If the Mariners do something this year, it’s gonna be grimy
In a good way.
The Seattle Mariners are nothing if not themselves.
To be honest, we should’ve seen the Braves series win coming—but that’s how they get you.
It would be very Mariners for them to rip off a great road trip to get back on track, walk straight into the glass door that is a home sweep on a tentpole weekend and follow that up by getting socked in the earhole by the best team in baseball.
But it’d be even more Mariners to have your Opening Day starter repeatedly receive said shots to the earhole before the club, stumbling around the ring drooling and swinging wildly, lands some haymakers of their own en route to perhaps the best win of the young season.
Sure series win? Oh no, no, no. They were competitive on Tuesday night but immediately after nice bullpen usage by Dan Wilson on Monday, José Ferrer getting Matt Olson late, he goes the other way. How Mariners.
So do the M’s roll over on Wednesday, falter and hand in a perfectly symmetrical 1-5 homestand after a 5-1 roadie? Nah. This is how they pull you along, teasing you like the worst situationship.
I can’t believe the kids made up a word for that.
Anywho, the 2026 Seattle Mariners are not going wire to wire. Not even close.
In my post after the game one win against the Yankees in the second series of the year, I wrote that I hoped 2-2 they were prior to the victory would be the last time this year’s club saw .500. That was, perchance, tempting fate a bit too much.
They saw .500 the next day and twice since, still having not climbed above the water’s surface since their fifth game.
And that water has been pretty choppy for the Mariners. They started down Bryce Miller and Carlos Vargas and have since seen injuries to Brendan Donovan, Matt Brash, Victor Robles and Gabe Speier.
You could say they’ve been unlucky but injuries are the thing folks always overlook in the offseason, when projecting mid-90s win counts (🙋♂️) based on a lineup that always looks like this vs. righties and that vs. lefties and so on.
Guys are going to get hurt and when they do the guy who plays instead of them are very important. You traditionally don’t have someone second in line who would start on some teams—but some clubs do because it isn’t against the rules or anything.
The Mariners started Leo Rivas for a month, bless his heart.
Brendan Donovan again won’t play more than 130 games in a season and when he is back, he’s good—but functionally about the same player as Cole Young. Good hitter for second, but probably not the bat or glove for third.
And then you have this situation where you were planning on your top positional prospect—best since Julio—being ready to fill in pretty quickly but no, he’s got a bad case of the swing and miss.
But when he does look ready and able to help the team, do you move Brendan Donovan to a utility role? Really? Or does he get reps in left, kicking Randy Arozarena into a partial DH platoon in a contract year?
Of course you also have the franchise’s longest-tenured player in J.P. Crawford manning the position Colt Emerson actually plays, and doing so quite poorly.
Don’t even get me started on the rotation.
It’s funny because even the good stuff is grimy; perhaps the best story so far is perpetual #6 swing starter Emerson Hancock turning into one of the best arms in the American League.
And as a result, Luis Castillo is going to pitch out of the bullpen? Really? Remember when Félix did that for like a day? Bizarre vibes.
That isn’t to say all this stuff is bad, though some of it is, but it does all make for a team that’s going to have to grind their way to a quality season.
Oh I almost forgot, they’re like the worst defensive team in baseball or close.
So yeah, if they do end up having the season they want to have or something close to it, it’s not going to be pretty. It’s going to be grimy.
What do I mean by that? Think of golf.
You really lose the handle off the tee on a reasonable par four and launch driver off the planet but some tall firs on the right not only keep it from entering orbit but elbow it towards the fairway.
You got a line. Actually only need the 5-iron. Horrid contact. Thinned like crazy. But it’s going to run. It runs all the way to the right fringe. You get it inside the hula hoop from 25 feet and your buddy says it’s good without thinking much.
It’s par. A grimy-ass par.
Give or take a little, that’s how the Mariners do it. In the successful years and not.
Last year they were riding Jorge Polanco, third baseman, in the early going as the rest of the bats thawed out. Then he was DH, but he could only hit from one side. Naylor rocked. Only kind of grimy because they could’ve got him in the offseason. And Geno being kinda meh fit the bill.
That club, one I’d say was still more talented than this one, needed to win an ungodly amount of games in a very short stretch to have the season they had.
The season was their best ever but that club, like this one, was grimy.
Leo Rivas started Game 7 of the American League Championship Series.
You’d like them to step past that because they need to go further to have a successful season, but just because they haven’t looked better yet doesn’t mean they won’t.
When they do look better, though, it still won’t be pretty. We’re going in circles now.
That’s Mariners Baseball.
It is Friday and a beautiful day in Seattle, Washington.
From the meadowy knoll at Discovery Park,
(Luke Raley literally just hit a grand slam as I type this)
Cheers and Go M’s.