Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Mariners' Midterm Report Card

Episode Date: July 16, 2021

Before handing out mid=season grades to the Mariners, D.C. goes over the two bits of news that came out today regarding both Hector Santiago and Jarred Kelenic. D.C. then gives each position a letter grade on how he thinks that position has fared over the course of the first half of the season. Finally, he recalls the first game in Safeco Field history on its anniversary. 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.

Today on Locked-on Mariners, or tonight on Locked-on Mariners, really, the host produces an evening show after a late-night bout with food poisoning. Welcome to Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Here's your host, D.C. Lundberg. I'm not entirely sure whether or not it was actually food poisoning, but something I ate yesterday just did not agree with me at all, and I was up most of the night, unfortunately.

I thought for a while here that I was going to have to have to have. have Clive Braithwaite to the fourth host to show today. But whatever happened, it's out of my system. Now it's a look and now feeling okay. And there are actually a couple pieces of Mariners news to discuss today on Locked-on Mariners, part of the

Locked-on podcast network. Please remember to download and follow this program using whichever podcasting app that you personally care to use. Ask your smart device to play Locked-on Mariner's podcast or any program here on the Locked-on podcast network.

Actually, gang, it's not necessarily a bad thing that today's episode is as late as it is. There was some news that broke this afternoon about 1.30. And usually at 1.30 in the afternoon, the show is already done. Or I'm just putting the finishing touches on it in post-production before I publish it. And that news involves Hector Santiago, which we've been kind of documenting, as it were, on the show over the previous few weeks. And this morning it was announced that there was some Jared Kelnick news. We'll talk about both of those bits here in A-Block.

In B Block, we'll do the mid-season report card, which I alluded to earlier in the week that I didn't get to on, I think, Monday's show. Yeah, Monday's show. Could have been Tuesday. I don't remember. And in C Block, it could have kind of be an extension of the trivia corner. But first, Mr. Santiago. It was announced today that the appeal of his 10-game suspension has been denied by Major League Baseball. He will begin serving this suspension, pardon me, tomorrow when the Mariners begin a three-game series in

Anaheim to face the Angels. He will be eligible to return on July 27th, exactly one month after he was ejected from that game in Chicago, when the umpires found Rosen on the inside of the wristband of his glove. I'm not surprised by this news, but I'm still disappointed. I just don't think he was trying to cheat. But at the same time, Major League Baseball was just waiting for someone to get caught and they didn't care what the circumstances were. They were going to make an example out of that first person that they got. The article that I read, written by Daniel Kramer on MLB.com, in that article, Major League Baseball did not say what they found in his glove, and his glove was at the

appellate hearing. That makes me very suspicious. I said last time I talked about this on the show that, well, this is not a court of law, the principle of innocent until proven guilty should still apply. And I don't think Major League Baseball proved guilt. Was he using illegal equipment? Yeah, he was. Should he have been ejected from the game?

Absolutely. Was he using this illegal equipment to gain an edge? No. Or at least I do not think so. And I don't think Major League Baseball prove that one way or the other. I am convinced that they are simply trying to make an example out of Mr. Santiago as a message to the rest of the league that they're not playing around. Remember, the sticky stuff, which

the Mariners' claim was Rosen, was on the inside of the wristband of his glove. If you're going to try to hide something, that's a pretty terrible place, since it would be obvious when you're going to that area to try to load up. Anything else that I would say from here on out would just be repeating myself from the last two times I covered this story, so I'm not going to bother going any further. But if you did not hear those other two episodes in which I covered this story, go back and listen to them. I'm pretty sure they've both got Hector Santiago's name in the episode title, so they shouldn't be too hard to find. Just to wrap up, though, the Mariners are not allowed to replace him on the active roster.

That's a rule that I actually like. Why should you have ever been allowed to replace the suspended player? I don't know. Anyways, Mr. Santiago not being available, not only puts a hole in the bullpen, it puts a hole in the starting rotation. He was the best candidate to use as a spot starter in Justice Sheffield's stead. while he's on the injured list, and that turn on the rotation is going to be up next Tuesday in Colorado. Robert Ducker has been used as a spot starter in these bullpen games, but he's in Tacoma. Eric Swanson has spot started a couple of these bullpen games, but he's just coming off the disabled list,

and he also hasn't provided the length that Mr. Dugger or Mr. Santiago have in their spot starts. So we'll see what they do. I'm not exactly sure what is going to be the case at this time, but I'm guessing it's probably going to be Mr. Dugger or Mr. Swanson. Moving on to the other news item that came out today in this packed A block, the Mariners are going to recall Jared Kelmick prior to tomorrow night's game in Anaheim, and he will be in the starting lineup as the center fielder. They have not announced what the corresponding roster move will be, and I'm not exactly sure if they know what the corresponding roster move will be,

they have 24 hours to figure that out or so. He will see the majority of the playing time in Sanchez, center field while Kyle Lewis is still on the shelf. Mr. Lewis might return in August from knee surgery, and when he does, they'll have to open up a 40-man roster spot. That's a conversation we can have at another time, though. After being sent back to Tacoma following an unimpressive first few weeks in the major leagues, Kellnick raked again. Also, he has reportedly took some of the pressure off of himself, and that can be a big help. Remember the beginning of last season? Jose Marmalleos was very impressive.

I love saying that name. It was very impressive in both spring camp and summer camp as a non-roster invitee. He made the big league roster, but then struggled mightily. He was sent out and stopped putting so much pressure on himself, and he came back up and hit something like 421. A better mindset can make a big difference. And I'm not saying Mr. Kellnick is going to hit 421 right out of the shoot, but I'm very hopeful that he will do

better now that he's just going to go out there and play ball rather than putting so much pressure on himself. I'm excited to see what he can do, and I would not be the least bit surprised if the rest of the way out he hit in the 270s, 280s, maybe even better. I don't know. Maybe that's a stretch now that those words come out of my mouth, but we'll see what happens, and I'm excited to see what he can do. Time for the trivia corner, ladies and gentlemen. This is a very significant date in Seattle Mariners history, and I will begin to explain why that is after this word from fully loaded. Today's episode is brought to you in part by fully loaded chew.

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the Mariners played their first ever game at Safeco Field, a very significant and important date in Seattle Mariners history, and we're going to kind of relive that game today in C-block. Coming up, I assign arbitrary letter grades to the members of the Seattle Mariners to make it seem like I know what the hell I'm talking about. But first, this word of interest from Rock Auto. This episode is brought to you by Rock Auto, which I just indicated. With the ever-increasing numbers of makes and models,

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Rock Auto prices are reliably low for every customer. Go explore their easy-to-use website today to find the solution to your auto parts needs. Go to rockato.com right at this exact moment to see all the parts available for your car truck van SUV, your crossover. Right locked on in their how did you hear about us box so they know we see. sent you. Amazing selection, reliably low prices, all the parts your car will ever need, rock auto.com. Now back to Lockdown Mariners and your host, D.C. Lunders. Thank you very much, Joey Martin. Today in B Block, we're going to go position by position and assign a letter grade to each one of those positions as kind of a mid-season report card. We're going to go fairly quickly,

or at least try to, so we can get them all in here in this segment. And it's another one of those segments where I don't really have an outline or any notes or anything like that. I do have statistics in front of me, but this is pretty much all off the top of my head. Let's start behind the plate. And as far as the catching goes, for the most part, it's been Tom Murphy and Luis Torrenz. In the early part of the season, neither of them were hitting. And Torrens's defense has been terrible all season. Torrens is now hitting, but he's mostly a DH. And they also have Cal Raleigh up there, who's only played one game. So I can't pass judgment on how he has done of the major league level because it's only four played appearances.

Jose Godoy also was up for a time, and his defense was pretty good, and initially hit okay, but not with much sting, and I think he was sent out after hitting. Well, he was hitting, let's see, he was hitting 162 at the time. So in terms of the catching, when you're, catching is a defensive position, and Tom Murphy's defense has been very, very good. So overall, you know, considering that Torens and Murphy, neither of them were hitting most of the season Murphy is still not, and Torenz's defense has been awful. It's been mostly those two. I don't know if I can give him anything more than a C-minus, really. We'll just move right on over

to first base and in the first part of the season. It was Jose Marmalajos and Evan White, neither of whom hit very well, although Evan White's defense continued to be outstanding. Evan White might not play the rest of the season. Jerry DePoto indicated over the weekend, or just prior to the mid-season break, that his injury is much worse than originally. thought. He was only slashing 144, 202, 237 at the time. And in recent days, it has been mostly Ty Freeds playing first base, who is swinging the bat pretty well. And also Jake Bowers has filled in there occasionally, and he swung the bat pretty well since coming to the Seattle Mariners. Overall for the season, first base is kind of more of an offensive position than a

defensive position, even though Evan White's defense is outstanding. Let's give them, but they've been better in recent days, I'll give him a C. I'll give him a C. Second base is where they've had some problems. Dylan Moore has seen most of the action at second base, and while his defense is good, not great, but good, he's only hitting 176,

on base at 268, which is high relative to that batting average and a slugging average of 348. Shed Long Jr.'s spent some time at second base since coming off of the injured list, and he's hitting below 200 as well. And defensively,

He's okay. He's okay. He's not great, but he can get the job done. Donovan Walton is filled done there, and his defense is very good. He's not much of a, his bat is not very potent, though. Earlier in the season, Ty Franch was seeing a lot of playing time at second base, and that was during the portion of the season where he wasn't swinging the bat, following his hit by pitch. And his defense at second base was bordering on terrible. So second base cannot get a very good grade. best I can give him probably is a D-plus. We'll move over to third base, and Kyle Seeger has played just about every single game at third base. Offensively, I think he's done.

He's only hitting 2.13 for the season on base of 280. He's slugging 4-11. He has driven in 50 runs, however, which is second on the team. He hits okay with runners in scoring position. Earlier this season, he was just on fire with runners in scoring position. But his defense is not what it once was either. and I think after a month or so, he had already made more errors than he did all of last season. Third base is another position I cannot give a high grade to.

It's pretty much been exclusively Kyle Seeger, and unfortunately I have to give him a D for this season. Shortstop, and this is where things are going to start to improve dramatically, as J.P. Crawford has improved dramatically. He is slashing 279, 341, 391. He has five home runs and 22 doubles. He leads the team in doubles, ladies and gentlemen, and he has 31 RBI, mostly out of the leadoff spot. That is pretty impressive. And his defense has improved.

He's always had the range. And last year, his hands improved to the point where they were an asset. And this season, I don't see him throwing as many balls away as he tended to last season. He's suffering from fewer concentration lapses out there at shortstop. and he's now defensively an asset. I mean, I know he won a gold glove last year. I just don't know if there was a lot of competition. I still thought like he threw too many balls away,

even though his hands had improved. Again, he's always had the range, and he's even better this year. Shortstop can't be anything less than an A. He has knocked it out of the park figuratively most of the season. He got off to a slow start, but then he simplified his swing, and he even said that over the past couple of seasons, he was going out there and trying to be a 20 home run hitter, trying to be someone who he wasn't,

and he's now staying within himself, and that's probably why the results have been there. I will temper that with this, however. Remember in 2019, he was hitting, I believe, 278 at the break that year and fell off a cliff in the second half of the season. The Mariners were after him to improve his stamina, put on some muscle,

could last a full season. We still don't know if he can do that. If he can, then the Mariners really have something here. I don't know if he can or not. I'm really hopeful that he can. I'm going to lump left field, center field, and right field into one, because not only have there been a lot of comings and goings in the outfield, but the three spots left center and right,

they're kind of rotated. Mitch Hanninger is the right fielder, but although he rotates into DH sometimes, Ace Frey has seen time at all three positions. I believe Taylor Tramell has as well. Sam Haggard, he's been out there and at least left and center field. Dylan Moore's played all three spots. Shed Long Jr. has been out there in left field.

And let's not forget, Braden Bishop, who's no longer in the organization. Dylan Thomas has been out there. Even Donovan Walton's played some left field. And, of course, Jared Kelnick was up for a few games in, beginning in mid-May. Jake Bowers has played the outfield. There have been so many comings and goings that you can't differentiate between the three positions. Mitch Hanninger might be the best of the bunch. He is slashing 257, 311, 487, and he leads the team with 20 home runs and 52 runs batted in.

Ace Freyley has also put together a pretty good season. He's more or less the new Lance Blankenship. As I mentioned previously on the show, only with more power. He has seven home runs and 23 runs driven in in 40 games. he is slashing 239, 409, 439. He has an OPS of 848 to go along with that 237 batting average. His numbers are kind of funny to me just because you don't see those type of numbers every day. But one thing that Ace has and also Taylor Tremel and Kyle Lewis,

they're very good defensive outfielders. Sam Haggerty can hold a zone out there as can Dylan Moore. And of course, Mitch Hanager, the anchor in right field as it were. He's got a very good arm out there. but a lot of them are plus defenders as well, which helps their cause. Collectively as a group, it's certainly better than the infield. That is for sure. I'll give him a B-minus.

Manager and Ace Fraley are really the only two have put together pretty good offensive seasons. If you can consider 238 a good offensive season. His game, though, is on base and a little bit of extra base punch, so I'm not really worried about that. I would like to see Manninger's batting average go up and his strikeouts go down. I don't know if that's going to happen, but collectively the outfield, again, will get a B-minus.

I'm not going to give a grade to the designated hitter because everybody is seemingly DHed. It's a position that Scott Service likes to use to give players a partial day off, especially the outfields. Ty France has seen some action at DH. Tom Murphy and Luis Torrens have kind of taken turns D-Hing as well. Terenz has seen a lot of action at DH recently, so it would be just grading basically the entire higher roster if I was going to say something about designated hitter. Now we'll move over to the pitching staff and I'll give a grade to the bullpen and to the starting rotation. And talk about hit or miss, that's the starting rotation.

You say Kikichi and Chris Flexen have both had outstanding seasons. If not for that one poor start in San Diego, and I talked about this I think a couple days ago, Chris Flexion would be among the league leaders in earned run average. Just as Sheffield had a miserable season, Marco Gonzalez has not. not had a good season either. Even though Justin Dunn's ERA is low, I have not been impressed with him because of the high number of walks and all the counts he's gotten into, all the full counts, all the two-two counts. He's had to throw a lot of pitches, and he doesn't provide a lot of length in ball games for

that reason. Logan Gilbert has started 10 games so we can kind of fairly assess what he has done so far. He's pitched 48 and 2-thirds innings. Has a 3-5-1 earned run average, which is actually the exact same as Chris Flex. and his whip is below one, which leads the starting rotation. He also leads the starting rotation in strikeouts per nine innings with 9.8. Ratio-wise, he's given up the second fewest home runs at 0.9 per nine innings. Chris Flexen's given up 0.8.

Starting rotation, again, hit or miss, and because of the misses, I can't give a real high grade. I'll give the starting rotation collectively a, I'll give him a B. I was thinking about a B minus, but I don't think that Sheffield and Gonzalez have been bad to the point to really take away from something a grade I could give to Kiketsi Son, Mr. Flection, or Mr. Gilbert. And Justin Dunn, we'll see what he does when he comes back. The bullpen, I'm also going to give a B. It's been hit or miss as well. And the misses have been big misses, and the hits have been big hits. Drew Steck and Ryder almost came out of nowhere.

I know he's a Major League veteran, but I think he was a non-roster guy if memory serves. and he's at a very good season, kind of solidifying himself in his setup role, and Kendall Graven's taking the closer's job and run with it. Paul Seawald also came out of nowhere and is putting together a fantastic season. J.T. Chagua, the avocado, also putting together a nice season after being a minor league free agent, non-raster invitee. Hector Santiago has put together a nice season of the bullpen.

Keenan Middleton's been hit or miss. Eric Swanson's also come out of nowhere and put together a, very good season. But then you get to people like Raphael Montero who just drag the whole bullpen down almost single-handedly. Will Vest has also really struggled as of late as well. But just going over the names, there actually might have been more hits than misses. So I will change that B to a B plus. The pitching has been better for the Mariners this season than the offense has been. The defense also has been, it's been good. It hasn't been great, but it's been good.

They've been turning a lot of double plays, which have been helping out their pitching staff. So that obviously is a plus as well. That ran way longer than I thought it was going to, which is fine because I don't think the next segment was going to be real long to begin with. But before we get to that, if you have a question or a comment for the show, please send it into Lockdown Mariners at gmail.com.

Questions and comments on any subject are highly encouraged, probably going to be doing another email episode on 2.4. I was going to do one this week, but these seem to work better when John Miller is available to do the show with me. And he's out of town, so he wasn't available to record. So probably on Tuesday, the Mariners don't have a game on Monday. So on Tuesday's show, there's going to be no game to recap. I'm rambling. Coming up, we relive the first ever game in Safeco Field history.

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Head to the website or use your mobile device today to sign up and receive your 50% welcome bonus on your first deposit. Bet Online, your online sportsbook experts, promo code Locked On, all one word. Now back to Locked On Mariners. Here once again is your host, D.C. Lundberg. Thank you again, J.M. We don't have a whole lot of time for this final segment today on Locked on Mariners, but that's okay. Today is the anniversary of the first ever Major League Baseball game at Safeco Field, occurring on this date, July 15, 1999. Prior to the game, the Seattle Symphony Orchestra held a kind of mini concert with a ceremonial opening of the roof.

Also, prior to the game, there was a mystery ceremonial first pitch pitcher. No one knew who it was. And in fact, the person who threw the first pitch didn't know until it was. being announced by Tom Huttler on the public address system. I think it was either Harold Reynolds or Alvin Davis who handed Dave Nehouse a baseball and just said to him, You're it and told him to go out to the mound with a baseball. And it was at that time that Mr. Nehouse learned that he was going to be the one

to throw the ceremonial first pitch in Safeco Field history. And I cannot think of somebody, I cannot think of a better choice to throw that first pitch. As far as the game went, Kilvio Varus of the San Diego Padres was the first batter to step into the box at Safeco Field. And he was opposed by Jamie Moyer, and the first pitch was a called strike. Mr. Varus grounded out to Moyer on the very next pitch, and then the Padres number two hitter, Eric Owens, hit a single for the very first hit in Safeco Field history. In the bottom of the first, Mariners' lead-off hitter, David Bell, collected the first hit by a Mariner in Safeco Field history, hitting a double

off Andy Ashby with a full count. The first run in Safeco Field history was scored in the top of the third inning. Kilville Varus led off with the single, was Sacrifice Bunted along to second base by Eric Owens. Reggie Sanders struck out, and then Phil Nevin hit a single, which scored Varus from second base for Saco Field's first run. The first Mariners runs were scored in the bottom of the eighth. With two outs, Dan Wilson doubled to right field and was immediately driven in by David Bell on a double of his own. That was off starting pitcher Andy Ashby, and he was then replaced by Heath Murray, who allowed a double to David Sagi to score Bell. That meant that the Mariners had a two to one lead going into the top of the ninth inning and out from the

bullpen to try to preserve this historic win, Jose Mesa. And Jose Mesa being Jose Mesa, walked the lead-off hitter Ruben Rivera, who then stole second base. It did not matter because he also walked pinch hitter John VanderWall and then walked pinch hitter Ed Giavanola to load the bases. Pinch hitter Dave Magidon was next, and he struck out. Mr. Magadon was known as a contact-hitting machine, but he was at the end of his career and couldn't get the job done here. Kilvio Varus was up again with the bases loaded and only one out, and Mesa put him on base via the base on balls, driving in Rivera with the tying run to a chorus of booze. Lou Panella had seen enough, and he went back to the bullpen to get Paul Abbott to face Eric

Owens, who would hit a sacrifice fly to score Vanderwal. Reggie Sanders grounded out to end the inning, but not before the Padres had scored two runs to take the lead. And ordinarily, in this era, you'd see Trevor Hoffman trotting out of that bullpen to try to save the game, but he didn't warm up in time. So Dan Miss Selly came out of the Padres bullpen to try to lock up the historic first game in Safeco Field history, and he had to get through Edgar Martinez, J.B. Buhner and Butch Husky.

He fanned Edgar and got both Buna and Husky to ground out, so he earns the save in Safeco Field's first ever game. A 3-2 win for the San Diego Padres. Winning pitcher is Will Canane, losing pitcher Jose Mesa. Mariners would lose the next day as well with a 2-1 score. Former Mariners Sterling Hitchcock pitching up, picking up the win, pardon me, for the Padres. Trevor Hoffman earning the save.

in that one. Incidentally, that was the Mariners' seventh loss in a row, but that losing streak would be stopped the next day when the Mariners beat the Padres 9 to 1 in Safeco Field's third game. Freddie Garcia picked up the victory in that one, and Mariners' third baseman Russ Davis hit the first home run in Safeco Field history, pardon me, a fifth inning blast off the Padres, Woody Williams. Tomorrow, Taylor Blake Ward will join me to talk a little Angels baseball ahead of the Mariners three game series in Anaheim, which begins tomorrow night. In addition, I will have an announcement on some changes that will be coming to this program here in a couple of weeks.

Also joining me tomorrow will be Emily Hartley, Sergeant Floyd Pepper, and a weed whacker. Please remember to download and follow Locked-on Mariners. Look for us on any podcasting app you can happen to think of. Leave a rating and review with your podcasting app of choice so allows. and remember to check out the other great programs here on the Locked-on Podcast Network. I'm D.C. Lundberg, again, sorry that this episode is as late as it is, but at least it's not going to be published during the Meritor's game, which I've actually had to do before.

And in case, I'll talk to you tomorrow, gang, and I really hope that it's published on time. But I'm feeling okay now, so I think it will be. And I'm also rambling, which I apologize for, so I'm just going to shut up. Get all the sports news you need in under 20 minutes with the Locked On Today podcast. Host Peter Bukowski will keep you updated on the latest news, in every major sport with Locked On's team of local experts. Follow the Lockdown Today podcast on the Odyssey app or wherever you get podcasts. This is Joey Martin speaking for Locked on Mariners, part of the Locked On podcast network.