Last season showed a
lot why the Seattle Mariners had a bad year. I am not saying they were the only
reason the Mariners were under five hundred and did not make the playoffs as
most thought they would.
Mike Zunino had a
super sophomore jinx batting way below the Mendoza line of two hundred. Also he
hit a lot less home runs as well. The only thing going for him was his defense
that was still exceptional. The Mariners
finally sent him down near the end of August when the season was over for the
Mariners instead of doing so in May. They should have played Jesus Sucre once
or twice more each week. Though he was not hitting that while Sucre plays
pretty good defense too; he may have hit better playing more often than once in
a while. We saw that somewhat in September when Sucre played more with Zunino
being sent down to Tacoma and was not brought up again when the Triple A season
was over. Zunino was sent instead to Arizona to work on his hitting.
The Seattle Mariners
signed a free agent catcher and traded for another during the off-season under
the new general Jerry Dipoto. This was one of a lot of transactions Dipoto has
made so far before training camp starts in four weeks. Unfortunately Sucre was
injured a couple weeks ago in winter ball back in his home country of Venezuela.
He broke his leg and he will be out for most if not all of spring training. He
likely will start the season in triple A though likely would have if he had not
been injured anyway.
Though he still is
considered the catcher of the future for the Mariners Mike Zunino likely will
start this coming season with Tacoma. We can all agree that he was probably
brought up too early to play for the Mariners. Zunino has worked a lot on his
hitting in Arizona during September. He lives in Florida during the off-season
so I am sure he has spent some time working on his hitting there as well. He
could be called up sometime during the season if his hitting comes through in
Tacoma. At least he does not have the pressure on him to perform this season.
Likely he will be the Mariners number one catcher in 2017.
The first catcher the
Mariners acquired was free agent Chris Iannetta who played with division rival
the Angels. Last year he had an off year batting .188 however Dipoto is
expecting him to recover this season. Dipoto though does not expect Iannetta
play almost every day like Zunino did last season. The other catcher the
Mariners got from the Baltimore Orioles Steve Clevenger in the trade from Mark
Trumbo. He likely will catch a couple times a week against tough right handed
pitchers since he bats left handed. He may play first base every once in a
while as well although they have Adam Lind another left handed hitter who will
play most of the time against right handed hitters. It is nice to have
Clevenger to add depth to catcher and first base in case of injuries. He will
be used sometimes as a pinch hitter as well.
With the acquisitions
of Iannetta and Clevenger will give Mariners the depth at catcher they did not have
last year. Along with the fact Zunino will be available at Tacoma. This is what
I especially liked what Dipoto did with the roster this off-season was to
increase the depth along with on base percentage. Most every position player acquired
had a higher on base percentage than those they traded away.
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