Nelson Cruz, Justin Upton, Ty Kelly And More Mariners News And Rumors

Happy Saturday morning. For many Mariners fans, it has been a fairly uncomfortable week. We’ve sat and watched multiple free agent signings, witnessed a few trades, heard various whispers and have little to show for it.

Such is baseball in November.

For those of you that missed something this past week, let’s take a look back and catch you up to speed.

News

Mariners fans have watched the Athletics go out and sign Billy Butler, a player many had linked to Seattle as a right-handed DH option. His 3-year, $30M price tag seemed to be in line with what Seattle might pay for him as well. But instead, the M’s will play against him 19 times in 2015.

We also saw the White Sox sign Adam LaRoche to a two-year deal. Now, not many expected the Mariners to be in play on the first baseman, but there was a small amount of speculation as to whether he could contribute to this team.

The Atlanta Braves sent Jason Heyward to the Cardinals in a four-player deal that included the Braves getting Shelby Miller. I can’t remember the last time a player won the Gold Glove and then was traded in that offseason.

More from Mariners News

• 2023 Steamer Projections: Teoscar Hernandez could see a drop in Seattle
• Steamer Projections: Julio Rodriguez to enter rarified air in 2023
• What if the Mariners traded FOR Tyler O’Neill this time?
• Mariners starting pitching is being overlooked by MLB
• Baking the Cake: An Adjusted Mariners Offseason Plan

News broke that Victor Martinez may have been close to signing with the Mariners. Seems Detroit waited to negotiate to see what other teams got in the mix. Martinez was leaning towards Seattle, then Detroit made their offer.

The Mariners did sign Cuban LHP Misael Siverio to a minor league deal.

Seattle added three players to the 40-man roster in advance of next month’s Rule 5 Draft. Catcher John Hicks, RHP Mayckol Guaipe and IF Ketel Marte were all added, bringing Seattle’s current 40-man roster to 39 players.

Finally, as mentioned here this week, Ty Kelly was traded to the Cardinals for Sam Gaviglio. The Mariners lose an interesting man in Kelly. If you have never checked out his Twitter account, I recommend doing so for some entertaining tweets. We here at SodoMojo wish Ty the best.

Rumors

This week, the editors and writers at FanSided’s MLB sites conducted a mock Winter Meetings. For those who didn’t see it, there were some interesting moves made across the League. It runs through Monday so there is still time for some fun. But here is a recap of what I did – acting on behalf of the Mariners in the simulation.

In the world of actual baseball rumors, we continue to hear tales of Justin Upton being available. Though now, the story is that his asking price by the Braves will be steep. Look, I like Upton, but do I think he alone, for one year is worth Taijuan Walker? No. There has to be other pieces in play for this to make sense to Seattle.

When the Blue Jays announced they were signing catcher Russell Martin, the news broke that Seattle had been in on the chase. This surprised a lot of people and prompted Chace Davy to write this piece on how fans shouldn’t worry about Mike Zunino.

Hanley Ramirez or Nelson Cruz? That seems to be the $50M+ question. It seems though, according to recent reports that the club actually prefers to land Cruz over signing Ramirez. Just keep in mind that there were several times last year where the Mariners were “not in on Robinson Cano” as well.

Opinion

In addition to the piece on Zunino, Chace also took a look at free agent RHP James Shields in his free agent spotlight.

Mike McDonnell told all Mariners fans to chill, as it relates to the Mariners having not made any significant moves yet.

Finally, I wrote a piece about long-term contracts in baseball in light of the 13-year, $325M extension signed by Marlins outfielder Giancarlo Stanton.