The Mariners can start playing for October with their rotation

The Seattle Mariners’ pitching staff has been a hot topic lately.

The status of Mariners’ Josh Naylor after exiting Monday’s game

With Bryce Miller returning from the injured list last month, the M’s found themselves with six healthy starting pitchers. They chose to piggyback Miller and Luis Castillo in the same rotation spot rather than using a six-man rotation or moving a starter to the bullpen – a decision that proved to be both controversial and surprisingly effective.

Now the Mariners are shifting to a six-man rotation going into their upcoming road trip that will see them play 10 games in 10 straight days against three different opponents.

“I think they are doing the more sensible thing long term,” ESPN MLB insider Jeff Passan said Tuesday on Seattle Sports’ Brock and Salk about the Mariners’ move to a six-man rotation. “… It seems like the most reasonable thing for this team to be doing, and not just short term. I do think that this potentially could keep arms fresher for October.”

That’s right – Passan said October, which is still some four months away. And while the Mariners are sitting in first place in the AL West, they’ve held that spot for less than a week.

That being said, the Mariners’ expectations are to get back in the postseason and make it deeper than they did a year ago, which means they’re aiming for a World Series. Considering the shape their starting pitching is in, and how down the American League is as a whole, it wouldn’t be a bad idea for the M’s to take this as an opportunity to conserve their pitchers’ workloads with their eye on the postseason.

After all, that’s what the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers do.

“When we look at the most successful franchise in major league baseball right now, it is unequivocally the Los Angeles Dodgers,” Passan said. “They’ve won two consecutive World Series, but even beyond that, year in, year out, they are atop the National League West. And how do they play things? They do it with, yeah, we’re, we’re going to prioritize and focus on what’s going on right now, but we’re not going to lose sight of what could be going on in October.”

Utilizing a six-man rotation on a regular basis means your top pitchers will get a few less starts over the course of a season than in a typical five-man rotation. When you’re just trying to get into the playoffs, that can be a problem. But if you’re pretty sure you’ll be punching a ticket to October, it could instead be a big positive.

“Maybe because the Mariners don’t have quite the grip on the American League West that the Dodgers do on the National League West, putting that into play is a little bit trickier,” Passan continued. “But at the end of the day, if you have a fresh Luis Castillo, and a fresh Logan Gilbert, a fresh George Kirby and Emerson Hancock and Bryan Woo and Bryce Miller, all the way down to the point where the season really, truly matters, you’ve put yourself in an advantaged position.”

ESPN MLB insider Jeff Passan is a weekly guest on Seattle Sports’ Brock and Salk. Hear a podcast of the full conversation from Tuesday at this link or in the player below, and catch Brock and Salk live from 6-10 a.m. weekdays on Seattle Sports.

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