Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - M's Tee Off in Arlington/Prospect Talk With Aram Leighton (Part the Second)

Episode Date: August 11, 2020

The Mariners hang 10 runs on the Rangers, while also pitching well -- both starting pitcher Justin Dunn and the Bullpen. D.C. talks about this impressive game. Then, the second portion of D.C.'s conversation with Aram Leighton speaking about the Mariners top prospects. Today, Logan Gilbert & Evan White are discussed. 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.

Welcome to Locked-on Mariner's, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Here's your host, D.C. Lundberg. Well, that sure was a fun game. Welcome to Locked-on Mariner's, ladies and gentlemen. This is kind of a special. DC is homesick with stomach issues edition of Locked-on Mariners, but we're still part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. You can download, rate, and subscribe to this program, or any Tlopin program on Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher Radio,

or whichever podcasting app that you personally care to use. Ask your smart device to play Locked-on Mariners podcast or any Tloffin program. Follow this show on Twitter at L-O-O-U-U-Skourner's, and follow me on Twitter at D.C. underscore Lundberg, L-U-N-D-B-E-R-G for those scoring at home. Well, the Mariners teed off in Arlington at their brand-new stadium, globular life, whatever it is. It's the new ballpark in Arlington. so sick of corporate names, there's no continuity.

So it's the Rangers Stadium. I don't give a damn who sponsors the name. In any case, we'll get to that game momentarily, but before we do that, I want to remind you that in the second half of today's program, we will have part two of our conversation with Aram Layton of Locked-on MLB prospects talking about the Mariners Farm System.

Before the game, first of all, the Rangers had had the roof closed. They got a retractable roof on that thing, and they had had the roof closed for all of their home games, thus far. They had asked the Mariners if it was okay to open the roof to see if the ball would fly farther. Well, guess what, gang? It did, and

the Rangers were not the beneficiary of this, the Mariners were. The Rangers had not been one of the better offensive teams in the American League thus far, and that trend kind of continued last night. But let's give props where props are due, and that is to Justin

Dunn, the meritor's starting pitcher. He goes six innings, allows seven hits two runs, both of them earned, three walks, he's got to kind of keep that down, two strikeouts. He got in a couple of mini jams, as did Justice Sheffield on Sunday. But just like Justice Sheffield, he was able to escape from those jams with, you know, pretty minimal damage. None of the endings spiraled out of control, and that is what had been happening to the starting pitchers and the bullpen as well. But like I said, six innings, two runs, very good numbers for Justin Dunn. The three walks are kind of concerning to me.

something that he has to work on. But on the other hand, he does earn his first major league win. And the Mariners muster 15 hits against Ranger pitching and only strikeout five times the whole ballgame. Six of those hits, by the way, three of them were home runs and three of them were doubles. So the Mariners notch more extra base hits than they do strikeouts, which is pretty cool.

Rangers got the scoring started underway in the first inning. on a Willie Calhoun triple. Mariners answered back in the top of the third inning on an RBI single from Dylan Moore. In the bottom of the third, Willie Calhoun again, Sacrifice Fly, and then the Mariners gets serious. Top of the fifth inning, Kyle Lewis up with two on, home run time.

First of three on the day, not for Lewis, but for the Mariners. And his fourth on the season. Moving into the top of the sixth inning, Dylan Moore hits an RBI single. Then Kyle Seeger comes up with the bases loaded and sends Grandma to the kitchen to grab the rye bread and the mustard for the first grand slam in the short history of that stadium, his third home run of the season, and his fifth career salami.

This broke the game open and gave the Mariners a 9-2 lead. Mariners would tack on one more on the top of the seventh inning on a Dylan Moore home run to center field, and that sucker was crushed, ladies and gentlemen, 430 feet. In addition, that was Moore's fourth home run of the season. He's got as many home runs as Kyle Lewis does, ladies and gentlemen. His bat has been hot lately. Tim Lopes started off with a hot bat and he's cooled down and Dylan Moore seems to have

picked up where Lopes left off. And as I said at the top of the show, Mariners achieved 15 hits in this game. Every single member of the Mariners starting lineup got at least one hit. The struggling Daniel Vogelback went one for five with a double. Kyle Seeger went two for five. Kyle Lewis, three for five. J.P. Crawford, two for five with a walk. Dylan Moore, three for four with two walks.

And Lewis also checked in with a walk of his own. Shedlong Jr. one for three with two walks. Very impressive showing for the Mariners on the offensive side of the ball. Again, only striking out five times. Well, they walked six times, five strikeouts, six extra base hits as opposed to those five strikeouts. Very good day for the Mariners offense. And very good day for the pitchers, too.

We mentioned Justin Dunn's line. Six innings, seven hits, two runs, both of them earned. The three walks, which is a little concerning. Two strikeouts. Anthony Meseevich pitched a scoreless inning, struck out two. Matt and Miguel's scoreless inning. And Taylor Gilbo was scoreless inning with a walk and a strikeout. Mariners' bullpen does their thing.

Has a very effective three innings, three scoreless innings at that, which is kind of an unusual performance for them this season. They have not really been doing that good of. a job. I believe they're renting number 27 in the American League and earned run average or somewhere along those lines. And they took a hit before the ball game as the famous star was placed on the disabled list with a forearm strain. Does not look too serious. He probably will be back after those 10 days. But Carl's Jr. was put on the injured list and he'll be out of action for 10 days. And the worst news is that Brian Shaw was the guy called up

from the alternate training site to replace him. he of the 27.00 ERA, who just looked terrible in his first stint at the big league level this season. No wonder Colorado dumped him like they did. But hopefully he can turn it around. Maybe he worked on some things at the alternate training site. Maybe he's not leaving balls over the plate. Maybe his controls improved. Let's wait and see.

I hope. I'm not optimistic, but I can hope. Mariners trivia question for the day. We'll give Justin Dunn some love for his. this trivia question as we did Justice Sheffield on the day he got his first Major League win, and I'll ask the same question in which round was

Justin Dunn drafted. And I'll give you the answer to that question after this from CBDMD. It doesn't matter if you're a professional athlete, stay at home parent, spend eight hours a day in an office chair, whatever you do, gang, everyone needs support to make it through the day. Luckily, our friends at

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Once again, CBDMD.com promo code locked on MLB, three different words, locked on, and then MLB, for 25% off your purchase of superior CBD oil products from CBDMD. Answer to the trivia question, Justin Dunn was originally drafted in the 37th round in 2013 by the Dodgers, but he did not sign. And then in 2016, he was drafted in the 3rd. first round by the New York Mets. He was then traded by the New York Mets with Gerson-Bautista,

Jay Bruce, and Anthony Swarzac, oh, and Jared Kelmick, so there's the big piece of the deal. And the Mariners sent Robinson Kanoe and his inflated contract and his PEDs, along with Edwin Diaz and cash. So with Edwin Diaz kind of struggling as a Met last season and Robinson Kano being Robinson Kano, if the prospects turn out of Dunn and Kelnick really turned out to be good players and the Mariners clearly got the better side of that offer,

even though I hated the deal at the time. My opinion is changing on that. One thing that I failed to mention yesterday, if you've got a question for me or I'll comment on the show, send an email to Lockdown Mariners at gmail.com, and I'll read it on the air and reply to it as part of the Friday mailbag segment. I've gotten a few emails, one of them from a fellow in Connecticut. So hello to New England, and we will answer that question,

and the other questions that I've gotten on Friday. More Locked on Mariners after the following. Welcome back to Locked on Mariners. Once again, your host, D.C. Lundberg. Thank you once again, J.M. We are going to go right into part two of our conversation with Aram Layton from Locked-on MLB prospects. We left off last time talking about Logan Gilbert.

I'm going to pick it up just a couple of minutes before we left off to set up the second part of the conversation. Enjoy it. talking about Gilbert specifically, he does have a full season of minor league ball under his belt. 26 starts at three different levels last season, 135 innings pitched with a 2-1-3-ERA and a whip under one. That looks encouraging to me. Yeah, and I think what looks encouraging the most is the fact that the Mariners were so confident in a first-year player there, excuse me, that they were comfortable after five starts in West Virginia to move him up to High A.

after just 12 starts there and where he was dazzling, then they move him up to double A. I mean, that's really quick to move a pitcher to three levels in one year in their first professional season, really. That speaks volumes to how much they think he is advanced and how mature he is on the mound. I think the big thing for Gilbert, too, is he is always able to, if he's not striking guys out,

he gets weak contact. And that's what he did even at AA. He got a lot of weak contact, held opponents to, under a 200 batting average. With that 95 around mile per hour fastball and a good changeup, you mix in the slider and you've already got a pitcher with three major league pitches and good command. Right now, his floor is probably a three or four starter

with a chance to be a legitimate number two if he can make one of those two pitches, the slider or the change up, a plus pitch, which I don't think he's far from doing. And speaking more to his minor league numbers, I was looking at them as you were speaking, going from Advanced A Modesto to AA, Arkansas. You know, there was a little bit of a jump in an ERA, but at high A was 173. His whip was actually lower in AA.

It was still under one. 6.1 hits per nine innings talking about the weak contact, which I much prefer pitchers, who will induce weak contact rather than people who will just blow people away. I personally feel like it's far more interesting to watch that. watching a pitcher just be fuddle hitters rather than just, you know, blowing them out left and right. And the strikeout numbers, they did go from 14.3 strikeouts per nine in single A. And they were about 10, 10.10 and a half per nine innings at both advanced A and double A. That's still pretty good.

Oh, it's great. And that's the thing is sometimes people are a little bit put off by the little downtick or uptick in the numbers, whether you're talking about ERA or batting average for an offensive player, or a pitcher. But the thing is, when they're dominating to that degree in A ball, you're not going to be able to match that. And the reality was he's just way more advanced than anybody in that league in high A ball, even though he was over a year younger than the average player out there. So that's why the Mariners realized that, quickly moved him up. And once he got to double A, I'd say he had a little bit of a wake-up call in the beginning, but quickly settled in. when the whips below won and you're on average about two years younger than your competition,

which means you're not trying to be too perfect. He didn't try to, you know, nip the corners and was worried about giving up the home run. Like he attacked hitters and he only walked 15 and 50 innings. And that's just a testament to the fact that he's not afraid to go right at hitters, even in his first professional season and even in a chance where he's in the third league in his first year after getting moved up twice. he's not afraid of competition if you watch him he's surgical with his pitchers he goes right after hitters and that's why i really am high on this kid he's he's not afraid of anything and i'm not saying that

all pitchers up there are you know cowering when they get moved up but this is a guy that was a mid-major pitcher and jumps straight into pro ball and hits the ground running no matter where you put him all the way up to double a now there's reason to believe that he could get a chance to crack the rotation at some point this year if the mariners need it that's fantastic that's fantastic. He is, all three pictures I mentioned, by the way, ladies and gentlemen, are at the alternate trading site in Tacoma because, you know, there's no minor league baseball this year, unfortunately, which makes us in Spokane very unhappy because we don't get to watch our Spokane Indians. I would also like to bring up, you mentioned that they're kind of advancing

Gilbert, or they did last year. Through the system pretty quickly, the Mariners are not really afraid to do that. They thought so much of Evan White, who was at AA last year, that they gave a a major league contract. And they said, you're the starting first baseman now, Evan, and they let him go. Yeah, and I was really excited to see what Evan White can do. I'm still excited to see what he can do,

and I wouldn't be too discouraged by his slow start here. You know, it's only been 51 at-bats, I believe. Oh, yeah. He's been struggling. There's no way around that. I mean, 24 strikeouts and 51-at-bats is pretty tough. But, you know, this is a weird year, and you're seeing some of the best hitters in the game struggle,

because of the weird circumstances. There's so many moving parts and just thrown out of your rhythm. It's one thing to have to make your debut and be a rookie in the major leagues against all the best players in the world. Now you consider all of the craziness going on. Some people react differently than others. But when you look at some of the best players in the game right now, whether it's Christian Yellich, whether it's Cody Bellinger. Ronald Acuna was struggling for a good bit of time there. There's a lot of really good players.

Chris Bryant was struggling for a while too. I don't think it's a coincidence. I think some players are more rattled and more affected by the circumstances than others. And Evan White may be one of those people. Maybe he just started a little bit slow. I wouldn't jump to conclusions on him. Maybe he wasn't quite ready. You know, if there was a minor league season this year, I'm sure he would have had a little bit more time to get some seasoning.

And that might be a little bit of the reason why he's struggling. Because you mentioned, they were aggressive with him. He only played 92 games in AA last. year. So it's not like he was just sitting down there for a while and ready to go. He had a great year in those 92 games. I mean, 18 home runs is ridiculous. The power is undeniable. His glove is fantastic. I'm not worried about it. At the very least, you know, you know that he got his feet wet this year and he can come back next year with a clean slate and get ready to go. It's just frustrating when it's such a small or short season rather that maybe right by the time he gets

going, the season's going to be over, and that's part of what you have to deal with, given the circumstances. But if I don't know what the vibe is with Mariners fans right now, I haven't been able to see, but if they're worried about Evan White, I would say, don't be. He'll be just fine. Yeah, I'm not, I'm not sure anybody's really worried about him. I'm not worried about him either. I mean, like you just said, it's just a slow start.

And if there was a minor league season, he may have been sent back down to double A or AAA to AAA to get some more seasoning, but that's not possible. The other part of it is, this is such a weird season. there is no reason to send him down. Let's continue to help him develop at the Major League level, and he will be fine eventually, and they brought this up on the television side on the Mariners broadcast, that even when he's struggling at the plate,

one thing he'll always be able to rely on is his glove, because he is a potential Gold Glove Award winner in the future at first base. Oh, yeah. I mean, I can't see, remember the last time I've seen a 70-grade slapped on a first baseman defensively. It's pretty rare to see MLB pipeline or some of these other prospect outlets be so high on a first baseman, but he has a 70-grade glove out there, and maybe he can even play multiple positions if that situation ever demanded it. But the fact that, as you mentioned, you have a gold glove caliber first baseman, it does, it's a little bit unfortunate for him because

at first base, you're going to have to hit no matter how good of a fielder you are. Exactly. That's the fact of the matter. So he's going to have to hit, but it does take a little bit of the pressure off at least when you do take into account that he is one of the better defensive first baseman probably in all of baseball right off the bat the second he gets to the big league. So I'm not too worried about him. As you said, the glove will always play. But unfortunately, he's going to have to hit well too because first base is a premium power and production position. Oh, it is. And I'm not worried about his offense, you know, going forward because I think he is, I think he is going to hit going forward. If he didn't throw left-handed, he'd probably make a great third baseman.

Yeah, absolutely. When you're that good at first, and he's big, he's burly, but he can move well enough to probably play third. He maybe even be able to play a corner outfield position down the line. You never know. It just really depends how well he moves, but he doesn't move badly at all. He's actually pretty darn fast for how big he is. The corner out isn't out of the question either. And that's the thing. The versatility should work in his favor and just get the bats under his belt. And I do like Evan White.

I thought he was a dark horse for rookie of the year. I think that ship has obviously sailed. Oh, yeah. But that's no big deal. You know, that's just one award, and he can bounce back next year and have a really solid season. He can still salvage this year.

And there's a lot of other prospects like Kyle Lewis who are making up for it and having really, really exciting debuts. We will have part three of that conversation tomorrow in the second half of the program once again. And tomorrow in the first half, we will be joined by guest panelists, Herb Tarlack, Gonzo, and a trash compactor. Download rate and subscribe to Lockdown Mariners, so you never miss an episode, particularly this one. That's going to be a great conversation.

Apple Podcasts, Google, Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, whichever podcast, again, that you personally care to use. Follow this show on Twitter so you know what's coming up at L.O. underscore Mariners, and follow me on Twitter as well at D.C. underscore Lundberg. That'll do it for today, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much for listening. Have a great Tuesday afternoon, and we will be back here tomorrow. This is Joey Martin speaking for Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network.