Mariners' Jerry Dipoto gets the wrong end of the stick with perception versus reality

Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto has had to deal with a certain amount of infamy, ever since he made his comments at the conclusion of the 2023 season about the team aiming to win 54% of their games. This was made even worse, when he followed it up by saying the organization was actually doing the fan base a favor by taking this approach.

Now, objectively speaking, when you listen to the entire explanation, you actually do understand where Dipoto was attempting to come from, but he just didn't do the best job explaining it sufficiently. Unfortunately for him, he doesn't get many (any?) favors from Mariners fans anymore after just one playoff appearance in since he first arrived in Seattle at the end of September 2015.

In any event, since then the Mariners have dialed back the media's access to Dipoto, and it's probably been for the best. Harsh or not, any time he has subsequently spoken publicly, people are almost looking for any excuse to criticize anything he says, with him not always helping himself.

Which brings us last Monday's Zoom conference call with the media, to discuss the re-signing of Jorge Polanco, some injury updates, and the Mariners' offseason in general. To be fair, Dipoto did provide some informative insight, but this became almost secondary to what he said about an offense that struggled last season.

Curtis Crabtree of FOX 13 asked what seemed to be a reasonable question about where the Mariners can expect improvement to come from in the lineup given the lack of significant offensive additions. Crabtree also made reference to the Mariners last season, leading the Majors in strikeouts and registering the second-lowest team batting average.

Jerry Dipoto gets defensive about Mariners offense

Dipoto then proceeded to give a detailed — but at times almost defensive — response to the assertion of a struggling lineup.

"How much time do you have, is the easy answer to that question. I think there is the reality of our offense and then the perception of our offense. We play in a tough ball park to hit in, our offense has generally been above average based on advance metrics, wRC+ and things like that, for a number of years now. The last three years we've actually had a very stable offense, particularly good on the road; I think one of the top 10 in MLB when we're on the road. And at home we play in a tough run-scoring environment that really benefits our pitching staff, and our position players have been asked to find ways."

In terms of perception versus reality, you can go into advanced metrics all you want, but the bottom line is scoring runs, with the Mariners only ranking 21st in that cateogy last year. As for being a top-10 offense on the road specifically, Luke Akins of the Mariners Consigliere newsletter took exception to this.

The thing is, though, that the Mariners don't actually need to be a top-10 offense in order to succeed (although it sure wouldn't hurt). When you have a starting rotation as elite as the M's, even a lineup ranking average in runs scored last season would have been enough to get the team into the postseason. (Of note, the Mariners did actually rank 12th in runs scored during the 2023 season.)

Jerry Dipoto under pressure to get Mariners back into playoffs

We can understand Dipoto's defensive nature to a certain extent when questioned about a seemingly impotent lineup, with it being almost a default setting for a lot of people to react similarly when being attacked (in a manner of speaking). However, you also get the sense that he is feeling the heat, with time running out for him to prove himself in Seattle.

One thing that's clear is Dipoto has a lot of hope in his players this coming season, looking for a combination of bounce-back seasons and others continuing to perform as well as they did last year.

"We had a few guys last year who came out and didn't have their best season and/or got off to slow starts. We added Victor Robles in midseason. We added Randy Arozarena at the trade deadline. We get a full season from what we hope is a resurgent J.P. Crawford, and we get perhaps the second half Julio (Rodríguez) rather than the first half, and that goes a long way. You add that to some of the players we had that had breakout seasons, like Luke Raley (and) excellent seasons like Cal Raleigh."

Dipoto also made reference to the signing of Donovan Solano and (a theoretically healthy) Polanco. However, it did raise questions, among the media and fans alike, when the 56-year-old claimed the front office didn't need to do a whole lot during the offseason.

This is just not the case, with multiple needs in the infield and someone like Alex Bregman still available. But the limited payroll increase has prevented Dipoto from doing much. This is why the Mariners were genuinely considering trading Luis Castillo and his team-leading $24.15 million salary for 2025 (plus two more seasons and a potential vesting option in 2028), in order to free up more money for other players.

Ultimately, Dipoto is right in that the Mariners do have the potential to be a good offense in 2025, but an awful lot of it comes down to hope, which can be a an useless hill to die on. Until then however, the perception is the reality that this is a not a very effective lineup, no matter how much you try to spin it otherwise.

Recent Posts