The 2022 Seattle Mariners bullpen will be electric

Seattle Mariners general manager Jerry Dipoto has been focused on adding bullpen pieces and he has delivered as promised. He brought in Keynan Middleton, Rafael Montero, and most recently, Ken Giles.

The Mariners bullpen is drastically better than it was last year, but the Seattle relief core will be even stronger in 2022. So, let’s take a look forward at what we could be seeing.

The 2022 Mariners bullpen

As Willie suggested in late December, the 2021 bullpen could look like this:

• Yohan Ramirez
• Will Vest
• Brandon Brennan
• Anthony Misiewicz
• Keynan Middleton
• Kendall Graveman
• Rafael Montero

The majority of these players are still young and have lots of improvements they still need to make, but the tools are there. I imagine that most of them will be a part of the 2022 Mariners pen, but there are even more reinforcements on the way.

Ken Giles is the name that probably first comes to mind. The Mariners signed Giles to a two-year deal but he is coming off of Tommy John surgery, so he probably won’t pitch until 2022. Giles will be a huge addition to the 2022 bullpen, and we already have a lot of depth as seen above.

If we wanted to throw Giles into the list shown above, who would we take off? Honestly, I don’t know. I think all of them deserve a shot in the bullpen.

On top of Giles, we are also waiting for Andres Munoz, who was a part of the Padres package we got for Austin Nola. Munoz is another exciting pitcher who has so much potential. He just turned 22-years-old last month and is recovering from Tommy John surgery as well.

And that is not all… the Mariners still have a group of young relief prospects looming in the shadows. Mariners fans have seen a little bit of Aaron Fletcher already, and he hasn’t been good so far. But, let’s hope he can figure things out quickly because his deception from the left side could be extremely useful to balance out the right-handed heavy pen.

We also have Wyatt Mills and Sam Delaplane, who are looking like studs in the minor leagues. Mills is a Gonzaga product like Marco Gonzales and has a low 3/4 delivery to get batters out. Wyatt is coming off of a great instructional league down in Arizona and will probably be in Triple-A during 2021. I wouldn’t be surprised if we even seem him this season for a little while.

Sam Delaplane is another prospect who is on a similar timeline as Mills. Delaplane has dominated the minor leagues even more than Mills and has a career 2.29 ERA. He has also struck out batters at a crazy rate the past few years. Sam has struck out 270 batters in 161.1 innings since joining the Mariners organization.

With that being said, Mariners fans are getting an early sneak preview of the future pen. Some of the current relievers won’t be with the Mariners for very long just because we have so much depth. I wouldn’t be surprised if Branden Brennan and Kendall Graveman become trade candidates at the deadline.

So, if the Mariners pen struggles this season, don’t be too disappointed. There is still a lot to look forward to.