The Seattle Mariners are looking to make it to the knockout stages for the first time in more than 20 years. Ichiro’s rookie season was the last time they played 162 games in the past. Going into Saturday’s games, Seattle is just half a game ahead of Tampa Bay in the Wild Card standings and is far from guaranteed that the post-season drought will end in 2022. The Mariners are doing their best to get there. that achievement right now, making a big step forward of the transaction period.
Seattle acquired Luis Castillo from Cincinnati on Friday night in exchange for three of the Mariners’ highest-rated prospects – pretty far out for a team with just seven games over 0.500. The two missing steps were towards the Reds’ organization in Noelvi Marte, Seattle’s No. 1 prospect farm, and Edwin Arroyo, the team’s former No. 3 prospect. A pair of right-handed players will also be coming to Cincy, swapping Castillo’s seats with Levi Stoudt, the No 5 prospect, and Andrew Moore, who has been placed on the Mariners’ Single-A team in Modesto, Calif.
The The Red Devils have the second worst record in baseball, and like the last stand of the Country is the seller on the trading term. Castillo is one of the biggest names on the open market. According to reports, Cincinnati received calls from about a dozen teams to reach his service. The Yankees are among them, but there are no talks around top prospect Anthony Volpe, who has performed well in AA. The comeback from the Bronx doesn’t prove to be as strong as what Seattle is offering.
Castillo is the Reds’ sole representative at this year’s All-Star game and will be at the peak of his career at the age of 29. He’s spent his entire six-season MLB career in Cincinnati. Seattle had no trouble pitching before casting Castillo on board. The Mariners’ starting spin has an ERA of 3.68, the seventh best in the MLB. Castillo’s addition brings a winning attitude from a franchise that has never made a World Series since its debut in 1977.
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AL West is Houston’s loser. Second place Seattle is a dozen games back. Rangers, Athletics and Angels will clearly not be a factor this season. That puts the Mariners instantly in one of the three Wild Card slots. It’s a dangerous game to play with one of the five post-season teams in each league handing out their jerseys after game number 163. Still, it’s better than what the Mariners have been doing for most of the millennium. .
Having yearned to return to the knockout stages since the fall of 2001, the Mariners suffered a drought after the fourth-longest season of all time in North American sports. The longest streak in the NBA and NHL is also in the works, but the Sacramento Kings and Buffalo Sabers seasons 16 and 12 haven’t touched Seattle, respectively. The longest MLB streak of all time was when St. Louis Browns, now the Baltimore Orioles, did not do any post-production from 1903-44. The NFL record is shared by the current Washington Commanders and the Arizona Cardinals a quarter of a century each.
The move for Castillo seems like a positive new age approach to end a string of miserable days. There are five teams in Seattle’s four-game round for a second Wild Card spot. Several bad streaks in a row and the Mariners will be far from controlling their own destiny. That’s why Seattle is so belligerent. Better to have tried and lost, than inactive and short-lived.
