How could you help me? What would you say to Julio? How would you try to help Julio get back to being who we all know he can be?

Man, there's so much good that Julio does, but it's clear that...

The thing that I just said about kind of the mental fatigue and the disconnect that shows up in August into the rest of the year is present for him.

And then also the 2020 that was just celebrated.

Such a milestone for him.

The only major league player in history to ever do that five years to start a career.

You say things like that and you're like, but then you watch what the product and the quality of that is on the field and you're like, I don't see the alignment or the synergy there.

So what's turned with Cal over the last month plus?

Mm.

There hasn't been many stretches this season where you see the starting pitching and the offense just clicking together, and it's tough to win.

A- and I feel like there's been so many times over the course of the season where the starting pitching has been tremendous, and they got no run support.

And now, like, the offense is producing more than maybe they were, but it's still not, like, consistent and aligned.

And now this, when the starting pitching is struggling, there's no one to back them up, and now they kinda get the backlashing of, you know, what August has been.

Uh, and if you look to the numbers, the runs per game that they have allowed, just the team ERA overall in general, the starting pitching has certainly struggled.

Um, but I don't feel like that's the, the main source of the problem.

Mm-hmm.

But like when you g- when you hear more stories about like in your neighborhood of, you know, West Hills, California

CaliforniaThere's a bunch of guys who go off and play college baseball, right? Like, in DFW, there's a bunch of guys who go off to play college baseball.

So it's like, it's this, like, it feels close enough to do, but also it gives them, like...

Man, like watch that guy do this.

Like, watch this guy work at that.

Watch this guy pick up his teammate.

Watch this guy, you know, just struck out, and he goes in and hurries up and gets his stuff on and goes out there.

Okay.

Good.

The piggyback has a negative connotation attached to it, and what this actually is, is it's a starter surplus.

There is a surplus of quality starting pitchers that the Mariners have, and what I love is they went through this process once, and there was a lot of disgruntled players.

And then they came back from it after the long road trip, and they saw, "Man, this, uh, starter surplus is actually really hurting our bullpen, and we just lost a couple of really important, you know, key arms in that bullpen of, uh, long relief in Chris Well and then Brash, a high-leverage arm.

Maybe we should all come together and, and, you know, do this together, and maybe we should all bite the bullet and be a part of this and recognize that if we continue to make this a big deal, they're gonna have to trade someone.

And if we actually wanna be together and stay on this team and wanna help this team get to World Series, then let's all do this together and, you know, bear the brunt of it and distribute it more evenly." How that functions, I don't know.

I haven't even looked at the schedule down the road to map it out.

Is that a challenge? Is that detrimental, or is that something in your life experience with pitchers if it's laid out with these guys, and this group in particular, of the way they're wired, they can make it work?

[laughs]

And I think for me, the more impressive piece, 'cause, like, when you're young, you're twitchy, you have those skillsets.

A lot of those are, you know, developed before you ever get to the Major Leagues.

It's, I feel like it's covered his tail quite a bit with velocity.

Like, he has the ability to get on time with below the top of the zone.

The more impressive piece of Colt, though, is the mindset.

When I was up there against the D-backs, he punched out three times on Friday night, and then stepped out there Saturday and hit a big home run.

Good.

Yeah.

So now being on the media side, I'm forced to think about things from different perspectives, whereas a player, I have one job and one job only, and I'm gonna go prepare myself for that, and anything that you ask me outside of that job is a distraction to me doing my job well.

Whereas now I'm k- I'm more interested in, in the bunch of moving parts.

I'm interested to hear what fans are thinking and feeling.

I'm interested to hear the media's perspective on what they might, you know, be seeing with this type of, um, play or roster decision or game decision.

I'm interested in how all those things function.

But I'm still learning a ton about the media side and, and how can I be critical but also respectful, because I know how hard it is to succeed and also fail at the major leagues, and I never wanna lose that tone.

Did that 2018 season feel like you were at the end of a window, or at the end of, uh, you know, a last shot with this group? Did it feel that way to you as a player at the time?

As a former player and, and guy who's been around the game your whole life, how do expectations, uh, affect a player or a team?

I heard this quote recently, and I thought it demonstrated how a team and fan base can function in unison, and the, the separation between expectation and reality is where frustration is built.

And this team and fans use the World Series expectations, you know, for the entire camp.

And games don't matter in spring training.

You're there for a specific purpose, and quite frankly, the Mariners were without a large percentage of their Major League roster during camp, so it's hard to build up that camaraderie and make sure that the guys were going to get the reps that they needed to feel like they were prepared for game one.

But that frustration has been brewing because the expectation is we're gonna go out there, win 162, and win a World Series and sweep every series.

That's not baseball.

Um, did that kinda perk any thought there in the sixth? 'Cause obviously it turns around in the eighth and comes back and bites you.