in person, I'd like to think I'd be the same person. So I would say be yourself is huge.

And also, like, don't be afraid to start. Like every single person that starts a podcast and builds it up, yeah, you're going to get negative comments. It's a very unfortunate. That's the way the internet is. But it happens to everybody. The biggest and best podcasts in the world, get those comments. And that's part of the reason we do a segment once a month where we kind of read some of our like ruthless comments, I guess, because we want to just show people.

One, we can laugh it off. And two, you're not alone. This happens to everybody. But okay, I'm sidetracking a little bit here. Just start is the big thing. Just start because if you never actually get out and do it, you'll always think to yourself, well, at some point in time, I'll start it. But if you just start, it's the easiest way to keep yourself pushing forward. And look, nobody's Joe Buck when they start or in a podcast or.

nobody's Ryan Rosillo when they start in terms of like big sports podcast. But I would think that's every single person that it'll eventually look back and say, oh, I've grown a lot over time. Like 10 episodes ago, I sounded way different. 50 episodes ago, I sounded way different. So don't worry about if an episode one or episode two, you feel like, oh, this isn't how I want to sound. The more you do it and the more you stick with it, you're going to get the results you want to find.

Yeah. And if you love it and if you love the team, just do it, just go for it. I was working at a movie theater and Colby was working at a grocery store and we just found the time to talk ball and write about the team back when we were still at Soto and when the pandemic had,

he and I both had nothing better to do. So we're like, let's just keep going with it. And let's start up CTZ. And then eventually the opportunity for locked on came. And we've been able to, you know, fortunately grow this into what become now and we want to take it further than, you know, where it is already.

But it can happen for anyone because there's still, I mean, even with how much this community has grown in such a short amount of time over the last couple of years with podcasts like your guys. There's still space for more people to talk about this team, for people to bring different things to the table that aren't really there. I mean, I've had multiple people reach out to me via DM, on Twitter and say, hey, I got this idea.

And it's like, I don't know anyone that's doing that. We're certainly not doing that. Go for it. Do it. So if anyone out there that's listening to this right now, that if you have an interesting idea, if you have your own interesting spend, and you don't have to reinvent the wheel here,

but if you have an interesting spin or do you think that you can offer something to the conversation to the community that is missing, or you think that your personality is something that this community is missing, go for it. Absolutely go for it. So it's been a weird offseason. It's kind of over. I mean,

we're at pitchers and catchers now, but so many guys are still left on sign, so who knows? But what have you thought about this whole offseason? TJ, I'll start with you. Organizationalally disappointing. It could not be more disappointing as an organization as a whole. It is the last thing you want to hear ever.

The last thing you want to hear is a group of people who own the team tell you they don't have, they don't have money to spend on the team after telling you for years, oh, don't worry. When the time comes, the checkbook is open and we're going to try and win a championship. And obviously, that's not the case. That's not even debatable. That's not on the top of their mind right now. But for what Jerry and Justin had to work with this offseason, sequencing aside, which sequencing made the offseason seem worse at first, better now,

because all the bad and then all the good coming here at the end. Right. Like this team's better than it was last season now. They have upgraded at positions they've needed to. We sit here and we're sitting last season. And I'm like, there are games in the 2023 Mariners season where Colton Wong is at second base and Tommy Lestella's D-Hing. You're sitting at thinking, how is this possible?

How is this possible? And now you fast forward to 2020. and you have an all-star caliber, 2004, and you have an all-star caliber player at each position, Jorge Polanco and Mitch Garber. And that's not even counting the added depth in the outfield in the quarter, the added

proficiency of the bats of Mitch Hanigur and Luke Rayleigh in those corner spots. That's like those are spots you needed more production out of last season, and you have four guys who are better than their counterparts, if not significantly better than their counterparts were last

season with all the good pitching that you had last season returning, all of it. And that leads to a lot of excitement. I am excited. I am through the moon to watch this team. That's all we could ask for for the budget they were given. This is about as exciting of a team as we could ask for. And this is with all of us growing up watching probably the least exciting franchise in baseball, seriously, in the mid-2010s, least exciting until Nelson Cruz came along. Yeah. I'll say, I'll say Robbie and Nelson Cruz, so pre-2014, but no, I'm with you. Jerry and Justin as a whole, I think T.J. said that really well, but Jerry and Justin as a whole, I don't know how you could give them anything, but an A-minus at the very least for what they've done this winter, given the restraints that they had.

I mean, T.J. talked about how massive the second base and D.H. upgrades are, which they are. Like, Jorge Polanco and Mitch Garber were on this team last year. We're talking about a different story for a ball club that finished only two games behind Texas and Houston. And then you factor in Luke Rayleigh, who first half of the year last year was crushing the ball. You get Mitch Hanager back. Like, I'm still almost flabbergated that they found a way to move off of Robbie Ray's contract. And not that I would have complained if they had kept Ray and waited until August or so for him to come back. But they needed bats.

The fact that they flipped an injured arm for a bat that's very familiar with the team. And we know when he's healthy and Mitch Hanager can be very good. And the fact that, like, I know you love this move, Ty, but Gregory Santos at the end. Like it felt like after Polanco, it's like, okay, this is a really good offseason. And then it's, oh, we just added firepower to that bullpen. Like, bullpen was already good. But you lose Topa, you kind of lack that third dominant arm in the bullpen all of a sudden. But then you go get Gregory Santos, who was unbelievable last year.

And you create what's a true three-headed monster. Like, if you get George Kirby and Logan Gilbert and Louise Castile, all these guys going six innings, you turn it over to those three. Like, good luck to opposing hitters. And I think that is one of the things that they capitalized on so, so well, because they know the strength as they're pitching and they're doubling down on that, getting a bullpen arm like that. So Jerry and Justin, if you don't have good things to say about what they did this winter with the restraints they had, I don't know what to tell you. Yeah, I said earlier this off season that it was like the, you know, that that Shaq and Kobe video that everyone posts. That's Jerry and Justin, the off season. Yeah.

They were hooping. They were hooping this this off season. Like once you got through all the bad, right, which the last like really bad thing was the Jared Kelnick trade where it was just like what the hell is going on. Like I remember the way that I felt that night. That's still to our to this day our most popular video because. Same with us. Obviously people were very upset. Yeah. Like naturally.

Like understandably so. But from that point forward. Sign Garber. Then a few weeks later, they pull off the Hanager trade and the Rayleigh trade. You guys should have seen my face when I got that text that Mitch Hanager is coming back like two hours before he got announced. I thought it was getting trolled. Yeah. You should have seen my face.

I was on a plane when it happened and I'm getting text from people. So I had eye messaging, but I couldn't get tweets. And I'm like screaming at people in all caps saying like fill me in right now on what's going on because I can't see. Like TJ have to do some of it. Some other people have to do some of it. Yeah, like I can copying and pasting Jeff Passon and allow into the into text messages.

Yeah. Like, hello, I'm Jeff Passon. Yeah. And then, you know, we got to that point,

right, where I'm, and I'm sure you guys remember this when the, the conversation on Marr's Twitter was all about Whitmerfield. Mm-hmm. Because he said that he liked hitting at T-Mobile Park and people just lost their minds. The only player to ever say that. It's like,

okay, so we kind of have to sign them now. Right, right. Like, it has to, and it's like, I just it's like it's like it's uh no picking a bat let's like Tuffy go switch coming in

saying I love Timoval Park right I loved it and then I was like I you know I think we'll pass on you Tuffy so you know we got to that point right where it's like all right we're talking about like a bench player we're talking about a topper for the off season essentially um and instead we get an all star caliber second baseman And then one of the best young relievers in all of baseball. I mean, are you kidding? Like, especially in this off season of all the off seasons for them to do it. You know, my biggest complaint with this regime, the depoto regime and their roster builds in the past, specifically in the off season.

It's not really over the course of the year once they, you know, kind of look at what they have and then readjust, is that they haven't gone into a season. with too much, right? So even deals like Blake Hunt, some Mod Taylor, bringing in someone like Canaan Smith and Jigba that has some upside just on the back end of the 40-man roster where now you're so far removed from if injuries crop up, you don't have to pull another Jose Caballero, another Mike Ford out of thin air, right?

You have guys that at least have some upsets. side or, you know, like with a Cade Marlowe or again, a Samad Taylor, someone that has tools that are projectable that are very easy to see, can carve out a path, a role at the major league level, or they have some actual major league experience and some success. So I love that aspect of the roster build as well. But also to just go, yeah, we could go out and get Whitmerfield. And you know, given what the restrictions were on us, that's a fine off season, you know, after adding Garver and Rayleigh and Hanager and doing all those things.

But let's go get an all-star second basement. Let's go get a really, really fun reliever. We all expected it to be over after the Mitch trade and Rayleigh on the same day. Okay, like they got there too. I would have been, I was sitting there. I was sitting there on the air hosting on the radio at that time. I'm saying, I'm like, okay, this looks like the caper of the off season. Like it.

It's done. They're going to get ready. they'll add marginal pieces and go from here. And then as you said, no, that was not the case. They like the foot was on the gas as much as it possible. As much as that $145 million budget could press that gas towards the floor of the car. They're, they're getting close to it. And I just hope Jerry keeps his promise that that number is going to go above 145 by the time this, by the time the season's in.

Because when they're going to have an operative, then the next step of all this, Jerry potentially has gone into the season too much. And you could argue that they still don't have too much, but I'll say it's enough for now. Because they've filled pretty much every hole except third base. But then once the Mariners are in season, injuries start happening, are they

going to get the resources they need if they're playing well to plug those holes? Everyone remembers 2018. That was a flawed team that go off to a really hot start. They were in playoff position. Jerry's ready to go make an acquisition at the deadline. and ownership says, nope, not happening.

We're not, we're not, we are not stretching ourselves to make the playoffs. And they didn't. They made marginal acquisitions and they fell flat on their face at the end of the final two months of the season and missed the playoffs. That can't happen again. That shouldn't happen again. Like the expectation is not for that to happen again. And that's going to be the next question, the front office and the people above them

need to answer as the season goes along. Yeah. And the nice thing about that is there is some payroll left over. in the budget. That's the good news. Like it in theory. Okay. In theory, as far as we know, there's payroll left in the budget. Because if the statement is true that payroll will at least marginally go up, if not even just stay the same from last year and be at 140, you do have a little bit of room to work with at the deadline if you want to go get a couple of impactful pieces. And the hope is they're going to do that. So if you want to look at it in that sense of, okay, maybe there's a whole or

you could still fill right now, but are opting to lead some payroll left open. Then you look at it as, okay, where will our needs truly be? And then we can go get it at the deadline. Maybe it's not third base. Maybe Arias and Rojas combined for a 110 WRC plus this year and are totally fine as a platoon over at third base. You find out your needs are somewhere else. You go get a bat or an arm from somewhere else. So, yeah, just the hope is they will go at the deadline.

And it's not like 2018 when it's Adam Warren. Zach Duke and Cameron Maybin. Yeah. That hurts. Yeah. Those names aren't fun to read out. I remember that deadline. Yeah. That was I think my first year writing about the team on Soto.

And, you know, leading up to the deadline, we were doing a lot of deadline articles and, you know, mock trades and stuff. And let's just say I had much higher hosts. I was shooting a lot higher than Zach Duke. Can't remember it, Jesus. As you should. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's correct.

As I should. As I should. What are your expectations for 2024? And do you have any predictions? So I think we differ on this a little bit, but I think the Mariners can win the West. I really believe that. The whole caveat is they do have to stay healthy. And everybody knows that is the biggest question mark of this team is the lineup has to stay healthy.

But if they do it, and you would think Mitch Garber being a third, full-time D-H should help that a lot now that he's not going to be catching. And if they're healthy, they have the best pitching in the division. They might have the best bullpen in the division. You can argue Houston's up there too. But between that combined and an offense that is much improved for a team that only finished two games behind Houston and Texas last year, doesn't feel like that much ground to make up. Houston's rotations getting older.

Like Verlanders already got some injury issues. I think there's a chance they can win this division. I really do. I'm not saying they're going to win 100 games, but there's a world where 92, 93, 94 wins might win you the West this year. And I think there's a chance the Mariners can really do that. So early, bold prediction, that's my prediction, is this team can win it. I'm a couple of wins lower than Lyle.

And while I think they can win the division, I just don't, I don't think it's quite as realistic. I'll notch down my excitement for the division a little bit. They feel more like a second place team with a tiny bit of upside. to potentially win the division. So I feel like right now it's them in Texas second and Houston first. Now that could mean still 88 to 90 wins, which would be perfectly fine.

That would be above their Vegas total right now. If they were at 90, that would be more than they had in 2023. And that would be an upgrade. What's lucky for them, if you look at the American League, like where are the great teams? There aren't any.

You look in the National League. There are two elite teams. And I mean, cream of the crop. You go over to the American League. No perfect teams. you don't need to be perfect. You just need to be in the right situation at the right time.

And then once you get in the playoffs, ball's got to bounce your way. And the Mariners, certainly the way this roster is structured are setting themselves up to do exactly that. So we do this thing every year called Flag Week, where we eliminate the Julios and the JPs of the world, the very obvious answers. And we plan our flag on a player that we're rocking with for the whole year.

that we really, really, really believe in. So I'm allowing you guys, each of you, to pick a player that you believe in in in 2024. TJ knows exactly where I'm going with this. And I know, I'm sure our two shows have some crossover. And for those of you who listen to our show, you know that there's two players I love. One of them is gone. And Jared Kelnik, the other one's Dylan Moore, who I've loved forever now. And the dude, I think, is just about the perfect utility player because he plays everywhere,

plays good defense at the plate he walks. He has pop. He can steal some bases. He is exactly what you want in a utility player. And he crushes lefties when he's at his best. The reason I think he had a down year last year is he basically had no spring training because he was injured. They tried to ramp up some at bats in the minors. He probably didn't get enough.

And then he had to try to adjust to big league pitching and he was behind the eight ball. He gets into spring training healthy this year, which he currently is. That is a guy that has so much value to a team off the bench, late in games, plays a couple times a week, crushes lefties. I think Dylan Moore, if healthy, gets back to 2022 Dylan Moore here in 2024. Now it'll be a really valuable piece, and I would certainly not complain about Dylan Moore. But I think it, for me, it's going to be Thai France. So finally he's going to drive line in the off season.

People were saying, okay, Ty, look what happened to JP. I think that's what we want from you, Ty. Loth, lift the ball a little bit more, hit for a little bit more power, have just sort of a different feel for your swing. And Ty, finally, it seemed like he was one of the first guys at Drive line once the offseason started. And that gets people excited. It doesn't guarantee results, but it's showing that he understands what he did last

season was not acceptable. And if Thai France can turn back the clock to 2021 in this lineup, we're, I mean, we're talking about a different level of excitement for this team and this lineup. I mean, Thai France hitting in your, that version of Thai France hitting in your six or your seven hole is a game changer. That makes your lineup one of the best in the American League. It already is. It makes it better. I mean, you get closer and closer

to the Houston Astros if that's what you get about Thai France. And, you know, it's fine. He's not the best power hitting first basement in baseball because you already have other power threats in your lineup. That's not what he has to be. It just needs to be the best version of Thai France. And I think the best version of Thai France makes

this roster just so much better. And Tiles is also just hilarious. So that gets an extra Browning points. So I'm on Twitter right now. I got to ask you guys about this because this is very interesting. So Ryan Divish was on the Lookout Landing podcast and apparently said that Jerry Depoto and Scott's service are not under contract beyond this season, which we didn't have

a confirmation of actually until I guess now. So what are your guys' reaction to that? Whose choice would that be? Would it be, Jerry? like GMs and managers by choice never want to have beyond a Prove it contract because then they can't make moves beyond this year, right? They can't do it. It's always the worst possible thing ever.

But you know what? I kind of have PTSD. I think when was the last time this was the case? It was 2018. They got their extensions. And then right after that, the team crashed. It crashed and burned. And people were like, oh, my goodness.

Well, they got extended in, what, 2021, I think, too. Or at least Jerry did. Yeah. I can't remember how long the 2018 extensions were. But that one, that one stood out to me because I remember they both got extensions that year in 2018. And, you know, I don't think that's going to happen this year. But you don't, you really don't ever know. But, yeah, is it RSN uncertainty? Is it just we haven't gotten to it yet? I would have been a good off season to do it. Yeah. I hope, I mean, Jerry and Scott both, but especially when you think about Jerry up at the top of the front office, like, I hope he sticks around. Maybe there, I mean, I know there's Samarano's fans out there that aren't the biggest DePoto fans. I certainly really appreciate everything Jerry DePoto's done. I hope he stays because, you know, I don't know if he'd take another job out there. I don't know if there's another job out there that would offer him something, but just thinking about what he's dealt with in his career, he has dealt with two very subpart. ownership groups. He has to deal with Artie Moreno. Now he's had to deal with the Mariners

ownership group. There's a part of me that wonders if he's just itching to be like, can I just put my philosophies into place and have a fair, reasonable, competitive, like payroll to work with. I hope he sticks in Seattle. I hope they find a way to keep him around. And Scott Service, too, who is very clearly not just a good manager, but well, well liked in the clubhouse. I think that would, I think that's a bad, that would be bad news if those guys left after this year weren't brought back. Because I think there's such focal points at this point of where the team's going and who the team is. So I hope those guys stick around. And if they didn't want them, like, you fire them.

Like you don't just let the contract run out and be like, all right, see ya. Like, you just don't want the two of them operating like they won't be in Seattle next season. That does nothing to the 2025 Mariners. We want the 2025 Mariners to be good. Right. Well, because it does make you wonder, like, what would they do at the deadline? Right.

Are they just going to go all in? Like, I don't think either of us if they don't have to trade Cole Emerson or Cole Young or Harry Ford, but if Jerry seriously doesn't think he has to be here next year, then he has no, there's no attachment there. Yeah. Yeah, it's.

That stinks. Yeah, it's very interesting. I don't want those guys gone. I think this is coming out on Thursday. We do podcasts twice a week, Wednesday, and Friday. We might have just found our Friday podcast topic. I can tell you what. Yeah.

Yeah. Very interesting. Yeah. Very, very interesting. All right. Well, on that note, thank you guys so much for being here for doing this. Really appreciate the conversation. Once again, just love you guys' podcast. Can not recommend it enough to our listeners. Where can everyone find it? Where can everyone find some of your other work? If you've got anything else you're working on, feel free to plug it. Floor is yours. So, yeah, we're on all podcast platforms. you want to look. We're on YouTube as well. Short forum on Instagram and TikTok at Marine Layer

Pod. Law and I are both decently active on Twitter. If you want to find us there, we're friendly. We don't bite. So, yeah, all the, all the good stuff. I will say we're on YouTube shorts along with YouTube too. Like we have our own podcast Twitter account. Like all our ads are just at Marine LayerPod. We're pretty easy to find. And yeah, I'd say that's the gist of it. I do some writing over at just baseball. If you want to catch TJ on the radio talking about Oregon State, he's down in Corvallis at KJO. And oh, and otherwise, for anybody that might be going down to spring training, we'll be in,

the two of us will be at spring training the first week of March. So if anybody's going to be in Arizona, we always tell people, we love to meet people. We love to talk to Mariners fans. So if you're going to be down there, tell us. We'd be happy, we'd be happy to meet up. Perfect. Thank you so much, guys. Really appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks. This has been awesome. We appreciate it a ton. All right. going to do it for our show. Thank you again to TJ and Lau for taking the time to chat. Really had a fun time recording that one, and I hope you enjoyed it as well.

Next week on the Mariners Content Creator Spotlight, we'll be joined by longtime friend of the show and the creator of the sea level substack. That has Ben Rennery. Really, really looking forward to that one. Until then, thank you so much for joining us here on the Lockdown Maris podcast.

I've been your host, Tiding Gzalas. Be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at L0 underscore Mariners. You can follow me at Tideon, and my co-host Colby at CPAT 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. Have yourself a beautiful baseball day and we'll see you next time. Peace.