It seems the Seattle Mariners may have finally found their footing. After a difficult start to the season plagued by injury and inconsistency, the Mariners have taken the lead in the AL West and seem poised to hold on for the remainder of the year. It still feels wild to have the Mariners among the best teams in the AL. I never even imagined this was possible. I thought the Mariners had not done enough this offseason and were going to fall back to being a fringe Wild Card team, but I’m glad to be proven
wrong so far.
Part of their inconsistency was the absence of Bryce Miller from the rotation and the… let’s say less-than-ideal performances from Luis Castillo. With Miller returning to the rotation and the breakout season being experienced by Hancock, the question became: should the Mariners run a six-man rotation for the remainder of the season? The answer here was a resounding yes.
Personally, this was not the result I expected. I guess there really is a silent majority that backs Castillo, at least for the first four innings of a game or so; that third time through the lineup hits different. Still, despite the inconsistencies to start the season, the Mariners’ experimentation with the rotation has seemingly worked out. Moving from a six-man rotation to piggyback starts with Miller and Castillo back to a six-man rotation, and somehow, out of all of it, they actually got several quality starts out of both Castillo and Miller. Both Castillo and Miller have another start coming up on the Mariners’ current road swing, so I guess we will see if this six-man rotation can work out like we all hope it will.
Now, for a moment, it did seem like Castillo was “cooked,” as the kids say, and the Mariners would have to move back to a traditional five-man rotation eventually. The question then was, who’s the odd man out if they do so, and you all were not shy about your choice at all.
So I guess it’s good news for Castillo that he seems to have mostly gotten back on track over the past couple of weeks. While the piggybacking was rough, it seems to be just what he and Miller needed to get back into the swing of things. It looks like the Mariners will be sticking with the six-man rotation, at least through the duration of this road trip. After that, who knows!
Cal Raleigh also struggled immensely here at the start of the season, which culminated in an IL stint and a rehab assignment in Triple-A. His injury raised an interesting opportunity for young Jhonny Pereda. Pereda has emerged as a bright spot for the Mariners as a backstop in the absence of Raleigh and amid the continued struggles of Mitch Garver; one has to wonder what the roster will look like when Raleigh is back in action. Pereda has slashed an impressive .288/.351/.404 over 52 at-bats so far this season, admittedly a small sample size, but far better than Garver’s measly .193/.323/.325, and multiple years of poor play behind that. Personally, while Garver has had his moments, I see no reason to stick with him over Pereda should it come to that decision, but let us know what you think in the survey below: has Jhonny Pereda earned a spot on the Mariners roster for the rest of the year?
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