Dan Wilson must make 1 obvious change to keep Mariners from losing grip on ALCS

Even as the Seattle Mariners went on a wonderful streak of 17 wins in 18 games to secure their first AL West title since 2001 and a first-round bye, not everything was running smoothly. Near to if not at the top of this list was Randy Arozarena's hitting slump.

There's no denying Arozarena was one of the Mariners' main spark plugs throughout the 2025 regular season, but he endured a noticeable dip in productivity during August and September. Towards the end of last month, we surmised the playoffs were needed to ignite him given his previous success during October, with his postseason 1.104 OPS being the best since Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.

Unfortunately for the Mariners, playing on the big stage of postseason baseball hasn't lit a fire under Arozarena, as he continues to struggle at the plate. Through seven games he's batting just .161/.278/.194 with a .471 OPS and is still searching desperately for answers.

So what gives? Well, simply put the leadoff spot hasn't agreed with Arozarena ever since he was moved there on July 31 by M's manager Dan Wilson, with him going from one of the lineup's most productive hitters to one of their least effective.

Prior to July 31 Arozarena had a .822 OPS which projected to be his highest in the majors since a 1.022 OPS in 2020, when he only played 23 regular season games. However, after moving to the leadoff spot he only produced a .645 OPS over the remainder of the 2025 regular season.

Mariners MUST move Randy Arozarena out of the leadoff spot

Clearly, it's just not working and at this point with so much at stake, you do have to worry how long it will be before the Mariners start paying for keeping Arozarena in the leadoff spot. As much as we appreciate the saying that if it isn't broken don't fix it when looking at the M's success in general, they can't afford to leave anything to chance.

One possible solution could be to have Arozarena switch places in the lineup with Josh Naylor, with the Canadian second on the Mariners with nine hits so far in the playoffs and just continuing to be a galvanizing force for the team. At the very least, the M's should consider putting Naylor in the leadoff spot against righties, who he has been particularly successful against this season as a whole even before his trade to Seattle.

While the Mariners lead the Toronto Blue Jays 2-0 in this best-of-seven AL Championship Series, they have repeatedly said there's still work to do in order to finish the job. This should include Wilson moving Arozarena out of the leadoff spot, or risk seeing the M's hopes of making it to a first ever World Series shatter into a million pieces.