Scott Servais explains why Mariners made a change at shortstop

Mariners manager Scott Servais acknowledged Wednesday afternoon that it was tough to send a guy down after one rough game, but the move was made. After committing two errors in the series opener against the A’s Monday night, Chris Taylor has been optioned back to Triple-A and Luis Sardinas called up.

“You hate to see that happen but what I am looking out for is the group, the 25-man roster and what is best for our team,” Servais said.

What a difference a year makes. In recent years past, with more focus on development of young players at the big league level, we might not have seen this move. Taylor may have been given the chance to get back on the horse again, but with a club that is in first place, things are different. Taylor’s development is still important to the organization and the Mariners are certainly invested as he was included in the hitting summit in January.

“In building a relationship with Chris we have had multiple meetings with him to try and get him in a good spot, comfort zone, where we can get the best out of his ability,” said Servais. “We just haven’t seen that yet. I hate to pull the plug on a guy for one game, but again we’ve got to do what’s best for our team, and what’s best for Chris. And he needs to get over the hump at the big league level and he knows that. And the only way to do that is at the big league level, I get that, but where we are at right now, we have got a good club, we are in first place, I just thought it was best to go with Luis. Chris will be back. Chris will get another opportunity, there’s no doubt.  This is the way we are going now.”

Servais pointed to the fact that Sardinas had won the position out of spring training and also said that roster rules and logistics played into the decision to bring Taylor up Sunday. Sardinas had not been down for 10 days at that point and could not be added back to the 25-man roster unless the Mariners placed a player on the DL. With the three-hour time difference and a day game Sunday, they had to move quickly to get a player to Cincinnati and chose to go with the one who would allow them to not place Marte on the DL if that indeed was an option. It wasn’t, the 10 days are up and Sardinas is back.

While I would expect to see Sardinas get a good amount of time at shortstop, it doesn’t appear he will get all of the starts in Marte’s absence.

“Luis is more of a pure shortstop, but it’s not just we’ll play every day and go from there,” said Servais. “I think Shawn O’Malley has done a really nice job and we will continue to work him in there.”

There might not be too many days available at shortstop. Marte could be hitting off a tee by the end of the weekend and will be eligible to come off the DL June 6.

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