Should the Mariners shuffle the pen?

Relievers are volatile. We've all seen it and heard it before specifically, with the Mariners in Fernando Rodney, Diego Castillo, Matt Festa, and this season Andres Munoz. While it might seem like the sky is falling in the Seattle bullpen, they still sit in the bottom third with 15 blown saves (27th in MLB). There is undoubtedly some recency bias at play this week, as the once-hottest team in baseball has blown three games late.

Some fans will clamor as the Paul Sewald trade being the watershed moment, heralding the move as robbing Peter (relief) to pay Paul (offense). Others say if owner John Stanton ponied up some cash in the offseason, we wouldn't have had to trade a key bullpen arm. Then there is another camp that points to veterans who underperformed until midseason (Ty France, Geno Suarez, Teoscar Hernandez). It's a combination of the above, but that's neither here nor there.

The real question is, what will manager Scott Servais do about it? Gone are the days when teams would float high-priced under-performing players through waivers in August and early September. The third wild card has changed everything. The only move Servais can make to solidify the game's back end is possibly shuffling the pen. Thankfully, there are a few moves Servais can make ahead of the upcoming series with Houston to right the ship.