Cole Young

Then with one out and a runner on third, you do give up the double.

But then now you have runner on second, one out, Naylor and Cole Young up.

Again, two lefties that hit righties well.

Naylor, one of the best, if not the best hitter on the Mariners this season.

And then how about Watson coming in, getting another save, gives up one hit.

It gets dicey when you're coming in for a save when you have a one-run lead, and it's especially dicey when you do give up a hit.

It's especially dicey when it's a one-out single with Cole Young coming up, but you get the double play, a great play in the field, and Ryan Watson earns the save to cap off a phenomenal pitching performance from the Angels to make it back-to-back great wins against the Mariners.

Both wins, the pitching very good as the Angels take the first two in the series.

You're, you're building your bench and your margin pieces of the roster of guys that are way better athletes.

And then you pair it with Cole Young and Colt Emerson and s- and players of that...

And Julio, obviously.

I shouldn't leave him out.

Uh, if you are going to list out by fWAR players you are confident in producing three fWAR for the Mariners next year, I only have two based on the performances of this season.

It's only Cal and Julio.

I can't even write down Cole Young for fWAR, because Cole Young hasn't, as good as his season has been, solid as his season has been, hasn't produced three fWAR this season.

Uh, if you do by bWAR, Cole Young is added to that list.

But, you know, they have Emerson, he obviously had the season-ending surgery and, and who knows how long that was like really impacting him as he struggled at the plate beforehand.

But they had already given, uh, Emerson some, some reps at, or, uh, excuse me, given Crawford some reps at third base to, in kind of deference to Emerson saying, "Hey, he's gonna be the shortstop long-term." You know, Cole Young has had a good, not great season over at second base.

And so it's, well, does Michael Arroyo fit in there? Does Michael Arroyo fit in over at third base? Are you gonna move Brendan Donovan to the outfield next year? Um, you know, is, is he gonna be fully healthy after the injury kind of marred season that he's had? There's a lot of questions, and I think just seeing how some of these infield pieces specifically, um, you know, are, or these prospects specifically, you know, performed on the stretch is, is gonna be telling as to, you know, kind of what iteration of, of the Mariners lineup we're gonna see taking the field next year.

Uh, I don't think there's much doubt that the pitching staff is gonna be, um, formidable.

Like, more doubles power than home runs power, but still, like, been an above average hitter since, for the majority of the season.

Um, th- and then all these, you know, young kids they have coming up.

I kind of like glazing over Cole Young saying he's had like a decent season, but he's, he's gonna finish as like a two and a half win second baseman.

Like, pretty solid for a guy who's really in his first full major league season.

He might get a squeeze and a start here.

Cole Young missed a lineup he got hit in the back last week, and I know he missed a start as a result.

They brought up Michael Arroyo.

Same thing with J.P. Crawford.

Has been banged up recently as well.

So Michael Arroyo might be someone to keep an eye on as a potential stream with the little bit of banged up here from Cole Young and J.P. Crawford.

And then let's see here.

I have some notes here.

Yeah, maybe just an extra infielder.

Because what I would like to see is Brendan Donovan at third, Cole Emerson at short, and then Cole Young and Josh Naylor.

Isn't that what everybody pretty much generally thinks?

I'd actually like to see them go get a third baseman, a natural third baseman, and let Donovan be your guy who's in the lineup every day, whether he's playing right field, whether he's playing left field.

He's been such a great individual for this organization.

But I'm just trying to figure out, does he fit next year? If you're making a concerted effort to say, no, we are world series or bust kind of mentality, and everybody's got a different definition of what that would be, could he be part of that? Because I don't know with Donovan there how JP fits in.

Assuming Colt Emerson is your shortstop to start the year and Cole Young is your second baseman, where would JP fit?

Yeah, I think I'm most excited about Colt Emerson.

Jeff McNeil would lace an RBI double, bringing home Henry Bolte to tie the game 1-1.

Three batters later, Max Muncy would reach on an infield single, and McNeil would come around the score following the throwing error by Cole Young.

The A's now have grabbed a 2-1 lead.

To the second inning we go.

In this game, Randy Rosarena hit one of Seattle's five home runs in a, yeah, that's right, 19-1 shellacking over the A's last Saturday night.

It was the Mariners' biggest ever margin of victory.

J.P. Crawford, Dominic Canzone, and Cole Young each added two run homers, and Michael Arroyo had a solo shot for his first big league home run.

Weston Wilson had five hits and scored three runs.

Mm-hmm.

4.4. For reference, Randy is 5.0. Cole 4.4. Cole Young was 4.4 this year.

Mm.

Canzone, 2.4.

Whether it's hitting strategy and hearing players say in that Adam Jude article that, you know, they were hearing mixed messages, to how the piggyback was communicated or not-

Mm-hmm

... to the injuries, uh, like the Cole Young, I'm sorry, the Colt Emerson one, to the way it was communicated to the media, which was essentially not at all.

Communication on this team was severely lacking over the course of the season.

Colt Emerson will be back, and I imagine he will be penciled in as the shortstop.

Cole Young as the second baseman.

I don't know where Arroyo plays.

Maybe you have him in a super utility role or maybe you put him at an infield position and just move Donovan around, 'cause you know he can play outfield as well.

Like, I, I'm not necessarily disagreeing.

Those guys are probably two of your three best hitters this year.

Like, you take those guys out of the lineup this year, y- you're, uh, you're essentially just the Dom Canzone and Cole Young Mariners.

Uh, [laughs] I understand why you immediately move on from both.