Mariners Analysis: Prospects Play Part in M’s Success

Shawn O’Malley, Mayckol Guaipe and Tony Zych have all contributed to the Mariners surprising start in 2016.

The Mariners (26-17) are off to their best 44-game start since the 2003 season when they stormed through the first quarter of the year with a 29-15 record. The M’s finished that season at 93-69. That Mariner squad- and the dominating teams in the late 90’s and early 00’s- defied expectations and won games because every single player stepped up during those winning years to pick up the slack for the stars who needed a boost.

This time around, a handful of prospects have been role players keeping the Mariners steady in what will surly be a competitive, un-expecting year in the AL West. Right now, the everyday starters like Robinson Cano, Nelson Cruz and Kyle Seager, along with the surprise slugging starts from Leonys Martin and Dae-Ho Lee have the Mariners core running at full speed, but two pitchers and one newly brought up batter have have tried to make their stamp and excite the Mariner faithful for the future of the club.

In this slideshow I will focus on the three prospects, Mayckol Guaipe, Shawn O’Malley and Tony Zych for their performances so far in 2016, and what we can look forward to for the rest of the year, and hopefully into late-October as well.

*Chris Taylor, who was just brought up from Triple-A Tacoma yesterday, will be at short during the 4-6 weeks that Ketel Marte will be sidelined by a thumb sprain. Taylor will be the next vital piece of the puzzle to keep the Mariners firing on all cylinders. His 1-3 start with 2 K’s and 2 E’s is not the way to keep your spot though.

Few games have been better for Mayckol Guaipe than his major league debut back in 2015 against the New York Yankees as he pitched a perfect 2.1 innings of relief, fanning two batters. Yet, while his career line reads 0-3 with 3 blown saves and an 5.29 ERA, there has been more of a positive feeling about Guaipe’s potential as he grows into the man he is destined to become.

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Within the past decade Guaipe has experienced some key changes to his game. First, the Mariners development staff felt that his stuff be more effective in short spurts as a reliever- the relief role worked with the Jackson Generals in 2014 as he boasted a 2.89 ERA in 31 appearances with 12 saves. Second, his physical stature has become indisputably more intimidating. When he was a young man in 2006 he stood 6’2” and weighed a mere 175 lbs. 10 years later he has put on a considerable amount of weight, now pushing 240 on the scale and growing 2 inches taller as well. This transformation helps to intimidate the batters who wait in the box ready to take him on.

Mayckol’s hitting the middle of the zone on 49% of his pitches. To emphasize how often he actually hit the batters sweet spot with his pitches, just think that 6 of 7 of his most struck targets were near the middle of the strike zone. All of this explains why his ERA is 4.91 and batters have a slugging percentage of .310 against the young Venezuelan, and why he was sent back down to Triple-A Tacoma.

If he can work on varying the location of his pitches while adding more speed to his fastball, he should be able to work his way back to the 25-man roster.

Shawn O’Malley hopes to be a solid back-up to the outfield core of Nori Aoki, Martin and Cruz. O’Malley has traveled through the minors most of his career before he first had his shot in the big leagues with the Angels in 2014. But his unproductive short stint, in which he struck out in 50% of his plate appearances sent him to the Mariners. In 24 games last year he was able to fix his strike out problem, striking out only 25% of his plate appearances and even managed to walk 12 times.

So far in 2016 it appears that his old woes are back to haunt him. Now, it is only a very small sample size of at-bats that can be examined in the 4 games he has stepped to the plate, but he has gone down swinging 4 of 10 times thus far. But that brightest side of his game has been his hitting- his average now stands at a career high .300.

No game showed his potential more than his last game in the starting lineup on May 22nd at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati. The Mariners were riding the high of yet another success road trip, coming into Sunday’s game with a 4-1 record on their latest travels. O’Malley stepped up by putting the ball in play all 4 times he went to the plate, including a single and his first double of the season (2nd of his career in 68 at-bats).

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Another bright spot for the right fielder has been his skills at in the outfield (and other positions). In his last two seasons in the MLB and at Triple-A, O’Malley has committed only 2 errors, the last of which came during his unsteady first week this year with the M’s. As he continues to shake off his early season jitters, O’Malley can be a good utility option to use when the starters need a day off,  but his goal will be to prove that he deserves more than just a back-up role.