Scott Servais and the Mariners will have a fine line to walk with rest management

What an awful Sunday night in 2021 it was. Seeing Mitch Haniger injured yet again felt like an ‘of course that just happened’ kind of moment. Like you finally got the punchline of a sick joke your buddies have been playing on you all day. Watching him limp off with Servais under his arm felt helpless as a fan. I can only imagine what was going through Mitch and Scott’s minds.

That said, I think we can all assume the Skipper will be hyper-vigilant about doing everything he can to prevent being in the same position. That’s going to include some of the most important guys on this team riding pine from time to time. In past years Servais has used the Designated Hitter spot in the lineup for such occasions. As a way to manage playing time and rest days.

That will be largely unavailable this year though because of our second favorite Mitch. So how will the lineup fare when one or more starters are rooting from the top step in the dugout? How much rest do some of these guys really need? Let’s take a look at the different tiers of guys, how much rest they’ll need and how Servais might approach it.

Mariners and Platoons+

The plus in this case is older guys with injury histories. The great news is that Haniger is already going to be in a 3 man corner outfield platoon with Raley and Canzone so his reps should be limited by that anyway. The not so great part is that he’s the only right hander in that triplet. You can throw Moore in, though I’d rather see his spot given to speedster Samad Taylor. He hits from the right as well and is almost as versatile as Dylan defensively.

The other uncertain platoon is third base. As it stands you can watch what you think of Urias’ ability to throw with an injured shoulder, (yeesh). Rojas is the left hand hitter but will be seeing time at second and short also. Non-roster invite Brian Reynolds could fill in for an injured Urias until he can get right. The other way this could play involves Polanco playing mostly third and Ryan Bliss bombing his way into a shot at handling 2nd.

In both scenarios, Josh Rojas is your infield rest and stop-gap guy along with Moore and possibly Taylor depending on what’s asked of them in the outfield. The ability to have Moore, Taylor, Raley, and Haggerty all man both grass and dirt will be huge for this team. Though one or two of those guys might not fit on the roster all at once. The other natural platoon position is Catcher but that’s going to get a whole section to itself as it couples with DH.

Dumps like a truck, truck, truck

Cal played in 145 games last year, 128 of those were behind the plate. If he repeats that this year Zavala will be the backstop in 34 games. That’s assuming Garver never throws on the pads. CaI will likely not get rest days at DH this year though which would result in his bat in the lineup about 20 less games. I don’t think that’s palatable. He’s one of the most dangerous guys on this roster. Servais might just plan to make Cal available to pinch hit at a crucial moment in the games where he’s sitting.

He could then either be replaced by a utility guy, suit up himself for an inning or two, or let Garver jump back there and dip his toes in at the back end of games, limiting his exposure to injury. I think it’s easier to view catcher workloads by innings. 1,458 of them have to be accounted for at least in a given season. Raleigh logged 1,038 of them in 2023.

I think that’s a great target to shoot for again. Garver posted 230 in Texas last year which was too many. Assuming he gets the last two innings in maybe 20 games tops means I don’t think he should be even scraping 50 over the ‘24 season. We are looking at around 350 innings out of Zavala which probably means 150 plate appearances.

Mind you that’s not many for a backup catcher but this particular one hit a combined .171 across 3 teams with a whopping 47 OPS+ last year. That’s not a major leaguer. There is hope that the 2022 Seby shows up where he hit .270 across 205 plate appearances. I’d bet on somewhere in the .230 range this year. If he’s not near that mark we probably see a call-up to replace him.

Seattle Skipper Scott Servais and his thoughts

We haven’t really seen this kind of Mariner set up in some time with a nearly full-time DH. We can only guess what the playing time breakdown will ultimately look like, but the Mariner Manager had a few interesting quotes to help illuminate a few things in a piece by Daniel Kramer from MLB.com.
When he asked Servias about platooning, 4th outfielder designations, and matchup rotations, he responded...

“I think all of them may be correct...Not just me, but most managers, you ride the hot hand... There’ll be some guys that are not going to be happy every day not being in the lineup, but that's a good thing”

Scott isn’t too big on giving precise answers on these kinds of things, for instance in his spring training interview with Brock and Salk of Seattle Sports the skipper wouldn’t even name Castillo the opening day starter. Rather saying that he is “definitely one of the best 5 starters this year”. 

We do know that Servais has played the right vs left matchup rather heavily when constructing his lineups. Canzone, Raley and Rojas get most of the run against RHP, while Haniger, Urias, Moore and Taylor see more LHP. 

All in all I think this breakdown of plate appearances is likely for each platoon player:

Dylan Moore and Samad Taylor probably split 250 appearances with the majority of them coming in corner OF spots. I think those splits give everybody enough rest and keep the lineup potent. I can say with confidence in any case, I trust Servais to pull the right levers. He’ll also be getting a ton of input from newcomer Brant Brown on approaching matchups. May the odds be ever in our favor.

Lots of love and GO Mariners!