5 players to watch at Seattle Mariners Spring Training 2020

Spring Training cannot get here soon enough. And in a season filled with uncertainty for your Seattle Mariners, there are still going to be a lot of fun things to watch.

Spring Training is a marvelous thing, isn’t it? It almost acts as an etch-a-sketch from the previous years’ team and reminds us that hope springs eternal. The Mariners may be in for a rough season, but there are still numerous storylines and players worth watching.

So today, we give you our initial list of 5 players we will be watching closely in Spring Training. These players may be looking to breakout, maintain their success, or just those looking to prove they are MLB talents.

While I may suggest that if you are headed to Peoria, you head to the backfields to watch some of the younger prospects this spring, our list will consist of players who are MLB ready or close to. No Julio Rodriguez or Jarred Kelenic on this list… yet. With that in mind, let’s begin.

5. Evan White

We have talked about Evan White a lot in the past week. He is a prospect with helium in the industry and that by itself is worth talking about. But White signed his MLB deal this winter and is now widely considered the heavy favorite to be the Opening Day starter.

For most of us, this will be our first extended look at White. We got to see some of him in Spring Training last year, in the MLB All-Star Futures Game, and for the one AA Arkansas playoff game Root Sports televised in the fall. But unless you have an MILB.com subscription, that is probably it.

As the projected starting first baseman, we should get to see plenty of White this spring and get to see the athleticism and defense we have heard so much about. Spring Training stats are pointless, making his offense tough to gauge until the regular season begins.

But it isn’t often the Mariners give a long-term major league contract to a player with no major league experience and with White’s praise pouring in from around the industry, it is difficult to not be intrigued.

4. J.P. Crawford

There was a lot to like about our first extended look at J.P. Crawford last season. He showed good on-base skill, a solid glove, and even flashed a month-long stretch where he looked like an All-Star.

However, we also saw plenty of room for growth in Crawford’s game, particularly at the plate. Crawford needed to add strength this winter as well as some flexibility. Crawford admitted that weight training wasn’t a part of his off-season until last winter, so hopefully, the Mariners set him up with a new workout regimen.

Crawford also needed to make some changes to swing this winter. Too often last season, we saw Crawford look caught in between. He was late on fastballs and early on off-speed offerings. These could be attributed to his timing that starts at the lower half of his swing.

Crawford can sometimes be late in getting the front foot down, which leads to a late start to his swing and causes the hands to drag rather than fire through the zone. This bad timing saps Crawford of some natural game power and also leads to more swings and misses.

Crawford generates enough bat speed that he should be able to hit for a decent average with 12-15 home runs and 30 doubles, but only if he makes the tweaks necessary to tap into that potential.

As it sits right now, Crawford is a middle-of-the-road, everyday shortstop. A valuable piece to be sure, but not enough to indefinitely crown him the shortstop of the future. But with no real competition on the big league roster or in the minor leagues, Crawford will get his chance in 2020 and 2021 to prove whether or not he is destined to be average or a bit more than that.

Hopefully this spring, we see some tweaks to his swing and a player whose time in the gym paid dividends for a promising young player.

3. Shed Long Jr.

It didn’t take Shed Long much time to become a fan favorite in Seattle. Of course, when you come up and immediately produce in your first taste of Major League Baseball, it isn’t difficult to understand how it happened.

Long hit .263/.333/.454 in 169 PAs in his first go at MLB pitching with 5 home runs and 12 doubles in 2019. But these numbers only point to a small part of the reason for the excitement fans are feeling for Long.

Long started his big league career by going 0-12 and being sent back down shortly after. But Long was recalled a few weeks later and the rest of his time in Seattle went remarkably well, slashing .280/.344/.483 in 157 PAs.

Long appeared to be more comfortable the more he played and now he enters 2020 as the assumed every day second baseman, despite the presence of Dee Gordon on the roster (for now). Unlike Crawford, for whom we are looking for changes, the questions surrounding Long are about whether or not he can repeat his success over the course of a full season.

Most believe Long will hit enough to carve out a role as a bat-first utility option, similar to that of Marwin Gonzales. The questions about whether or not Long can be an everyday player revolve mostly around his defense.

Long showed some versatility in 2019 and played a decent left field for stretches. Ultimately, it appears the Mariners see his future at second base, where he has some serious question marks surrounding him. The question as to whether he will be able to stick at second should be easy enough for most to see and that process for fans will begin early in Spring Training.

Long isn’t a lock to be a bad defender. He is a good athlete and has the skills required to be good with enough time. If he can be even a fringe-average defender, his bat should carry him as an everyday player. But of course, we would love to see him be better than that. And he very well could get there.

2. Justus Sheffield

Justus Sheffield is a guy I can’t help but like. He checks a lot of boxes. He is a former first-round pick, throws hard, misses bats, gets groundballs, is young, athletic, and works hard at his craft. He has 2 above-average pitches and throws enough strikes to be, at worst, a high-leverage reliever.

The slider has a chance to be a plus offering and flashed as such last year. The final line surrounding Sheffield’s slider didn’t look great in 2019. Opponents hit .302 against it and slugged .491 against the slider, but some bad luck may have been to blame.

The expected batting average against the pitch (based on exit velocity and launch angle) was .217 and his expected slugging percentage was just .364. Either way, we as fans can feel pretty safe about two of his offerings.

There are two questions left for Sheffield to answer. First, can he control the strike zone better than he did in 2019? Sheffield throws enough strikes, but there is a difference between throwing strikes and commanding the strike zone.

Second, what does the changeup look like? Last spring, we saw a legitimate, 55-grade changeup from Sheffield. Unfortunately, we didn’t see it much last year. He didn’t throw it much, to begin with, and when we did see it, it left a lot to be desired.

The pitch is a difference-maker for Sheffield and can take him from a #4 starter or high-leverage reliever and a #3 starter with upside. Sheffield is a near-lock to begin 2020 in Seattle’s rotation and growth in the changeup could be huge for both Sheffield and the Mariners.