The Mariners are poised for one of their most active offseasons in years, with their recent retooling effort having reached its conclusion. Before turning their attention to outside acquisitions, they’ll have to determine whether to retain a few of their own key players. This morning, MLBTR’s Steve Adams covered their looming decision regarding Kyle Seager, and Seattle will also have some notable calls to make on the pitching side.
Yusei Kikuchi, the team’s All-Star representative, could hit the open market. The team has to decide on a four-year, $66MM package deal of conjoined club options this winter. If the club declines to make that long-term commitment, Kikuchi will either exercise his own $13MM option to return in 2022 or choose to test free agency.
Entering the season, the team exercising the options looked like a long shot. Kikuchi then got off to the best start of his three-year MLB career, seemingly making that a tougher call for the front office, as Steve explored here in early July. Over the season’s first half, the 30-year-old worked to a 3.48 ERA across 98 1/3 innings, en route to the aforementioned All-Star selection. He’s struggled mightily over the past couple months, though, with just a 6.04 ERA in 47 2/3 frames. The southpaw’s strikeout rate has dipped a couple percentage points relative to the season’s first few months, while his walk rate has spiked. He’s also been tagged for eleven home runs in his last ten starts as his rate of hard contact allowed has ticked up.
Given those recent struggles, the odds the club picks up Kikuchi’s options look to be dwindling, writes Corey Brock of the Athletic. That’s not particularly surprising, as the southpaw now owns a 4.32 ERA with league average strikeout and walk rates (24.3% and 9.3%, respectively) over the course of the season. Paired with his subpar showings in 2019-20, making that level of long-term commitment to Kikuchi would seem quite risky, even for a club with ample payroll space.
Declining the options would give Kikuchi the chance to become the third Mariners’ starter to hit the open market, joining James Paxton and Tyler Anderson. Seattle could be motivated to bring Anderson back, as he’s fared well since being acquired from the Pirates in a midseason deal. Over eight starts, the southpaw has a 3.83 ERA, offsetting a below-average 18.1% strikeout percentage with a very low 3.7% walk rate. Anderson tells Brock he’d have interest in re-signing with Seattle, and M’s manager Scott Servais said he’s “very intrigued” about the possibility of a reunion, opining that Anderson “would be a good fit going forward.”
Anderson has posted back-to-back reliable seasons. Since the start of 2020, the 31-year-old has a 4.25 ERA in 207 2/3 innings. He hasn’t missed many bats, but he throws plenty of strikes and has done fairly well to avoid damaging contact. It’s possible he and his representatives look for a multi-year deal this offseason, but Anderson was limited to a one-year, $2.5MM guarantee last winter and has split this season between two clubs with pitcher-friendly home ballparks.
In addition to augmenting the group in free agency, the Mariners could look into a long-term deal with one of their pitchers already under team control. Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reports that Seattle offered righty Logan Gilbert an extension last September, which the former first-round pick declined. Rosenthal doesn’t suggest there are any plans for a future offer in the near future, but it wouldn’t be surprising if the front office decides to make another effort at some point.
Gilbert had yet to make his big league debut at the time of the M’s offer, but he’s since made his first twenty starts. While the 24-year-old only has a 5.10 ERA, his peripherals have been far more encouraging. Gilbert’s 26% strikeout rate and 5.1% walk percentage are each a few points better than the league average, as is his 12.7% swinging strike rate. The front office is likely as bullish as ever on the young starter’s long-term outlook.
While Gilbert reached the majors this year, his mid-May promotion was late enough in the season that he won’t accrue a full year of service time. He won’t reach free agency until after the 2027 season, although his promotion should enable him to qualify for early arbitration as a Super Two player over the 2023-24 offseason (assuming the existing service time structure survives this winter’s collective bargaining negotiations). No starting pitcher in the 0-1 year service class has signed an extension since Chris Archer’s April 2014 deal with the Rays. With nothing of recent precedent, it could be difficult for the sides to line up on a mutually agreeable price point.
Noah Daube-Valois
Love MLBTR… but where the heck is that article about the Renfroe craziness??!!
Wilmer the Thrillmer
I didn’t know anything about the Renfroe craziness until I just Googled it.
Yikes. To say his comments are incendiary would be a massive understatement.
bucsfan0004
Seems like MLB is reverting back to the ol’ Trump tactics – don’t test for Covid, and you won’t find it. Haha
mrmackey
I don’t recall that being a tactic. It was pointed out though that as you test for a novel virus that never had a test made for it more and more, you will of course discover more and more cases. The media turned that as usual in to “it’s Drumph’s fault!! We’re having a spike in cases!”. Perceptive people saw through it.
shyzer
Trump’s own words clearly show less testing was a tactic:
“You know, testing is a double-edged sword. We’ve tested now 25 million people. It’s probably 20 million people more than anybody else. Germany’s done a lot. South Korea’s done a lot. They call me, they say the job you’re doing. Here’s the bad part, when you test the, when you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people, you’re going to find more cases.
*So I said to my people, slow the testing down please!* They test and they test. We had tests, the people don’t know what’s going on. We got tests. We got another one over here. The young man’s 10 years old. He’s got the sniffles. He’ll recover in about 15 minutes. That’s a case. Add him too, that’s a case.”
news.yahoo.com/trump-said-people-slow-testing-1926…
Three days later, he reiterated he wasn’t joking
“But when asked by CBS News’ Weijia Jiang on Tuesday if he was kidding when he made those remarks, Mr. Trump replied, “I don’t kid.”
While he praised the U.S. for conducting millions of tests, he said increased availability of tests is a “double-edged sword.””
cbsnews.com/news/trump-slow-down-testing-coronavir…
mrmackey
Yes it’s double edged as it allows propagandists to run wild.
BeforeMcCourt
At this point, the guy claiming testing is the problem is the propagandist….look in the mirror, mrmackey
Dogham
Could be worse……you could be going to PetCo to try to get some horse dewormer or fish tank cleaner because someone without a medical degree told you it was okay.
Deleted User
Is Renfroe crazy or is the league gaslighting him?
Noah Daube-Valois
I think the league is gaslighting because I don’t see an incentive for him to lie. There’s a chance he misunderstood something, but in that case he would have came out with an apology. Of course the leugue wouldn’t admit to it if it was true and I don’t think it would be good for the red sox executives if they said it was true.
DP@14
I’m really hopeful and anxious to see what they do this off-season. This season has been amazing as a fan.
Wilmer the Thrillmer
No way they give him the 4 year extension. He’ll exercise his 13mil player option and have another opportunity to have a breakout year.
bloomquist4hof
That would be ideal for the team. I could see negotiating a 2/25 with him or something.
Stevil
Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times pointed out that Seattle would have to pay the Lions an additional cut, which virtually everyone forgot about, so the 66m would actually be much higher.
The real question now is whether or not he’ll pitch well enough the rest of the way to test free agency.
Fred Park
Stevil, think Kikuchi is probably done as far as having any more good years.
He seemed to me to be always right at his limit, and was having some nice lucky breaks.
Divish might agree with that, too, off the record at least.
Dorothy_Mantooth
If he’ll be healthy, they should re-sign Paxton for sure. It also makes sense to bring back Anderson, keep Flexen and I guess they let Kikuchi walk unless he exercises his one year option. The Mariners are set up to make big additions to this team this offseason. It’s great to see them become a competitive franchise again.
BPG86
I really don’t want to see a rotation with 3 or more lefies again next year. Marco and one other will be more than sufficient.
ballgawd
Flexen has two years (23 is a $MM club option) on his contract, plus two years of abritration.
hoof hearted
Seagar and Kikuchi-
“let ’em go, let ’em go.
dont hold on to ’em anymore
let ’em go, let ’em go
turn away and close that door”
Anderson; might be nice to keep him around.
Deleted User
I think your daughter got ahold of your account
MarinerJunky
Let both Seager and Kikuchi walk. Kikuchi is a Boras client so I see he walking to test FA and offer Anderson a nice two year deal since he pitches well in Safeco as a 4th starter.
This will leave Seattle with around 40M on the books for their current contacts and Arb for the current players. Payroll should be at least 120M for 2022 and they only need a TOR arm, a SS or 2B and an OF bat.
painterman360
I think they need to sign two aces, a 2B, DH, two quality OF that can clutch hit for when we load the bases and all of a sudden we have the 7,8,9 hitters trying to bring in runs
bloomquist4hof
Which is why I said 75 wins if they don’t do anything in the Seager thread. They need alot of people to sign or to trade for this off-season. Also why I said keeping Kikuchi and Seager might make sense. Projections don’t work like some people seem to think here. You don’t add to this year’s total and call it good. You come up with team projections, attempt to figure depth and in the case of the bullpen leverage, then look at strength of schedule once we know it. They could very well win 90+ games but that’s going to require the right talent influx, player development, and luck. I have a fair bit of faith they can be good. They have the money and trade capital. I think their future is bright, I’m just being real.
bloomquist4hof
They have to negotiate with enough teams and players to add that talent. It’ll he a tall order without gross overspending of money and talent capital. Keeping Kikuchi and Seager would reduce that need a but. That’s all I said. Kikuchi is a likely bad deal but there’s a non zero its not. If they did that and used Toro at 2B they could find an ok utility infielder as insurance, focus on DH or OF, possibly using Haniger and Lewis at DH depending on who they bring in, overspend on an front line SP maybe trade for a reliable mid rotation type too (or resign Anderson) add a veteran Bullpen arm because you always end up needing them and they look good. Just don’t block Rodiguez or Kirby which I doubt is an issue.
bloomquist4hof
I’m not actually advocating keeping Kikuchi at 4/66. I think he’s likely not to give up as many home runs as he’s doing but a reasonable projection is a 3/4 type going down hill from there not worth 4/66 with Kirby and Hancock knocking on the door let alone Williamson and a few others. If they could plug someone like Alex Cobb on they might even do better for less especially considering the point made here of additional funds owed to the lions. My point is it would reduce the need to negotiate with even more people to plug the hole of losing him.
ArianaGrandSlam
Dump him.
IslandM's
If the Ms is serious about going to the WS next season, they should only look for the best to improve the team. If we can get a better pitcher than Kikuchi, we should let him go. Kyle Seager must go due to his BA. If we have a big budget in the free agency, go with the big fishes but be smart.
As of now, If I am Dipoto, I would assemble a best WS team.
1. JP Crawford (SS)
2. CCorrea (3B/SS) – FA
3. MSemien (2B) – FA
4. NCostelanos (DH/RF/1B) – FA
5. Haniger (RF/DH)
6. France (3B/2B/1B/DH)
7. KLewis (CF)
8. Murphy (C)
9. Kelenic (LF/CF)
Bench:
1. Toro (3B/2B)
2. C Raleigh (C)
3. Fraley (OF)
4. DMoore (IF/OF)
5. Luis Torrens (LF/DH)
Starting Pitcher
1. KGausman (FA)
2. Stroman (FA)
3. Gonzales
4. Flexen
5. LGilbert
6. MBash
Relieve.
1. JSmith
2. Doolittle
3 Hector Santiago
4. Diego Castillo
5. Steckenrider
6. Casey Sadler
7. Kevin Graveman (FA)
Tacoma
1. KGiles
2. IF SLong
3. SP JDunn
4. SP Sheffield
5. OF JBauers
6. RP MAndriese
7. OF Trammel
8. 1B EWhite