Mariners are feeling the heat from top prospect they neglected to trade

As the trade deadline loomed, the general consensus was that Seattle Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto needed to aim big with his job potentially on the line, which likely meant giving up some key young talent in return.

As per Jim Bowden of The Athletic (subscription required), his poll of 40 MLB front office executives had M's catcher Harry Ford as the second-most likely prospect to be moved ahead of the deadline on July 31.

As it turned out, while the Mariners did successfully aim big by acquiring Eugenio Suárez and Josh Naylor (as well as Caleb Ferguson), they somehow managed to do the impossible and avoid giving up any of their eight top 100 prospects including Ford. This was a tremendous result in keeping a player who is ranked third in the M's farm system by MLB Pipeline behind just Colt Emerson and Lazaro Montes, but what does it mean moving forward?

There has been some thought given to now trading Ford during the winter instead, with him likely to still remain a hot property between now and then. He's had a tremendous season in Triple-A Tacoma and, while he did cool off there for a second, he's now back to his best. His five home runs, 18 RBI and a 1.130 OPS in his last 15 games for the Rainiers to all but put the power questions to bed.

As much as you can appreciate Ford continuing to be dangled as a key component in any trade package, the Mariners need to also consider taking advantage of the fact they avoided having to part with him at this year's trade deadline. And yes, that's even despite Cal Raleigh having a lock on the starting catcher position for the foreseeable future.

The case for the Mariners keeping Harry Ford

For a start, Mitch Garver is all but gone after underperforming (and disappointing) during his time in Seattle, as his $12 million mutual option for 2026 is sure to be declined by the team. This at least gives Ford an opening to get some starts at catcher for the Mariners, while also seeing playing time at DH and getting other opportunities just because even Raleigh can't remain indestructible forever with him now 28 and continuing to accrue wear and tear on his body.

Another option is to have the 22-year-old Ford change position, which he's more than capable of doing given the combination of his speed, work ethic, leadership skills, and hitting ability. This is actually something the Mariners have already toyed with the idea of after giving him some playing time in left field last year during eight games in Double-A Arkansas. The main challenge with this approach is that the Mariners' preference is to keep Ford at catcher, so something has to give.

In our humble opinion, the organization is best-served using some combination of having him as the M's main backup catcher next year and playing him at other positions, because we firmly believe he's too special a talent to be moving on to pastures new.