3 needs the Mariners still have to become serious contenders in the AL West

This offseason is certainly a tale of two halves. The first half of the offseason looked to be very disappointing, with expectations that the Mariners would be swimming in the deep end for guys like Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell, and Cody Bellinger, yet we were expected to be excited about the additions of Luis Urias and Mitch Garver. We were expecting a payroll that would rival that of the Rangers, Blue Jays, and Astros, but after many concerns about the regional sports network issues (for many other teams as well), we were told that the budget would probably fall in line with where it was last year (around that $140-$145 million mark).

We then saw some major salary dumps, when the Mariners shed the contracts of both Marco Gonzalez and Eugenio Suarez (there may have been more to Geno than just the contract). They followed that up by trading former ace, Robbie Ray, to the Giants in return for Mariners' fan favorite, Mitch Haniger.

All signs pointed to the Mariners being done and trying to just piece together what they could with the very limited financial resources that were allotted to them, but that wasn't the end of it. They made two more trades that were perhaps the most surprising trades of the offseason, acquiring former all-star second baseman, Jorge Polanco, along with breakout reliever, Gregory Santos.

With all of that being said, you have to give Jerry Dipoto and Justin Hollander their flowers; they have absolutely killed this offseason (not even factoring in the limited financial resources, they have just raised the floor so much). That's not to say that they can't improve this team, however, and today we look at three needs that the Mariners could still address to further prove they are going to compete for the division title.