The Mariners have reduced their spring training roster to 45 players. The team announced Friday that it optioned two infielders (Patrick Wisdom and Donovan Walton) and a pair of right-handers (Zac Grotz and Taylor Williams) to Triple-A Tacoma.
Every member of the quartet has garnered some major league experience, but Wisdom may be the most notable name in the group. He’s a former high selection of the Cardinals, who took him 52nd overall in the 2012 draft. But Wisdom, now 28 years old, has only totaled 86 major league plate appearances to this point. He spent almost all of last season as a member of the Rangers’ Triple-A affiliate, with which he batted .240/.332/.513 (97 wRC+) and hit 31 home runs in 453 plate appearances. Wisdom then joined the Mariners on a minor league contract back in November.
Walton, 25, ranks as the Mariners’ No. 24 prospect at MLB.com. He did appear in seven games with Seattle last season, but he hasn’t even played at the Triple-A level yet. Walton was quite effective in Double-A ball last season, though, as he slashed .300/.390/.427 (134 wRC+) with 11 homers, 10 steals and almost as many walks (63) as strikeouts (72).
As for the optioned pitchers, the 28-year-old Williams became a Mariner in February by way of a waiver claim from the Brewers. He racked up 53 innings out of the Brewers’ bullpen in 2018, parlaying a 95 mph fastball into a respectable 4.25 ERA/3.95 FIP with 9.68 K/9 and 4.25 BB/9. But Williams spent the majority of last season at the highest level of the minors, thanks in no small part to the near-10.00 ERA he posted over 14 2/3 innings in Milwaukee.
Grotz, a former Astros, Dodgers and Mets farmhand, is in his second year in the Seattle organization. He amassed a combined 77 2/3 innings among the Double-A, Triple-A and major league levels last season. In his first 17 1/3 frames in the bigs, Grotz notched 18 strikeouts and allowed eight earned runs on 14 hits and eight walks.
When is Dealin Dipoto going to wake up?
What part of this news are you disagreeing with?
All that Wisdom for nothing
Should of traded Haniger last year, even if he puts up 2018 numbers his value will never come close to what they could have got .
And they should’ve drafted Anthony Rendon instead of Dustin Ackley but you don’t get do-overs in life! In fact, if we’re playing the should’ve game- they should’ve traded him after his All-Star 2018 season! That’s the Ms org in a nut- shell. What could have been. Google 10 worst Mariners trades and you’ll see what I mean!
Rendon instead of Hultzen, you mean. They shouldn’t have swept the last series of the season to get the #2 pick instead of Strasburg when they ended up with Ackley.
They got rid of Cano. That makes up for a whole host of sins.
Took me a while to get over the pain of letting Eddie go but that has the potential to be one of their best moves ever! Still, it’s a drop in the ocean of bad Mariners trades. Trust me, ask google about our trades
Given how horrible both Cano (aging) and Eddie (the inherent fickleness of all RP not named Mariano Rivera) were last year, that trade is all-but-guaranteed to be one of the most lopsided in the FA era even if none of the prospects acquired by the M’s amount to anything.
The fact that all of those prospects have climbed even higher in the last year could make this one of the most lopsided trades in all of MLB history. It won’t top selling The Babe, but it has every bit of potential to eclipse the M’s least (Lowe+Varitek for a bad RP) and most favorable (Buhner for Phelps) trades. Just only Kelenic puts it right there with both. Dunn, Scheiner and even Bautista add in further wild cards in the David “Arias” for Dave Hollins mold.
Funny how this site turns comments off for articles involving Blue Jays’ catcher Reese McGuire. He was just pulling his goalie!
Why turn off comments for the “East Notes” article? Whatever topic it was that was considered too sensitive to comment on should have just been given its own article.
Shut up.
The numbers may mot show it but Zac Grotz was having a pretty good Spring. First Tui then Grotz- it may sound odd but those two transactions give me a little hope re: the M’s bullpen. On the surface there seems to be an improvement in talent from last years pen, esp the first half of last season. Gerber and Delaplane (except for 1 bad outing) were impressive in ST. Swanny, Magill and Brennan. We’ll see about Hirano and Edwards Jr. This may be controversial but I like Justin Dunn as the long inn relief/ middle relief pitcher especially if the AAA baseball is similar to the one used last year. I don’t see the benefit of putting Dunn in the PCL if we use the 2019 ball. Later in the year hopefully Austin Adams will return from the IR
The only thing I’ll disagree with is the assertion that Dunn *must* be moved to LR (the garbage bin of pitching) with no basis on his performance.
He did far, far too well as a SP in AA to warrant that kind of move right away. Long Relief is for those who’ve failed as SP, then in Short Relief and then in Middle Relief Given that Dunn not only hasn’t failed yet as a SP, but has still been very successful to date, it would be irrational and worthless to throw him away like that.
Don’t forget the trade ! Fletcher…Remember the name!!
hey nfl hasnt been canceled……………………………..yet……………………………….