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As May comes to a close, here are 3 reasons why the Mariners will make the playoffs... and 3 why they won't
We've just turned the corner on another month in the Mariners season. Although June 1st holds no special meaning other than the start of a new month, it feels like the right time to take an updated look at how things are going with the Mariners so far in 2023.
Now, some of you doom and gloomers (we even have some of them here) are wallowing in misery like a pig does mud on a hot day. Woe is me, the season is over, blah blah blah. Yes, the Mariners have struggled a bit against teams with winning records (10-17 with a -14 run differential), it's not near as bad as it looks. We will get into that a bit later.
However, their Pythagorean win/loss should be 31-25 right now, showing that this team has been a bit unlucky. It's easy to look at this team and see where the main need is, as most nights the offense is lackluster compared to what we were hoping for at the start of the season, especially after the offseason additions.
Yet, the Mariners are still sitting two games above .500 as they enter into play for their first series of June. June 1st is an off day, which makes it seem like a great choice for looking at 3 reasons why this team is still going to make the playoffs... and 3 reasons they won't. Let's go back and forth style on this.
Reason #1 the Mariners won't make the playoffs: The offense doesn't show up
This is easily the most frusturating part of the Mariners season. I've always liked Kolten Wong, so when the Mariners traded for him, I thought that the hole at second base would finally be filled. Instead, we are looking at a 5'7" hitter that is hitting below his weight and playing some below average defense as well.
Then there is Teoscar Hernandez. He'd been hitting around 280 over the last 3 seasons, and has long been one of the better, albeit underrated, hitters in the game. Great average, massive power, doesn't walk, but hits the ball hard and does it often. Instead, we've been treated to someone whose OBP is lower than his cumulative BA from the last 3 seasons, all the while posting a SLG under .400. Oh, and he leads the league in strikeouts with 4 million. Okay, it's 78, but it feels like that many.
Jose Caballero should probably be a platoon guy, Geno has been struggling to find a hot stretch, and Trammell/Haggerty/Pollock have bene rough on the bench. If that all continues, I can't see the Mariners doing enough to make the playoffs.
Reason #1 the Mariners will make the playoffs: The offense will come around
EXCEPT I STILL BELIEVE!
Teoscar is going to figure it out. If he doesn't have a stretch of 15 games where he hits like 6-7 homers and bats .345, i'll be incredibly surprised. Shoot, he might even do it twice over the remainder of the season. Look at what he's done throughout his career, and there is no reason to think he wouldn't put up some hot stretch.
Same with Geno. He goes through spurts, and has always been that way. He will go 21 games with 1 homer, and then he will hit 8 in 11 games. A Geno surge is incoming.
Julio is heating up. Just check how he has done over the last 10 games. He's rocking an insane slash line of .419/.432/.721, with three homers, two steals, and eight multi-hit games. His average is back up to .246, and he's hitting the ball harder than last year and doing it more often as well.
Big Dumper is doing better, as evidenced by his ripped game winning RBI double in the finale against the Yankees. JP Crawford leads all of baseball in exit velo increase, going from 85.1 to 90.3 mph. Kelenic has cooled, but is still hitting .273/.333/.513 with 10 HR and 14 2B.
If these guys can put it together for a while, they could go on a massive run. I'm not predicting a 14 game win streak, cause it would be insane to see that two years in a row. Something along the lines of a stretch of 22-8? Yeah, I could see that happening for sure.
Reason #2 the Mariners won't make the playoffs: They don't sell the farm for an upgrade (again)
Look at some of the moves that the Mariners have made in recent memory. They traded for Geno and Mr. Whiny Pants, giving up a healthy group of prospects. They then called up the Reds once more, grabbing one of the top pitchers in baseball, Luis Castillo, while giving up one of the biggest groups of prospects in Mariners recent history in order to grab him. It looks even better for the Mariners after locking La Piedra up to an extension, but it was still a lot to give up.
Kelenic got here by trading Cano and Edwin Diaz, with some other flotsam involved in the deal. The Mariners don't have a contract like that to offload, so a deal like that is off the table. JP came over for Segura, but that was a deal made with the future in mind, and not the present.
Even the deal with the Padres to get Munoz, Torrens, France, and Trammell was a future move. None of those guys, save possibly France, were expected to do anything quickly for the Mariners. Any trade that they make now would need to be for an immediate upgrade, and I don't think they are going to sell the farm to do so. That being said...
Reason #2 the Mariners will make the playoffs: Trader Jerry and Johnny Boy
Can we really expect the Mariners to make it to the end of July without making a couple of moves? I'm not saying that it has to be something huge. However, getting someone similar to the deal that they made for Tyler Anderson can be a big help to a team. He wasn't great for the Mariners, but knowing that someone is going out there and giving you 5 innings of 3 run ball every single start is helpful.
AJ Pollock, Kolten Wong, and a good portion of the Mariners bench just haven't been good enough for this team to succeed. Runnings multiple guys out there with batting averages well under .200 isn't going to cut it for a team with health playoff aspirations.
Could they find a UTIL guy with .5-1.5 years left on his deal? What about a nice 1B/DH to platoon and give France some days off of the field? How about a corner outfielder that can actually do what Pollock was supposed to do, giving Kelenic a bit of rest once in a while, and keeping Teo out of the field some nights and letting him focus on just hitting.
I could see any of that happening, and if I had to make a bet on players acquired for the MLB roster between here and the deadline with a number of 1.5, I'd take the over on it.
Reason #3 the Mariners won't make the playoffs: There are some darn good teams in the AL
I left this one here, because it's sort of the one that the Mariners have little to no control over. You can't do much about how other teams play outside of playing them yourself, and that's more limited this year than it has been in a long time.
Take a look at the records of the current teams sitting in playoffs spots, as well as their projected records if they keep up this pace for the entire season.
Tampa Bay: 40-18 ( 112-50)
Texas: 35-20 (103-59)
Minnesota: 29-27 ( 84-78)
Baltimore: 35-21 (101-51)
New York: 34-24 (95-67)
Houston: 32-23 (94-68)
With how those teams are doing, and New York and Houston only set to get healthier, it's not going to be easy to make the playoffs. Of course, teams could fall or struggle as we get into the summer, especially with the AL East beating up on itself. Still, you are looking at a handful of teams set to push into the mid 90's or higher for one of those Wild Card spots. The Mariners have a negative -14 run differential, but 13 of that just came against the Yankees.
How confident would you have been about this team getting to 95 wins at the start of the season? I know a lot of us were hoping for something in the 92-96 range, but that was with a fair dash of optimism. If the Mariners can win about 62% of their remaining games, that should get them to 95 wins or so. It's not that farfetched, as it's important to remember that the Mariners won 65% of their games after the 29-39 start last year.
Things aren't going to be easy for the Mariners, things seldom are in baseball. They've got a long path ahead of them, but I'm still confident in this team getting into the low-mid 90s for wins. With over 100 games left, there is a lot of baseball remaining. HOWEVAHHHHH...
Reason #3 the Mariners will make the playoffs: The Pitching Staff
This is the bread and butter of the team. The pitching staff is loaded, and everyone knows it. Castillo, Kirby, Gilbert, Miller. What a group of 4. They're doing that with Robbie Ray out and Chris Flexen in the pen. Marco occasionally gets shelled, but will also throw some gems.
Look at the start that Bryce Miller had to his career. He was literally doing something that had never been done to start someone's career before, and the stretch of 5 starts with 4 or fewer baserunners and some other caveats had only been done a handful of times by any pitcher in their career since 1901. AND HES MAKING HIS DEBUT!
Kirby just hung 8 scoreless on the Yankees. Gilbert threw 8 scoreless as well, even though it was the Athletics, but he did it on just 78 pitches. Then there is Castillo, who might just be the most talented of all of them when he is on.
That's without even talking about the bullpen. Munoz is out, and Festa just came back. Berroa is the holder of some incredibly nasty stuff in the minors, and could see a call-up this season if the need arises. The Mariners have had to make some moves and go through the year without their most dominant reliever, and are still bordering on a top-5 bullpen. You finally find your way through the Mariners pitchers, only to face Munoz and Sewald to close out a game? Yeah, have fun with that.
The season is long. We know that. I feel good about the Mariners, and even though they need to improve, I definitely think they are capable of doing so.
Go Mariners!