Morosi: New-look lineup can help Mariners avoid another slow start

The Seattle Mariners’ opening day roster will look very different from last year, with roughly half the 26-man roster set to be different than what the M’s rolled out in the first game of 2023.

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That’s especially true in the lineup, where the Mariners are expected to have just four members of their 2023 opening day lineup start come Game 1 of 2024.

The Mariners had a slower start to the offseason and did more subtraction than addition early on before adding a number of veteran bats like Jorge Polanco, Mitch Garver, Luke Raley and Mitch Haniger.

“It is, I do think, a better team than what they had in terms of that quality, the well-roundedness, the ability to execute right now, than they maybe had a year ago,” MLB Network’s Jon Morosi told Seattle Sports’ Wyman and Bob on Wednesday.

The Mariners traded a promising young player in Jarred Kelenic to Atlanta in order to sell off two bigger contracts of Evan White and Marco Gonzales. But Morosi thinks that trade was about moer than just shedding salary.

“The Mariners simply could not wait any longer for him to figure it out on a more consistent basis in terms of putting the ball in play and being able to have, as you’re describing, those situational at-bats,” Morosi said. “He may – he probably will – over the fullness of time, be a more complete player than Luke Raley. He’s got the higher ceiling, perhaps. But right now, they needed Luke Raley and they needed Mitch Haniger to come back. They needed what Mitch Garver gives them, what Jorge Polanco gives them.”

Slow starts have been a big problem for the Mariners over the last three years. They needed a big summer turnaround in 2022 in order to make the playoffs, but they fell just short of a postseason berth in 2021 and 2023 in part because they didn’t play well in April and May.

“Really, half of the lineup was not part of this team when last season started … They’ve changed out a lot of pieces,” Morosi said. “And I’m sure, without putting words in (manager Scott Servais’) mouth, I’m sure that’s been a huge focus about getting off to a better start,” Morosi said. “Obviously everybody wants to have a good start, but you’re not going to allow this team — you can’t, really — let them work into the season and kind of feel their way through April. Last April, they went 12-16 and that cost them a playoff berth. It did. If they if they go 14-14, if they’re just .500 (in April), they’re in the playoffs. So that’s where you look at segments of time, there’s no just kind of easing into this. There can’t be.”

A big part of that will be the new bats, who are all veterans.

“I think that a smoother start with some more veteran bats to put the ball in play more often is going to be a great way to begin 2024 for the Mariners,” Morosi said.

Another key? A better start for superstar outfielder Julio Rodríguez, who struggled in April as a rookie in 2022 before taking off and had poor first-half numbers in 2023 before a hot finish resulted in him finishing fourth in AL MVP voting.

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“If Julio, who described last year as having a ‘sophomore slump’ in what was still in a top-five MVP-type of a season, if he’s going to get even better, he’s the kind of guy that can erase a lot of shortcomings. And I look for him to be better from the very beginning of the season,” Morosi said. “And even when for a player that talented when he’s just a little bit more consistently brilliant … will change a lot. You think back to some of the losing streaks they had (early in the season) … that’s where they lost the division. When you look back, that was where it happened. We didn’t know it at the time, but that’s where it happened.”

Listen to Wyman and Bob’s full conversation with Jon Morosi at this link or in the player near the top of this story.

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