Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - The Seattle Mariners' Rotation NEEDS Deeper Starts, Better Health in 2026

Episode Date: February 25, 2026

Ty and Colby continue their 2026 season preview with a look at the Mariners starting pitching, giving their thoughts on the upcoming seasons for Logan Gilbert, George Kirby, Bryan Woo, Bryce Miller, Luis Castillo, Kade Anderson, and more. Click to vote for Round 1 of our Top 50 Mariners Moments Tournament! Click to learn more about the Everydayer Club! Join the Ahoy, Sailors Discord server! Check out our Patreon! Follow the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @TyDaneGonzalez | @CPat11 Follow the show on Bluesky: @lockedonmariners | @tdg | @mlbcolby Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Turbo Tax For a limited time, you can have your taxes done by a local TurboTax expert for just $150 — all in, if a TurboTax expert didn’t file for you last year. Just file by February 28. Take taxes off your plate and get back to your life.  Visit https://TurboTax.com/local to book your appointment today.  Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast FanDuel Use your Profit Boost on an NBA future and get entered for your chance to win a trip to the NBA Finals. Play your game with FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. Visit https://FANDUEL.COMto 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) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Injuries dominated the conversation around the Mariners' rotation in 2025, but they've also been a much different group on the road than at home for a while now. So what gives? And what does that mean for 2026? We'll discuss coming up here on the Locked-on Mariner's podcast. Colby, hit it. You are Locked-on Mariners. Your daily Seattle Mariners podcast. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day.

Ahoy, Sailors. it is Wednesday, February 25th, 2026. You're listening to the Lockdown Marrars Podcasts, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, now the number one sports podcast network. My name is Tadda Gonzalez. I'm joined, as always, by my co-coast, Colby Patnode. We're two lifelong Marys fans who've been covering the team for over half a decade. And today, we're continuing our 2026 season preview with a look at the

Marin starting rotation and give our thoughts on, of course, Brian Wu, Logan Gilbert, George Kirby, Louise Castillo, Bryce Miller, as well as Kate Anderson and more. But before we do that, just want to quickly apologize for some technical issues that we had to deal with, unfortunately, yesterday. Apparently, as far as I'm aware, there was a glitch that affected all or at least most of the locked-on shows. And we were unfortunately one of those shows that were affected.

And so our episode yesterday didn't get uploaded to Spotify and Apple and all those podcast platforms immediately. I know that it's up now. I don't know exactly when it finally went up, but hopefully you've been able to listen to that episode. If you haven't, though, it's a really fun episode. We go over round one of our top 50 Mariners moments bracket. And we would love for you to also participate in that. If you haven't already, just hit the link in the description of that episode,

either on YouTube or on your preferred podcast platform. But I believe everything is fixed now, but just wanted to say sorry for that if you were. obviously, you know, excited to listen to a new episode at the time that you usually listen to it. And hopefully you're able to do that with this one. Hopefully, if you're listening to it, that means that that is the case. Anyway, all right, let's get into our starting rotation preview, Colby. And I want to talk about the Mariners rotation as a whole here real quick.

I want to look at the, you know, broader picture first and foremost before we talk about these guys individually. So the last couple of years, it's been a tale of two rotations for the Mariners. At home, for the most part, they've been fantastic. They've been dominant. They've been one of, if not the best rotation in all of baseball. On the road, though, this past year, they finished 17th and FIPP. The year before that, they were 16th in FIP, and that's after being fourth in Road FIPP in 2023. So,

what gives what do you think this maybe says about the marron's rotation and isn't fair at this point to wonder if maybe we've overrated them based on how well they've pitched at T-Mobile Park specifically and obviously we know how how much that ballpark benefits

pitching in general yeah I mean it's possible I think the really tough thing is to judge last year's rotation just because you know four of them missed time.

And notice how they still won the division and went to the LCS. Imagine that. But anyways, some of you guys know what I'm talking about. It's tough to judge them. Like they didn't take a step forward. So it was like, is 2025 and proof that 2024 is real or is 2024 the outlier? And the injuries are what caused it to look more like 2024 than 2025, blah, blah, blah. You know, in general, we know that, like, Luis Castillo is very good at Team Mobile Park and not very good on the road.

Like, and that makes sense because you look at the stuff and you kind of look at the type of pitcher he is, it would make sense for him to be better at Team Mobile Park. But yeah, I think in general, in terms of like, are we overlooking the, are we overrating these guys? Maybe because our assumption has always been that these guys will get better from, you know, the time we saw them to now. And reality, you know, four of the guys got worse last year. Kirby, Gilbert, Castillo, and Miller. Now, Miller had the most serious of the injuries. It affected him pretty much all year, as we know.

But Kirby missed all of spring training in, like, the first month, and Logan missed a month. And Luis was still pretty good. I mean, he regressed a little bit, but not as much as people seem to think. And so he continues to be a little bit underrated. but he's still rock solid. But yeah, he's not what he was two, three years ago. And so you kind of end up in a spot where it's like, yeah,

we thought we had this great rotation before these guys get hurt. They're just a little less effective when they come back. And, you know, that's just the reality of something you have to deal with. And even Wu definitely, you know, got better. But even he missed crucial time because unfortunately the, what was it, the peck? It was a peck strain or whatever. Yeah. That cropped up at the absolute worst possible time.

and that impacted him in the playoffs as he wasn't really able to go all that much. So, yeah, it's tough to say how much of, you know, how much of last year is just them getting back to they were in 2024. And how much of that is like, no, they were actually going to be at the 2023 cells. It's just, you know, you had a shoulder injury that cost you six weeks. You had an elbow injury that cost him six weeks. You had bone spurs that sporadically, you know, cost Bryce weeks at a time. And he was never really all that effective. and then obviously Wu misses the playoffs essentially because of his late season peck injury.

So, you know, it's one of those things where it's like it's really hard to judge, you know, because 2024 technically could still be the outlier of, you know, how they perform on the road. Because like you said, in 2023, they were really good. Now, different rotation, you know, different skill sets at that time. So it's really tough to say, I don't know. If they're overrated, maybe we've. we've overrated them based on their ceiling more so than what they've actually produced. But I still think they're a top, you know, top three or four rotation in the American League.

And overall, they're top 10 in baseball. You know, I think, I think you would say the Dodgers rotation is probably better. I think you would say the, the Phillies rotation is probably better. But after that, you know, maybe the healthy Yankees rotation, but they're not healthy. Like, they're not healthy right now, not hypothetically not healthy. They're not healthy right now. And so we don't know how that. Look, obviously the Astros rotation took a step back.

The Rangers rotation certainly has some dogs at the top and some really high upside guys. But, you know, three, four, five, still a bit of a question mark there. So I don't know if the Mariners Road woes are proven at this point just because it's hard to really glean anything from 2025 because of the injuries. But, yeah, I mean, obviously they're going to be better at home. A, it's a great ballpark to pitch in. but also be most players are better in their home ballpark because they get to go home at the end of it. They get their normal life, right? They get to be around things that are familiar.

They don't have to worry about all the things that go with being on the road. So it's not all that uncommon for players to perform better in their home stadium. But yeah, obviously a big factor of that is that Team Mobile Park is such a good stadium to pitch in. And you get away with a lot more mistakes than you do when you're pitching in, you know, Boston or New York. So, yeah. it's a good question. I'm just not quite sure how to answer it yet because I think it is easy to be like, you know,

they were 16th this year and 17th last year. And it's like, okay, but they were hurt this year. So, I mean, that doesn't mean they're not going to get hurt this year, but I'm not sure.

I'm not 100% sure what causes it. But I think it's a fair question to ask. So Colby, a term that we often use on the show is swing player, which is to essentially signify a player that's going to have such a great impact on the club depending on how either good or bad they'll be. And for the mayor's rotation, I don't think you have to look any further than Logan Gilbert for that. Gilbert in 2025 in some ways was actually at his best.

You know, 11.89 case per nine, that is by far a career high for him. 295 X-FIP. That's a career low for him. In other ways, though, it was a significantly regressive year for him. You mentioned him as one of those four guys that got worse. in 2025 and i agree with that despite you know some of the strides that he made in in other areas of his game specifically because and this is a sentence that i uttered a lot over the course of 2025 i'm sure you know a lot of you remember me saying this very often when talking about logan go

he struggled mightily to put guys away in a timely fashion that ballooned his pitch count and therefore he wasn't able to get deep into games with any sort of regularity On opening day, he went seven innings against the A's great. That's a little in Gilbert, we all know and love, right? But then from that point forward, he went five, five and two thirds, five, four and two thirds. And then eventually three, that's when that started against the Marlins was cut short. And he went on the IL with his elbow issue. And, you know, we were a bit worried about what that could have meant.

You know, we did, you know, utter the words, Tommy John at a couple points in time over the course of his IL stent. Fortunately, he was able to make it back on June 16th against the Red Sox, and he was able to stick in the rotation for the remainder of the season from that point forward. But he didn't go more than five innings until more than five and a third innings until July 22nd when he went six and a third against the Brewers. And he didn't go any further than that in any start from that point forward. He went six and a third again against the Orioles. That's the deepest he went into a game after opening day.

And those issues continued on into the postseason as well. You know, I'm looking at his game log right here. I'm seeing a lot of five flat, five and a third, four and two third. There's even a two-winning start here. That was that Philly start. That was just an absolute disaster. I think we all remember that. It was just very unlike Logan Gilbert in that way.

Logan's been a very dependable starter, not just in terms of posting, but also, you know, being able to get deep into games with consistency. So the key in 2026 for Logan Gilbert, very clear. Get deeper into the games. Take pressure off of your bullpen and do that with consistency. Be that dependable starter that you have been in the past. Yeah, you can't be the staff ace if you're going five innings, 75% of you. of the time. You just, you can't do it. And the pressure that puts on your bullpen, you know, particularly when, you know, Bryce is, is having the type of year that he was having last year,

that George was also having some similar issues, getting quick, efficient innings as well. It just, it creates too big of a load on the arms of the, on the bullpen. And that's why you end up with four guys having to cover as many innings as they did, because, you know, the bullpen wasn't all that deep and you know you just felt like you had to use the same four guys over and over again and they caught up with them at the end of the year and so you know a big part of this is like yeah adding for air will but what would really help is logan gilbert going back to throwing the 200 innings we know he can uh and you know staying healthy and and pushing six seven inning starts on the regular and the five inning starts becoming the outliers rather than the norm and logan has to get there i mean

it's really that simple um you know you want to get paid the big bucks you want to be the a $35, $40 million a year arm that you think you are, you can't do it by throwing five innings a night. Nobody's going to pay that money for five innings a night. So it's a big year for Logan. We know that an extension may be on deck or at the very least he's getting ready for free agency. But again, five innings 30 times a year, ain't going to cut it.

You got to be that dog. You got to go six and seven innings on the regular. And if that means you have to sacrifice some of the strikeouts to do it, so be it. figure it out. Yeah, in general, the stuff just wasn't as good in 2025 either. He had some issues, you know, landed in the slider specifically, you know, left a few of those over the, yeah, left a few of those over the plate as well, you know, just trying desperately to throw that pitch for strikes.

So, you know, we'll see. And he's made a little bit of a tweak, according to him, something that he says probably isn't noticeable, but it's stuff to do with his core and his posture. So hopefully that that leads to, you know, better success for him as well and keeping him, you know, fresher as well. But, you know, I'm looking at his game log from 2024 and, you know, he went eight, you know, plus four times. He went seven a bunch of times in 2024.

Like that's the guy that we know Logan Gilbert can be. That's the guy that he needs to be in 2026. All right. We'll talk about the rest of the rotation in just a moment. But first a reminder, this episode of the long time air is brought to you by TurboTex. Look, y'all, tax season doesn't have to take over your life, all right? Because this year, TurboTax is making it easier than ever to just hand things off and move on with your day. With TurboTax full service, you can have your taxes done for you by a trusted local expert, start to finish, without the stress or guesswork.

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Locktime Podcast Network, your team every day. Thank you so much for making. your first listen for all things, Mariners, and also thank you for making the lockdown the number one sports podcast network. Baseball is back, and you can lock in by joining the Every Day or Club, which gets you add free episodes and access to our group chat on Discord. For the next week or so, you can use the promo code spring.

That's SPR-I-N-G for a free month. Go to lockdown mariners.com or tap the link in the description to learn more. Also in the description, you can now vote for round one of our top 50 Mariners Moments tournament. We launched that yesterday. That link is in the description, both here on YouTube and on podcast platforms. So be sure to check that out and make sure the link is there.

And then all you have to do is just click that, hit a few buttons, submit. That's it. It's just like our Mariners fan survey that we did. And Colby, we have, I think you told me before we hit record on this thing, 350-ish submissions already. I think so, so long ago, who can remember. Right. But 363 as we are recording this might be more by the time you guys are hearing this.

Right. But yeah, 363 so far. That's a pretty good sample rate. And we've got some matchups that are tight and some other matchups that are tightening. So I want to get over there and vote to make sure your favorite actually advances to round two. But, yeah. It's been a good first day, which a little surprising considering that most of our podcast listeners didn't get to listen to their episode until today, hopefully. Go back and listen to it, guys. It's a lot of fun. We went through the whole bracket. And, you know, just kind of gave you some background on the process and all that. If you guys are curious, so go listen to yesterday's episode. And also there's a video that shows each of the moments we're talking about in case you guys are our descriptions aren't clear enough. You can go and actually watch the moments. So that will be linked in the description down below as well.

So yeah, make sure you vote. Tell your friends to vote. Pick your battles, pick your sides. And let's see, because I got to tell you, man, there is one matchup right now that is separated by about 10 boats out of 360 casts. So things are getting interesting. But there's still time for you to sway the results because we will not close the voting on this until Monday morning. And then we will start prepping for round two.

Yeah. I'll just say this. you know if you want to see victor rubles's great catch against the astros move on or maybe you know felix's final start move on you you might want to you might want to get on that yeah yeah yeah you might want to get on that yeah all right so getting back into our starting rotation preview here let's let's talk about brian woo career year by all accounts for brian wu unfortunately ended on a sour note with him being unable to finish the year and being unable to start for the merriors in the post season due to you to the pectoral strain or whatever exactly the issue was for him. But he was an all-star. He essentially established himself as one of the 10-ish best starters in all of baseball. Finished what, six, I think in A.L. Syung voting fifth. I think.

Six. Yeah, somewhere in there. I'll double check that. I'll double-check that in a second here. But it was either way, either way, you want to slice it. Fantastic year for Brian Wu. you know again unfortunate that it ended on kind of a sour note but you have to be feeling great about woo going into 2026 right yeah i mean it's it's kind of funny we talk a lot about

uh guys when their prospects and we're like yeah i mean he's got a fastball but you can throw you can't throw you know only a fastball because these are major league hitters eventually they'll hit it and brian woo kind of tests that theory a little bit because he throws his four seamer and his two seamer like 75, 80% of the time. And he's one of the best pitchers in the American League. And so, you know, I don't know what he was fifth, by the way. I don't know like what's left for him to really prove. I mean, I guess getting through a whole season without getting dinged up.

But I mean, he basically did last year. Just again, it happened at the worst possible time. You know, he goes deep into games. He throws strikes. He gets whiffs. He gets strikeouts. He's just, he's good. He's a very good pitcher.

Like, is there a way. you can take another step forward. Sure, I mean, I guess it's a slider or sweeper, whatever he's calling it these days, if that could take another step, if you can get a little bit more command on that, maybe a little bit more break on that pitch. Sure, that would help. Or I guess you could add a cutter or change up something to help them against lefties. But you really found that front hip two seamer last year.

And that was just an absolute weapon. When you front hips it to lefties, that's my favorite pitch in the entire rotation. It really is. I mean, look, Brian Wu, he throws strikes, quality strikes. He gets tremendous value out of both of his fastballs. He can locate them in all four quadrants of the zone. And just being able to do that gives you such a high floor that it's basically improbable or maybe even impossible. We'll see if you can stay healthy.

That's true. Every picture we talk about over the next two days, if they stay healthy. All right, let's just make that blanket caveat right now. But Wu shouldn't be any worse than a number three just because of how valuable the fastball is and how much how he throw strikes. And his delivery is extremely repeatable. It's not like he's really gone through long bouts where he struggled to throw a bunch of strikes. Like, no, he's just very consistent. And he's going to get guys out with the fastball.

And when you think you can hit his fastball, you can't. He's just going to throw more fastballs. And so that alone gives him the floor of a number three starter. And then again, like we saw last year, he was a number one or a number two for most of the year. and you know we saw the slider sweeper again whatever he's calling it these days take a little bit of a step forward if you can take another step maybe he can finish top three in the sally young or maybe even win the thing but the fastball is alone and the command alone give him a good chance to go out there and go six you know six innings every single time out and and he basically what he did last year yeah the last two years combined Brian Woo has thrown 299 strikeouts to 49 walks. That is insane. That is insane.

Six to one ratio. It's pretty good. That's pretty good. You know, again, like, like you said, we'll say this about every picture that we talk about. That's just kind of like it's like the unspoken thing, right? If they say healthy, if they say healthy, if they say all agree that that's the caveat. So we don't have to say it before every single arm we talk about. Yeah.

It applies a little bit more so to Brian Wood, though, given his history. And, you know, I'm, I'm really interested to see how his body responds. in 2026. He's throwing 186 and two-thirds innings, which is by far the most innings he's ever thrown in his entire life in a season. You know, look,

this guy didn't throw a ton even, even in college, right? So, like, he really has, his arm hasn't been taxed like other guys up to this point in their career.

So how does his body respond to that? And can he do it again? What is the repeat, repeatability? of 2025 for Brian Wu. Yeah, I mean, like, if Wu just is always going to be dinged up, it's not going to be because he's not, like, built to handle the workload.

He is extremely athletic. He works very hard. You know, he's got the size, the strength and all that. Just some guys, you know, get a little bit unlucky. And it just kind of James Paxton, for example. So now Wu has been able to, you know, battle through it more than somebody like James has or was. But yeah, I mean, Mariner's fans aren't too unfamiliar with the ace like stuff of a guy who just constantly feels like they're dinged up. And hopefully Wu is not the next in that line.

But right now, you know, until he gets through a whole season, he basically did last year. It's, again, really sucky that it happened when it happened. But, yeah, I'm pretty confident we will be fine. I think, you know, maybe he's not a guy that you want going 200 innings. and maybe he's a guy that you kind of have to short start every once in a while just to make sure, but you'd much rather have, you know, a healthy Brian Wu in the playoffs and worry about getting him, you know, 28 starts in a row where he goes six innings plus, like, or whatever it was. So we'll see how it goes for him this year. But yeah, I really don't think there's much of a reason to worry about Brian Wu.

Now, another guy that we, we need to at least acknowledge the injuries with is Bryce Miller, Colby, because it was a big part of his story in 2025. Pitching through these loose bodies, these bone spurs and his forearm slash elbow area, he clearly just wasn't the guy that we had come to know and love over the last couple years leading into 2025. This year, you know, he said that he didn't get the surgery to address those loose bodies in the off season, but he feels 100%. And we did start to see him turn the corner in October. You know, he was your worst starter in the regular season.

very well might have been your best in October. The way he pitched in some of the biggest games of the entire year for the Mariners, pitching game one in a hostile environment and Rogers Center, starting that game off, by the way, by giving up a homer to George Springer and then just locking in from that point forward and given the Mariners the chance to win that game

and they ultimately did. We saw some real maturity, some real growth out of Bryce Miller in October, and it essentially came out of left field given the way that his regular, their season has gone. So does that, you know, small sample size, relatively small sample size, inspire enough confidence in you to feel good about Bryce going into 2026? Are you still concerned, given that he hasn't had the surgery and all that? I'm concerned because it just feels like

having loose bodies around those tendons and your elbows is a recipe for disaster at some point. Maybe it's, you know, three years down the line. Maybe it's three months into the season. I don't know. So from that aspect, I'm concerned. And it's also one of those things where it's like, are you always going to think you can pitch through that? And you're just like, oh, we just need two weeks off. And you're just kind of this guy because you try to avoid getting the surgery done. Like those are my concerns with Bryce. If he's healthy, I'm not concerned about Bryce's performance really at all.

I mean, we know who Bryce is. He's going to go deep into games. He's not going to strike out a ton of dudes, but he's going to strike out enough. He's not going to walk anybody. We know how good the splitter is. We know how much value he gets out of the fast. ball at the top of the zone. And we know that he can really spin a couple of breaking balls.

So it's just kind of about finding consistency there. I mean, 2024, Bryce Miller was really good. Deserved more, you know, Sy Young hype than he got. And, you know, the stat I love that I didn't pull up this time. But, you know, it involved people with more innings pitched and lower ERAs than Bryce Miller. And the list was like Garrett Cole, Terrick Scoobel and like Garrett Crochet. Like, it was an insane list.

And so, you know, we know who this guy is. He can eat innings for you. He can give you the low three, high two ERA type of season. And if he's healthy, the floor really does seem like he's going to strike out eight and a half guys per nine. He's going to walk, you know, two and a half, two guys per nine. He's going to have a mid three ERA. And he's just going to be a two and a half three win pitcher.

And that's probably the floor if he's healthy. So, yeah, in terms of like, if you're telling me that the bone spurs aren't going to be an issue at all this year, I'm going to tell you, Bryce Miller's a three, three and a point pitcher this year and I'm going to bank on it and feel really good about it. So I'm not concerned right now about performance. It's just how are those floating bodies that apparently didn't need to be removed? How are they going to impact them? And are they going to crop up at the worst possible time?

And that's always going to be in the back of your head. But, yeah, I'm pretty, I know, I guess you say I'm pretty bullish on Bryce heading into 2025 or 2026, sorry. Coming up next, our thoughts on the 2026 seasons for George Kirby, Louise Castillo. And then we'll also talk about the depth behind this group of five. And just a moment. But first, a reminder, this episode of the Lockdown Marys podcast is brought to you by Indeed. Hiring isn't just about finding someone willing to take the job.

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patreon.com forward slash control the zone. Link in the description of this episode. So let's talk about Luis Castillo, Colby. called him the stabilizer in this rotation for good reason last year because i mean first and foremost he was the only guy out of the five to actually stay healthy from point a to point b problem was on the road he was mostly really bad he greatly contributed to some of those road issues that we talked about at the start of the show but you know towards the end of the year he really locked in he came up with some big time starts again he was the stabilizer in this rotation and uh you know hopefully that continues going into 2026. I'm a little surprised that he's here. I'm not going to lie to you, but

you know, I kind of assumed going into this off season that he was going to get traded, that he was going to get, you know, maybe essentially salary dumped. That didn't happen. And I'm okay with that. I'm glad that that didn't happen because I really like Luis Castillo and I still think that he can be a real big part of this rotation moving forward. Yeah, I mean, look, the guy is just a walking 180 innings of mid-3-ER-a baseball or high-3-ER-a baseball. And is he going to wow people with the stuff anymore? No, is he going to blow fastballs by people? Kind of.

I mean, I know the VILA, everybody's worried about the VLO, but he still gets plenty of whiffs on the four seam where he still gets lots of value out of that pitch. And there's always just, you know, the remote possibility that Luis can, you know, maybe find the change-up he once had or get a little more value out of the slider, tweak that a little bit. Luis is not really a,

or not really known for, you know, tweaking things or anything like that. He just kind of does what he does and the results speak for themselves. So we'll see if there's a wrinkle that he can add. But yeah, you know, he struggles sometimes. You can tell when he's in trouble, when he starts missing glove side. That's a pretty early tell. It usually happens early in a game.

But yeah, I mean, like Louise, look, if I had to bank my week on somebody giving me six and two-third out of this, rotation, I would bank it on Luis, even though it might not look pretty. He'll figure out a way to get it done. And he can certainly still dominate the bad teams and he'll keep you in the game against the really good teams and get an okay postseason. Like, there's still some trust here in this guy. And even though he's probably your fifth best starter, he'd be the number two or three on a, you know, the number two on a couple of teams and the number three on a couple of, you know, actual like playoff contenders. So he's still really good. And I feel like he's kind of in the JP camp where people are overload. looking him and they're rushing to get him out the door. And it's just like, I mean, I get it.

There's exciting young players behind them, but like Luis is still kind of a dog. And you need him and he's the stabilizing force in that rotation. And, you know, when all us fails and all the young arms are banged up and they're trying to figure something out, there goes Luis Castillo. And you know what? He might give you, he might give up four or five runs, but he's going to give you seven innings when you really need it. And he also still occasionally will just absolutely dominate a team with

mostly just the fastball at the top of the zone. And, you know, at Team Mobile Park, there's probably not, I mean, he's probably part of the big four when he's at Team Mobile Park. Like, it becomes a true big five. When you're on the road, you know, you try to work around it. You try to survive that start. But at Team Mobile Park, like, he might be your second best starter if he's pitching at team mobile.

So, like, he sells that upside. Luis, again, just kind of people are being fatigued with consistency. and good performance when they think that, like, elite performance is being blocked when we just can't possibly say that. Luis is got one more year on his deal after this. We'll see if he sticks around. We've been writing him off for the last couple of years because the Velo's been bad and all that. We've been trying to trade him.

And yet he just shows up every year. It gives you 180 innings. And, you know, I think he's missed one start in his Mariners career. And it was at the end of a season that didn't matter. And he would have pitched if it had mattered. and they just like, yeah, we'll just put them on the IL. So durable, consistent, still solid. Like, this guy is exactly what a rotation needs.

And when you have as many, you know, concerns about the rotation as you do on the health perspective, Castillo is exactly what this squad needs. And so I'm happy to see him still here. So George Kirby, lastly, overall, a strange year for George. I'm not going to lie. You know, he starts the year, obviously, you know, on the aisle with the, with a shoulder thing and then he comes back and it's a different george kirby the arm angle is different and he finally you know this is something that a lot of people were asking for he finally kind

of traded off some of the walk rate for more strikeouts 9.79 k's per 9 that's a career high for him career high walk rate though as well first time he ever exceeded two in that regard 2.07 you know it was a career worse year for him er r way. FIP wise though, pretty much in line with this career norm. So 421 ERA but the FIPP 337, it was 3-2-6 a year before that. It was 3-3-4 the year before that. Overall, two and a half win season for George Kirby by Fangraph standards. About a three-win pace if you didn't miss time. Yeah. But I think you and I are both in agreement that we're a bit underwhelmed with what we saw from George Kirby. I feel like George is who he is. We keep on trying to predict the next step and like, oh, he's going to explode this year.

I don't think it's going to happen. I think George is a very good number three and elite number three, or he's a, you know, a low end number two. He's going to throw strikes. He'll miss a good amount of bats, but I don't think we're going to see George become, you know, the two five ERA guy put up the six, seven win season because if it was going to happen, feels like it would have already. And, you know, he keeps tinkering.

He keeps on adding new pitches. He changes things up and the results always end up being roughly the same. And, you know, his big problem last year is that he could get you to O2 pretty quick. He'd get two outs pretty quick. He had a real hard time finishing guys off and he had a real hard time getting out of innings. The number of times he would get two quick outs on eight pitches and then have to throw another 12 to 15 to get out of the inning. It was a lot. I just think Kirby's going to be, you know, mid-3-ERA guy.

He's probably going to give you 180 innings. And he'll have two or three starts where he's just piping fastball down the middle and he loses focus. and he gets mad because somebody didn't make a play behind him and he just kind of whatever. I don't want to be here anymore. And then he'll have games where he's furious George and he's eight innings of 11 K's and, you know, one hit and all even out at the end. And he'll just be really good. Like I don't think George is going to be bad. He's never been bad.

I mean, over the course of an entire season, he's never been bad. He's certainly been bad for moments. But yeah, like George is going to be really good. But is he going to take that next step? Is it going to be the number one that we think he can be? I don't think that's ever going to happen. You know, it's weird because I feel like we actually saw some strides being made in terms of like maturing on the mound and, you know, not letting some things get to him. You know, we talked about this a lot last year when we previewed Kirby's year.

And we said that we would, you know, we wanted to see more maturity out of him in that regard and not, you know, let every little thing that goes wrong to ultimately just. completely derail his starts because it felt like it that had happened in the past and you know there were again like I said there were moments this year where I felt like he actually did that like um I forget exactly what happened it was a start in Anaheim but he didn't get a call that went his way and then it was like bases loaded and you could see like he was a bit frustrated about that but he was actually able to lock in and get out of it I was like okay that's different that's like actual like that's that's growth like he wasn't just like you know he didn't do the thing that that you said where he just starts piping fastballs and it's just like,

we'll see what happens. Yeah, yeah, right? Like, he actually, like, really got into his bag, dug in and got out of it.

But then there is, you know, the Tampa start, you know, down at Steinbreda. Something about pitching in Tampa, by the way, with George Kirby,

something that makes him go off the rails down there. But, the Tampa Bay Area is in Carrie Carpenter. Two things you never want to see George Kirby face. Yeah. And yeah, the playoffs were a bit of a mixed bag as well. Yeah. I don't know.

I just, I'm a bit confused about how I feel about George Kirby right now. And it's possible this could be his last year in Ameris uniform. We haven't acknowledged that yet, but that is a possibility. We talk about a little bit, like why we talk about Logan getting extended and not George and all that. And just kind of the,

not like the bad fit of Kirby with Seattle, but just very clearly it's not the same as it is with Logan and Bryce and Brian. There's a disconnect there. And it's not just us speculating that we've heard that from people who are actually connected. You know, like they're with the team every day. And we can kind of see just with our own eyes. Like, just a little bit different. Just a little bit.

And there's nothing wrong with that. And George, while he's here, he's going to be good. I really don't doubt that George will be good, and I'm not worried about that aspect of it. But yeah, it could be George's last year. We'll see. It might matter if there's an offseason or not because they might not just simply have time to trade him next winter. But yeah, I think George will bounce back to some degree, but I don't think he's going to take that full step forward. If anything, he takes a half step forward to be back where he was in 23 and 24.

I think that's where we're most likely to find George in 26. But, yeah, even last year is worse year. still pretty good still pretty good yeah i mean it was a solid year i definitely think we can get more out of george kirby i'm not saying say young year like i was talking about a couple years ago but like i definitely think there's another year past what he did in in 2025 i hope to see it someday while he's still wearing a mariner's uniform of course well more so what i'm talking about is just more so getting back to who he was the years prior right i think that you know just in terms of what he did in 2025 i think there's a gear above that for kirby for sure

So let's quickly talk about one of the guys that might make the Mariners feel a little bit better about trading George Kirby, whether it's next one or just eventually down the road. That's Kate Anderson, who has taken spring training by Storm so far with what he's done and live BP. We talked about this when they drafted him. He's very advanced. He pitched in the SEC at a very, very, very, very high level for LSU. We didn't think that it was going to take, you know, long for him to start getting into the United States. the conversation of making the rotation. And it seems like we're well on our way to that being the case.

You know, he's going to start the year and probably double A would be my guess. Yeah. I don't think they'll waste their time, you know, waste this time with, with, it'll be double A. Yeah. And, you know, probably midseason, you know, he might be ready for his first taste of major league action. But what are ultimately your expectations for Kate Anderson in 2026?

Yeah, specifically in 2026, you know, it's so much of it is just kind of like learn how to be a big league or and learn how to get big league hitters out. And some of it is just stuff. You'll be able to do that on stuff alone. But other things, you know, you got to set up certain pitches and you have to do things in the first app at bat that set up the second app at and all that. It's knowing when, you know, you can't throw that 3-1 fastball and knowing when you have to take a shot on the 3-1 slider and see if you can get a whiff on it. Like it's just little things like that that you have to pitch and you have to really know who you are as a big leaguer before you can actually go out and execute it over and over and over again. So yeah, I think in general, if Cade has to make, you know, I don't know, 10 starts or whatever, then I think he'll throw strikes. I think he'll be competitive.

I think he'll grind out innings. I don't think he's going to be, you know, Paul Skeen's as a rookie or anything like that. But I think he'll probably be a little better than Logan Gilbert when he came up his rookie year, probably a little better than Bryce and Brian and George, too. I think he is a step above where they were at when they debuted. It's just, you know, he's barely, technically he hasn't played professional baseball yet. So you got to be careful there. But he did throw 130-some-oddnings last year.

So it's not like, you know, he threw 80. And now you've got to kind of baby step them to, you know, 100, 110. Like, no, he could probably go from 130 to 160, depending on. on how they feel. And he, you know, he bulked up a little bit this winter. He's, he's still very skinny, very, like, slight. But he did add some good weight, and that should help him along the way. You've got to be a little bit careful because of the past Tommy John, but what pitcher hasn't had Tommy John in their past. It's really hard to find one. So, yeah, overall, if he does have to come up, I think he'll contribute. I think he'll be a solid contributor. And, you know,

I might have a bold take about him when we get to our bold take episode. So, you know, do you want a little preview now or now we'll save it? We'll save it. Yeah. I mean, it's not even March yet. But, yeah, it's, I think he'll be solid whenever he makes his debut. And then I think he'll build off of that. So I think he'll be a big leaguer.

Like, you're not going to be looking at him like, we look at Emerson Hancock and we're like, sometimes, sometimes, yeah, other times. Right, right. You know, so, yeah, we'll see how it goes. but I think ideally you'd like to not see him make any starts this year. But, you know, we'll see. I don't think it'll be long before he's the number six guy in the Mariners' depth chart. I mean, honestly, it might happen before, you know, the end of April.

It'd be pitching really well in Arkansas. But hopefully you don't need them. But I think we know it. Like, if somebody goes down and they're going to be down for a month, then, you know, Anderson will be on that short list. if somebody goes down and they just need like a spot start, then it'll still be the Diaz, the Hancock's. So he's not the number six in that sense,

but like, you know, if Kirby goes down for a month and they need a guy from May to June, I think they would go to Anderson. I don't think they're going to be that, I don't think they're going to be that cautious in terms of getting them up to the big leagues too early. Now, they lost Logan Evans during the off season to Tommy John. But I think you have to feel better about their depth than, you know, this year than last year.

Because they've added guys like Cooper Chriswell who they might have to stash in the bullpen. Is Emerson Hancock part of the depth or is he part of the bullpen discussion? I don't know. But at the very least, I feel like Chriswell might be ahead of him either way. Should be. And Dane Dunning might be ahead of him. And, you know, Chris Well and Dunning have a lot of major league. starting experience in their past, you know, even for for Dunning who's struggled as of late,

he has, you know, had some success at the major league level. Randy Dobnack has had some major league success in the past. It's been a few years since then. But at the very least, they have some guys who've been there and done that now. Coral Cox's got some upside too. Cole Wilcox has some upside. They have- reliable Casey Lawrence.

You know, very quickly last year you would run into the blast. because I mean, look, the first week of the season, they had Luis F. Castillo starting for them. Yeah. So did not stand for fun. No, it did not. So I feel like they're in a better spot depth-wise. I don't think they have amazing depth. But when you throw in like Kate Anderson will be part of that depth pretty quickly, you know,

and then they get maybe Ryan Sloan eventually. I think that's maybe a bit more of a stretch than post-all-star break. It starts to become a little bit more of a real conversation. but even then it's like probably at that point at that point too you're you got to wonder about anyings and all that is you know but whatever either way like maybe ryan sloan's part of the depth kate anderson is definitely part of that that equation and then you got the chris wells the dobb knacks the dunnings of the world i feel like they're in a pretty good spot with their depth i just i feel like they've protected themselves a lot better yeah i feel like chris well's a guy who could

throw really well at Team Mobile. So I don't think they're going to risk losing him to the waiver wire. He's out of options. So I think they'll stash him in the bullpen. And if somebody goes down, maybe they call up, you know, Hancock or Dunning and they kind of like piggyback Chris Well so that he can, you know, build up to being able to go five or six innings. But I don't think that's going to take that long.

He's been a starter for a long time. And he's, you know, kind of being sent out right now as a starter in spring training. he's on that schedule where he's going to throw two innings and then he'll probably throw three or four in his next outing. But I think the Mariners really like him. I think they can actually get, I think they can get value of him from him out of the bullpen as more than just an emergency high or an emergency long relief guy.

And if, you know, they do have to make that call, then I think they really like Chris Well. So I think he's the number six, even though he's going to start there in the bullpen. And then, yeah, Hancock will see if he makes the opening day roster as a bullpen member. My hunch is they send him down to, AAA just keep them stretched out so they do have to, you know, pivot to Chriswell.

They can call it Hancock to eat some innings as Chriswell builds up his pitch count. But yeah, like you said, Dunnings had some success in the big league level. Dobnack has had some success. And, you know, if you just need a spot start, you'd always add Casey Lawrence to the 40 man at DFAM and do that whole rigmarole again. We'll probably go to Toronto for a little while and probably come back and probably go back to Toronto for a little while. If they, if Casey Lawrence gets called up at any point this year, he will

tie the franchise record for most, most unique stents with the Seattle Mariners. It would be his fourth separate stint with the Mariners and that would tie him with Raul Ibanjas. Kind of two ends of the spectrum there, huh? Of like, yeah,

well, this guy was a mariner four different times. And it's like, yeah, one of them was like the classic journeyman four A type. And the other one is, is Raul freaking Ibanias. So Casey Lawrence,

the best basketball player of Marinus history. Yes. Apparently. Apparently. So yeah. I do feel reasonably well. Again, we'll see when Anderson is ready. Hopefully you don't need him.

But he's the one who could actually step in and replace some of the production from somebody who gets hurt. Everybody else is kind of a number five type, and that's fine. Not too many teams have, you know, the Mariners have arguably five number threes, and then you might throw Anderson in there

if you're really optimistic about him and say they have six number threes. How many teams have seven number threes or eight number threes? Most teams have, you know, they have two number threes, a number four, and then like six number five, six, seven types. So like, yeah, it's don't. Don't think I didn't catch it. You're the one that won't let it die. This is on your.

But anyways, yeah, I feel okay about the death. I'm just giving the people what they want. The people want me to acknowledge it. So that's all I'm going to say about that. Good luck editing this, jerk. All right. Well, that's going to do it for our show. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Lockdown Marys podcast.

Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. Once again, if you never miss an episode, it's time to make it official. Join the Lockdown Every Day or Club. Get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord and more, all built for our most loyal fans for Colby Patnode. I'm Taday Gazzalas. Be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at ILO-Enter-Marras. You can follow me at Tedding-G-G-C-Pad-E-Pat-E-E-Pat-E-E-C-B-WB-WB.

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