Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Why Does THIS Keep Happening to the Seattle Mariners?! | Mailbag Monday

Starting point is 00:00:00 Why do the Mariners continue to run into the same issues bringing in veteran free agent hitters like A.J. Pollack and most recently Rob Reff Snyder. I'll answer that of more coming up here on Mailbag Monday. 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 Monday, June 22nd, 2026. My name is Tadding Gonzalez, and I'm joined as always by McCose, Colby Patnode. this episode is brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use the promo code locked on. That's L-O-C-K-D-O-N for $20 off your first purchase. Let's open up the mailbag and answer some of your mayor's questions, starting with this one from Ham Swarity 69,

Starting point is 00:00:48 who wants to know Logan Gilbert has been the guy we've expected him to be for the past two starts. What have you seen from him that suggests he's on the right path? I know he's a kitchen sink guy, but these past two starts have been foreseem heavy. Is it increased fastball value, decrease split usage? or something else. Yeah, there's a couple things going on with Logan. One is the passball VLO is up, as is the usage. Yesterday we saw him hit 100 in the first.

Starting point is 00:01:16 He had a 28% whiff rate. Remember 30 is like elite first starter, so pretty darn good out of Logan. The Vilo was up. He maintained, I mean, obviously it dropped a little bit in the seventh inning, but he was still at 96 in the seventh inning. The usage is way up. yesterday was at 68% forcing usage,

Starting point is 00:01:36 and he's been at about 35 to 38% this year. Split-splitter usage way down. He only threw six yesterday. And yet, funny enough, the six that he threw, all six were strikes because he got six swings and four of them were whiffs. So in an extremely effective pitch, he's just not throwing it as much, which is allowing him to get some quicker outs because he can't really control the splitter.

Starting point is 00:01:58 He's talked about that. It just kind of goes where it goes. He doesn't have a great feel for it. Um, so he's throwing a lot more fastballs, getting a lot more outs on the fastball, getting a lot more swifts on the fastball. The spin rates are up to so it's not dropping as much as it gets to home. He's ditched the cutter entirely since Cal Raleigh's come back. And that was a pitch he was thrown about 10% of the time with disastrous results. Um, so that's gone. Uh, and he's really gone to be more of a four seam slider guy. And then the split is still a legitimate weapon. He's just using it less and less. He's relying on it less. Uh, basically it's only there. you know, to try and get swing and miss. And he's only, he's not going to throw it, you know, three times in a row with an O2 count. He's going to throw you. He's going to challenge you with fastballs right now.

Starting point is 00:02:43 I've also noticed, and again, I don't have, you know, individual game heat maps in front of me. But I have noticed that he tends to be working down with the fastball more than he has in the past. Like over his previous 40 some odd starts, he was always trying to top rail the four seamer. And now he's going to all four quadrants with it. He'll challenge you down at the knees with that. pitch, which kind of allows him to get more outs, more balls put in play in fair territory. That top rail fastball gets fouled off a lot, especially with the, you know, the spin rate and the Velo that Logan was throwing it over the last year and almost a half.

Starting point is 00:03:18 It just, and you combine that with the splitter being a wild pitch that if you didn't get a chase with it, it was probably going to be a ball, like the pitch counts would get out of hand. And the last, you know, two, three, four times out, he's actually been able to get semi-deep into games with, you know, 100 pitches. He's still collecting strikeouts. It's not like he's had to trade, you know, he hasn't become a, you know, a sinker ball, ground ball,

Starting point is 00:03:41 Marcus Stroman, 6K per 9 type of guy. Like, he's still getting plenty of whiffs. There's still plenty of swing and miss in that game, but he's getting deeper because he's challenging guys more with the fastball. He's putting it down at the knees more than he has at the past. And he's throwing pitches that he has some control and command over a lot more than he's throwing the split, which he just very good pitch. one of the best splitters in baseball, but no idea where it's going to go.

Starting point is 00:04:04 No idea. And so it's really hard to game plan around, you know, that pitch. So, yeah, I do think, you know, ditching the cutter is huge. It was a bad pitch, and he hasn't thrown it since Cal's come back. And he's just kind of almost simplified the approach and the game plan a little bit here to just attack guys and go right at them. And, you know, it's only three starts. The previous 40 were all pretty much the same. A lot of strikeouts, five innings,

Starting point is 00:04:32 hope he only gives up two runs. But, you know, what we've seen for the last, you know, three starts or so, definitely a guy who you'd be more interested in paying $150, $200 million to than the guy we saw in the previous 40 starts. And, you know, he's kind of slowly pitching his way into the all-star game conversation.

Starting point is 00:04:52 He's got a low 3-ERA. He's almost worth as much war this year as he was all of last year. He's on pace to go, you know, his 180 inning. like he always does. He's going to have a good, good amount of strikeouts, probably 200 strikeouts. He's on pace to do that, just barely. So, yeah, we'll see how this goes. Obviously, again, it's only three starts. Three good starts, three great starts don't wipe away the previous 40, which were mostly fine, but not, you know, we've talked about it. But yeah,

Starting point is 00:05:20 not what you expect from Logan Gilbert. Yeah. So, you know, big time fastball value happening right now. The spin rates are up. The VLO's up. He's thrown the slider more as a lot. this very secondary pitch. The splitter is there basically only once he gets two strikes and he's not relying on it to get outs. And yeah, he's he's kind of pitching them more. He's less predictable now because it used to be if it was elevated, it was a fastball. If it was down, it was a split.

Starting point is 00:05:46 And you could pretty much lay off the split of it was. If it came out of his hand low, it was probably going to dip out of the strike zone. So now he's thrown that fastball, you know, down at the knees and you can't give up on it. And it's more ground balls, more pop-ups and things like that. So he's getting deep. in a game. So yeah, it's been a kind of a, I mean, game plan change. I don't know what you want to call it, a mentality change or whatever, but he's done it three times now against two different opponents. So I think we can say it's not just a matchup base thing. I think this is kind of new direction Logan's

Starting point is 00:06:17 going to go. And we'll see the league will adjust to him. And obviously we know the cat and mouse game there, but very encouraging stuff from Logan Gilbert over his last handful of starts. Yeah, you said it earlier. It's a simplified approach from Logan Gilbert. I think we're seeing a guy go, hey, my stuff is really good. I just need to let it go eat, right? I think the thing that has been the most maddening about watching Logan Gilbert over the last year and a half or so has been that it just kind of feels like he's trying

Starting point is 00:06:47 to finesse at bats. It feels like, for lack of a better term, he's trying to galaxy brain at bats. It's like, dude, like your fastball is really good, especially paired with your extension. and like if you're going to throw 98 99 like we saw yesterday I mean that might as well be a billion miles per hour you know with the extension that he gets so just go after guys because you're going to get your your strikeouts a lot quicker and you're going to get out of innings quicker

Starting point is 00:07:14 and you're not going to do this thing that we've seen for so long now from him where he's having these long at bats and he's having these long innings where he's throwing 20, 30 pitches and then he's only able to go five. And he's essentially, you know, a five-and-dive guy. Now, those five innings are probably, you know, overall pretty successful because, you know, he's not giving up runs, which is ultimately the name of the game.

Starting point is 00:07:38 But you need Logan Gilbert to get deeper into games. We've talked about this. And now you're starting to see that more with this more aggressive approach. You know, he goes six and a third yesterday. He went, what, seven his last time out against the Orioles? That's what I want to see from Logan Gilbert. Now, he's not going to go seven every single time. I don't expect him to go seven every single time,

Starting point is 00:08:00 but he needs to go seven more often than he has over the last year and a half. And that was my biggest issue with Logan. And that was the reason why, you know, a couple of weeks ago, I hopped on one of my postgame reactions and said, hey, I basically have zero interest in, you know, and the Mariners giving this guy a ton of money long term. But if he's going to pitch like this, more often than not from here on out, then I'm absolutely back on.

Starting point is 00:08:26 board with keeping Logan Gilbert here in Seattle for as long as possible. So hopefully this is a version of Logan Gilbert that we continue to see for the rest of the year. Because this is the type of guy that I do have confidence in throwing against, you know, the best of the best in October. All right. We'll answer more of your questions in just a moment. But first a reminder of this episode of the longtime era's podcast is brought to you by game time and five hour energy. There's nothing like watching a Mariners game.

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Starting point is 00:11:18 everydayer club for ad-free episodes and access to a group chat with me and other listeners of this show. Tap the link in the description or go to lockdownmariners. that supercast.com to learn more. Let's get back into your questions here on Mailbag Monday. I mean, their name is just a bunch of tongue emojis. Has enough time passed to ask what's up with Josh Naylor? Yeah, yeah, let's talk about Josh Naylor.

Starting point is 00:11:42 Because the defense is atrocious. And I feel for him and the fact that, like, it's pretty clear like he's playing through something. You know, we know that he's been dealing with the shin and wrist stuff. The fact of the matter is, though, with Josh is that, he's not hitting enough where we can go, well, you know, that just comes with the territory with Josh Naylor. The bad defense is just kind of, you know, what you have to live with because he's just so good at the plate. But since the start of May, he's got a 106 WRC plus.

Starting point is 00:12:08 Now, for a little while, you know, he was running like a 130 WRC plus since the start of May or, you know, I think it was like a 140 WRC plus since that Astros game back in April when he had the two home runs. But now those numbers have started to decline. That's not good enough. That's not good enough to mass. the defensive deficiencies that we're seeing from Josh right now. It's been a problem. I've never seen a single player struggle to underhand flip up baseball 15 feet. Like I've seen Josh Naylor struggle this year. I think he has a yips at this point.

Starting point is 00:12:43 Right. And there's only so much that's a mental block, right? That that's something that's a real psychological problem. And there's only so much the Marys can do about that. But at some point, you know, it's such a big problem. Like he could have hurt Logan Gilbert yesterday. Like now, thankfully Logan was fine, but like, you know, he could hurt somebody with those bad flips and all that. So it's not just the flips, though. Obviously, like you said, he's kind of double clutching every throwdown to second base. And he's also just a whiffed on some, on some throws that, you know, infielders have made that, you know, I mean, look, every once in a while of the ball, you know, you short hop the first baseman.

Starting point is 00:13:25 and you can't quite get it or whatever, fine. But like, there's been some reasonably good throws that most first baseman would pick and Josh has missed them. So it is a problem because, like you said, he's not hitting anywhere near enough to make up for that. And mostly no power whatsoever. And we know that he's banged up, but there does come a point in time where it's like, this is, this is a problem. Like, you cannot be, I mean, Josh isn't even a 20 grade defender right now on the 2080 scale. He's below that. So it's just, you know, at some point, do you have to start deaching him until he's healthy?

Starting point is 00:14:00 What do we do at first base in the meantime? But it's a problem. Like it is a legit problem. Like right this second, first base is probably the biggest need for the Seattle Mariners, which sucks because you just paid this guy. Like you're not going to go out and get a first baseman at the deadline. Probably not. Right. So like, you're not going to go trade Wilson Contreras and bench Josh Naylor.

Starting point is 00:14:22 No, they're not going to do that year one of a, you know, a new contract. So it's just kind of one of those things. They're in a tight spot here, and they need Josh to be better. Flat out, they need him to be better. Because what they've gotten from him this year is not acceptable in any, you know, any way whatsoever. It's not acceptable offensively. It's not acceptable defensively. He needs to find a way to contribute.

Starting point is 00:14:43 And, you know, I think part of it is, you know, get him out of that cleanup spot. Like, what are you doing? You're putting a lot of pressure on him when you have him hitting third or fourth. Like get him down hitting sixth, seventh, until he figures it out or until he gets healthy. And then, you know, defensively, that's just something you're going to have to work through. There's really not much you can do except keep putting them out there

Starting point is 00:15:04 and hope that he figures it out, especially if it is the I just, I mean, you can't just yell at him to fix it. That's not how that works. So, yeah, the defense is a problem. We need to start looking at Josh Naylor as a negative, net negative to this team, more so than a positive. But also, I don't know what you do to fix it unless you want to put them on the I don't see what really course the Mariners can take to correct this.

Starting point is 00:15:30 Yeah, I mean, you know, you mentioned the power, right, and the lack of power. Well, that hasn't actually been a problem for him this month. The problem, though, is that he's been a wildly inconsistent hitter in the way that he has produced. So this month has been an inverse of last month, where last month he was hitting for average and he was getting on base of time, but he wasn't. hitting for any power. This month, he's not really hitting for average. He's not really

Starting point is 00:15:57 getting on base, but he's hitting for a slug. You got to find some middle ground. Yeah. So it's just like, who like, who even are you offensively right now, Josh Taylor? Yeah. And again, we wonder how much of that is remember he had the back stuff. Now, he's got the shin and the wrist. Like, he's very banked up. We know that.

Starting point is 00:16:19 So, I mean, at some point, you consider just placing him on the aisle and just trying to get him right. you know how many injuries can the mariners really sustain well you know it's not unlike randy it's not like Josh is is helping you so much that you feel like you don't like i have to put randy on the i have no choice i don't want to but i have to josh isn't at that level like if you think that two weeks off would do josh any other some good you might want to consider it and you could probably survive with luke raleigh playing first base for a couple weeks uh because i i don't think luke raleigh as bad as he has at first would be any worse than josh has been defensively so

Starting point is 00:16:53 It's definitely a problem. Josh has reached a level where we need to talk about them as something that needs to be fixed. I think you should, you know, again, move him down in the lineup. I don't think he should be hitting in the top four. But that doesn't really help the defense at all. So I'm not really sure there. He is a problem right now. I just don't have any idea how you fix it, unfortunately.

Starting point is 00:17:14 Titus wants to know it has seemed like during this competitive window, the Mariners are in. Jerry is really bad at identifying major league free agents that will help the team. even with being on a budget as he is. Is this a right process wrong result issue? Or is there just something fundamentally wrong with how Jerry in this front office identifies talent at the major league level?

Starting point is 00:17:36 They seem to be really good at drafting and developing minor leaguers, but it's very funny watching a career guy come here in the offseason and have an all-time bad season. I understand that you guys aren't in the front office or anything, but it would be interesting to hear your guys' insight. Now, I assume you're primarily asking this question because of Rob Ruff said it, right?

Starting point is 00:17:55 You didn't mention him by name, but my guess is you're not overly concerned about why Juan Nicosio and Mark Sopchinsky and Yoshi-Hirano didn't work out all those years ago. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you want us to talk about why the mayors continue to bring in these veteran right-handed bats and why those guys continue to just completely fall off a cliff once they get to Seattle. Because it's not just a matter of these guys coming to Seattle and they're 20 to 30% below their career norms. no, they have every single time with Pollack, with Solano, and now RefSenter, they've come to Seattle, and it's been the zero percentile outcome. It's been the most extreme end of the spectrum where these guys have gone from savvy offseason additions

Starting point is 00:18:37 to completely unplayable in just a matter of months. Why does that continue to happen? My answer is I have no idea. I really don't. Now, from the perspective of, or just, the process that we can see, right? Which is even for Colby and I, we can go on fan grabs,

Starting point is 00:18:59 we can go on baseball savant, we can go on baseball reference, we can read articles and we can see, hey, that guy was really good last year. You should go and bring him in. From that perspective, the process of adding Rob Ref Center this past winter was fantastic because the mayor's needed a better right-handed hitting option

Starting point is 00:19:15 off of their bench against left-handed pitching, and they went out and statistically speaking got the best possible guy to go do that. just based off of the numbers the last few years. Rob Refsiter was a lefty destroyer and a Boston Red Sox uniform. The issue here is timing. The mayor has continued to get in at the wrong time on these guys, on A.J. Pollack, on Donovan Salano, now on Rob Reffsiter. Why is that?

Starting point is 00:19:43 And at that point, that becomes a question of internal process, which we can't see. So that's just kind of left up to the imagination. Now, there were reports this offseason that Rob Ruff Center was considering retirement. Why was that after having yet another fantastic season with the Red Sox last year? Why did the Red Sox not bring him back? I think those are fair questions to ask, especially now in hindsight. And with the information and the connections that the Marys have that we're not privy to, what made them still feel comfortable bringing Rob Ruff Snyder in?

Starting point is 00:20:25 What made them feel confident that they were going to get the guy that we saw last year, or at least a guy that was close to what we saw last year, or over the last few years with the Red Sox? And we'll just kind of never know, but whatever that is and whatever process they have taken internally to land on Pollock, to land on Solano, to land on Rough Snyder, and for it to ultimately go as sideways as it has gone each of these three times, right,

Starting point is 00:20:59 for it to be as extraordinarily bad as it's been all three times, that's something that clearly needs to be reassessed. Yeah, we just, we don't know what it is. You know, like how, I don't, maybe it's only one or two more, but like how many more wins do they have if they had picked Miguel Antahar this off season instead of Rob Hardin. It's been fine. Kept track.

Starting point is 00:21:23 Certainly much better than Ruff Snyder. He got off to a hot start. I think he slowed down recently. But yeah. So again, I think the roster build is, that roster build is fine, especially when you're limited,

Starting point is 00:21:35 like you said, with, you know, Jerry and the budget and all that. But obviously the process of picking the right player, something's off there. All right, we'll answer a couple more of your questions in just a moment,

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Starting point is 00:22:38 For more information, see calci.com slash regulatory. And you're listening to the Lockdown Errors podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. As always, if you want to hear from me and Colby, even more, and help support the show. We have a Patreon. It's called Control the Zone. And on there we talk,

Starting point is 00:22:56 Mariner, Seahawks, all the good stuff. For more information, go to Patreon.com forward slash control the zone. Link in the description of this episode. Let's get back into your questions here on Mailbag Monday. Jeff wants to know who will be the next piggyback combo. Your guess is as good as mine.

Starting point is 00:23:13 You would think it would be Logan because they've already announced the starters for this Pittsburgh series. And they didn't have. announce a piggyback with any of them. Yeah. So I think the answer is Logan Gilbert, but we don't know. Now, VanGraphs, I know has the, they have Bryce and Logan piggybacking again on Thursday, but we haven't heard that announcement.

Starting point is 00:23:39 And they were pretty. Bryce and Louise. Yeah. But they also have, they also have Logan and Hancock piggybacking against the Guardians on Saturday. So they're not really sure. That's what I think is going to be the case. Yeah. I would think so too, yeah.

Starting point is 00:23:54 That one makes more sense. They've said they're only going to piggyback the starters once. Like everybody's going to take a turn with the piggyback once until the All-Star break. And so Bryce and Luis have already taken their turn. So there's four people. So I guess there's four options here. But yeah, Bryce or sorry, Logan and Hancock make the most sense. And then you finish it up, you know, on the next homestand with Brian Wu and George Kirby and go from there.

Starting point is 00:24:20 Well, it also makes sense because Gilbert and Hancock are stacked together. Kirby and Wu are stuck together. If you only get one or the other, then there would be some weird odd man out. So I think it is pretty clearly going to be Gilbert and Hancock in Cleveland on Saturday. Might be nice to get a little preview of Hancock coming out of the bullpen too, just in case that's something the mayors need to do later this year. Yeah, yeah.

Starting point is 00:24:46 And then I guess we'll see Kirby and Wu do it. first week of July probably maybe the blue jays Toronto Toronto series probably yeah yeah that's kind of what I'm thinking next question here from Lions the mayor specifically need a right-handed bat at the MLB trade deadline who is your favorite target of yours a couple weeks ago I probably would have said Austin Martin and I still like that idea it's just he's really struggled as of late but I like the multiple years of club control I like the flexibility that he brings.

Starting point is 00:25:23 Romi Gonzalez is a good one as well. Unfortunately, he had a little bit of a setback on his injury rehab. So you might be trying to acquire a guy who's got like 28 plate appearances at the big league level this year. But he's crushed lefties and he also has some versatility. Spencer Steer, the reds are kind of slowly fading where a lot of the National League is surging. So Spencer Steer, I think, would be a solid one. Yeah, but I think my favorite, you know, know, it's probably Taylor Ward just by default almost.

Starting point is 00:25:53 There's just not a lot of great right-handed options out there right now. That could change. Obviously, teams can fall back and all that. But yeah, I think Taylor Ward's probably the simplest, and he makes the most sense, and he's a rental, and he plays a position where you might be able to get him some batts regularly. So I think Ward is a good spot there. But, yeah, I do think Romney Gonzalez.

Starting point is 00:26:14 Nate Eaton is interesting. I wish he could play some infield, but, you know, just an outfielder. but he's got speed he's got you know pretty good defender he's got great raw power so uh i think he would be an interesting ad but how much better is he than like victor roblas i don't really know so yeah yeah just not a ton of great options right now that there's going to be some pretty good you know part-time right-handed bats available i think i just don't know there's going to be a starting right-handed bat better than taylor war that you could realistically get all right that is going to do up for a show. Thank you so much for joining us here on the

Starting point is 00:26:49 Lock Time Marries podcast. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. And once again, if you never miss an episode, it's time to make it official. Join the Locked-on Every Day or Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord and more all built for our most loyal fans. Colby Pat Nod, I'm Tadangazas. Be sure

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Starting point is 00:27:21 Peace.

Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Why Does THIS Keep Happening to the Seattle Mariners?! | Mailbag Monday

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