Mariners Midseason Awards: MVP – SS Jean Segura

The Mariners are set to return to action, with dreams of the playoffs dancing in their fans heads. The dream would not be a possibility without the fantastic break of Mid-Season MVP, Shortstop Jean Segura.
Lets begin by admitting that even though the Mariners sit 4 games under .500, there are several candidates for this award, including All-Stars Robinson Cano and Nelson Cruz. A case can be made for Ben Gamel, as well as James Paxton. However; our MVP award belongs to Jean Segura.
Segura currently posses the third highest fWAR on the team at 2.0 in just 60 games played. He leads the team in BA, OBP, Hits, and is second in Slugging % and SB. This despite having between 10-90 fewer plate appearances than his teammates.
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To put Segura’s current triple slash of .349/.390/.482 in perspective, we will compare it to former Mariners great Ichiro Suzuki’s famous rookie year slash. In 2001, Ichiro’s triple slash was .350/.381/.450. That’s right, Jean Segura is having a better offensive season than Ichiro’s 2001 MVP year to date.
Unfortunately, along with missing 30 games of the offense in the lineup, the lower leg injuries have taken a toll on his speed thus far. He is a mere 9 for 16 in SB attempts, but hopefully, we will see Segura’s full offensive ability in the second half as he regains the burst that made him a base stealing threat in the past.
What has really surprised most Mariners fans, myself included, is Segura’s defense. Billed as a below-average defender, Segura’s defense has been ranked as average by most metrics, getting a solid average score of 0.7 on Fangraphs. He will never be a Gold Glove caliber defender, but his bat should more than compensate for an average glove.
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Segura barely edges out Robinson Cano and Nelson Cruz. Cruz’ month long power outage and Cano’s mini slumps give a slight edge to the consistent Segura. If the Mariners are going to make the playoffs, they will need Segura to continue his MVP ways.