The Mariners announced a series of roster moves prior to today’s game, with utility player Dylan Moore and right-hander Diego Castillo each being reinstated from the injured list. To make room on the active roster, the club has optioned both left-hander Brennan Bernardino and outfielder Kyle Lewis to Triple-A Tacoma.
The optioning of Lewis is arguably the most significant detail here, as he is a former Rookie of the Year and once seemed a lock to be part of the next great Mariners team. Now 27, he burst onto the scene in 2019, making his MLB debut and getting into 18 games. He hit six homers in that small sample and slashed .268/.293/.592 for a wRC+ of 128. He carried that over into the shortened 2020 campaign, hitting 11 homers, stealing five bags and producing a batting line of .262/.364/.437, wRC+ of 127. He was unanimously voted the American League Rookie of the Year that season.
Unfortunately, Lewis has been having a miserable time over the past two years. He suffered a meniscus tear in 2021, which ended his season after just 36 games. His recovery even lingered into 2022, with Lewis beginning the season on the injured list and not getting activated until May 24. Just five days later, his misfortune continued, as he landed on the concussion IL. The M’s sent him out on a rehab assignment over a month later, in early July, returning to the big league club in late July.
Lewis has hit very well in the minors during his various rehab assignments, putting up a batting line of .293/.408/.741 this year for a wRC+ 177. However, his MLB playing time has been much less successful, as he’s hit .143/.226/.304, striking out in 30.6% of his plate appearances in that 18-game sample.
With Mitch Haniger recently returning from the injured list, it seems Lewis got squeezed out of the outfield picture, as Haniger will take regular playing time next to Jesse Winker and Jarred Kelenic, with Moore, Sam Haggerty and Jake Lamb also capable of seeing some time on the grass. Julio Rodriguez is also expected to return from the IL later this week, which will only crowd things further.
The option could potentially have repercussions for Lewis from a service time perspective, as he came into this season with his service time clock sitting at two years and 20 days. Since 172 days is considered a full season, Lewis would need to accumulate 152 days on the active roster this season to cross the three-year mark. The season is about 125 days old at this point by my unofficial count, meaning Lewis is about 27 days shy of crossing over that barrier. If he gets recalled later in the season and makes up that difference, he would qualify for free agency after the 2025 season, but it would be pushed back by a year if he comes up short. He would almost certainly still qualify for arbitration as a Super Two player regardless, as he should finish the season at 2.145 even if he never returns to the big league club. The Super Two cutoff moves from year to year, as it includes the top 22% of players between two and three years of service time. The most recent cutoff was 2.116, with the highest of the past decade-plus being the 2.146 in 2011.
The option of Bernardino is also a notable development as he was the only lefty in the club’s bullpen, with Ryan Borucki getting placed on the IL recently. For the time being, it seems the club will operate with an entirely right-handed relief corps.
That relief corps will evidently include Chris Flexen, as Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times notes that he has been moved to the bullpen. With the acquisition of Luis Castillo at the trade deadline, the M’s are suddenly dealing with an abundance of starting pitching, as Castillo joins Robbie Ray, Marco Gonzales, Logan Gilbert and George Kirby in the rotation. It seems Flexen has been edged out for the time being and will work out of the ’pen. Flexen is just 3 1/3 innings away from securing himself an $8MM guarantee for next year, as MLBTR’s Anthony Franco recently examined. Moving to the bullpen will delay Flexen vesting that salary for next year, though he should still have plenty of time to get over the line.
Lewis rlly fell off after that ROTY
Well his knee is about as sturdy as mashed potato, so that can really put a damper on your ability to play. He’s still extremely talented, he’s just missed so much time with injury.
Lewis missed a month due to the concussion as well, that still may be lingering now. He may not be right until next year anyways..
To be honest with you Kyle there really weren’t any other rookies in 2020 to choose from his numbers were not spectacular but best of those rookies who did play Kyle
That’s why the 2020 season just really shouldn’t have happened at all. Nothing that happened that season should be thought of as anything that really mattered. Looking back, it would have been better to just cancel the season altogether instead of changing the game so drastically to avoid Covid.
You can consider it to have not happened if you want, but most people would rather have seen baseball than not that year.
I enjoyed watching it, but I don’t take anything serious from that year, especially stats. Just a super weird year.
I would have liked to have seen baseball that season too. I didn’t want to see 60 games in empty stadiums in front of cardboard cutouts with ridiculous rule changes.
@hiflew You didn’t have to see it though. You could have changed the channel – the remote is in your hands.
Exactly..I needed MLB back just for the sake of my sanity that year..rule change or not, it was better than nothing..plus, the cardboard cutouts were temporary..
This was 100% the right move. Until KLew is healthy he’s not helping the team.
Absolutely, more consistent playing time, possible reps in the outfield. I’m less worried about Klew regaining his former form than I am about JK realizing his. Kelenic is underwhelming and his outlook is bleak.
It just keeps getting worse and worse for Kelenic. Hard to watch.
KLow
Next year is make or break for Lewis. Hope he gets back into form.
So now we wait to see whether Kelenic or Haggerty gets snuffed for J-Rod on Friday.
Why would Haggerty get send down he is hitting better than most of the team.
On top of that, he’s hitting .483 / 1.393 OPS vs. LHP in 29 AB. Sure, small sample size but good grief!
Love having JK’s glove- especially in late innings. I’d rather we cut Lamb. He doesn’t add anything we can’t find with another player on the team.
Or Toro. I doubt Haggerty, his position flexibility and speed are needed. Even though he had the game winning hit Torrens will be optioned as soon as Casali is ready.
Toro is already down in AAA. Haggerty isn’t going anywhere. Not with that OPS!
Kelenic will be sent down once Julio is back. And it’ll be interesting to see what they do with Torrens. I can’t imagine them carrying 3 catchers until September call ups. But this is exactly the reason that they traded for Casali. Glad Torrens is making the decision tough on them.
I didn’t realize he was the one sent down when Haniger was brought up.
Luis Torrens has no options less
I wouldn’t worry about someones OPS over 100 PA. I doubt Dipoto is thinking that way. He has some internal projection he uses. He knows Haggerty is a 5th OF AAAA type. If he stays over Kelenic it has more to do with Kelenic than him.
Basically it means releasing him, technically he could accept being sent to Tacoma(though highly unlikely).
Kelenic 100%
Lewis should have been sent down awhile ago… he was not healthy.
As bad as Toro was, he never should have been sent down over Lamb. And, Lamb should be sent down when JRod comes back now that Moore is back.
Toro deserves his demotion and it was long overdue. Lamb isn’t getting sent down either. Kelenic only came back due to injuries and looks just as bad as he was before. Kelenic is going to be sent down.
Lamb had a hit in his first AB and is 0 for 10 since then, hitting a whopping .111 for the Mariners. Toro at least won some games and has been clutch. It’s not like Lamb was amazing in LA before the trade either… he was a .239 hitter there while homering at the same rate as Toro.
Lamb was good in 2016 and 2017, but hasn’t done anything anywhere since…and is 31 now, 6 years older than Toro. His line since 2017:
2018: .222 BA, 6 HR
2019: .193 BA, 6 HR
2020: .193 BA, 3 HR
2021: .194 BA, 7 HR
There is zero chance we should have traded for him, and zero chance he should be taking time over anyone on the roster.
I’m not disagreeing with you. I’m just saying Lamb is being removed from the roster. They just traded for him.
Isn’t*
Last year at this time the outfield consisted of Haniger and nothing else. Then Haniger got hurt. Now we have an abundance of OF talent to pick from. This is certainly better than rolling out Jake Fraley, Jarred Kelenic and Shed Long in the outfield.
Julio, Haniger and (insert name here) is definitely an improvement over last year!
And here they were counting on Lewis, along with Haniger, to come back from the DL healthy enough to revive the offense. Haniger seems fine… at least for now. Lewis just doesn’t seem healthy yet. I still wish the M’s would have added some more hitting at the deadline.
Lewis has hit very well in the minors during his various rehab assignments, putting up a batting line of .293/.408/.741 this year for a wRC+ 177.
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I think you are over-selling his minor league stats. To me, the key stat is his long AA trial in 2019. He had 152 Ks in 457 ABs, roughly 200 per 600 ABs. That is way high for someone with middling power. And that 200 per 600 translated almost exactly in the MLB with 71 in 206 ABs in 2020.
He should be better than what we’ve seen this year, but is likely overrated based on a short-season ROY.
Lewis may or may not be overrated, but if you think he has “middling power”, you clearly haven’t seen him play much.
Wrong Diego Castillo linked Mr. McDonald
Don’t sleep on Kyle. He can still hit the ball. Those skills are still there. Give him some at bats and he will get there at the plate, of that I have little doubt.
The knees? Absolutely trash. He’s destined for 1B/DH.
The Mariners need OF help and should have addressed that. Haniger and Lewis have the kind of injury history you don’t rely on and while I think Kelenic ends up good enough to play regularly, that hasn’t happened yet. There’s also some legitimate questions about Lewis’ bat if he’s more a LF/1B/DH type now.
I think Lewis is fine fwiw, it’s just that given his age and injury history, he’s going to have to hit alot. He has the tools to be that his career batting stats would work at those positions, but he loses alot of potential in that kind of a defensive role.
He needs this. Hit the reset button and work on something’s. He’s never experienced this level of struggle in his life, so you feel good that he can bounce back. But who knows, the injuries or maybe the shear fact that he’s mentally struggling for the first time might be too much for hmm
I wonder how much the hit in the head has affected Lewis? He got hit pretty good yes it bounced of an arm and caught some of the helmet. Has to get in your head for a bit. I never watched him as the pitch came in. If he was moving his head or closing his eyes.
With Julio in CF and Haniger in right Lewis will be a good LFer. Would be nice to get some consistency in the OF. Those guys would lock up the outfield tight.
Really surprised that they moved Chris Flexen to the bullpen instead of George Kirby. We are getting very, very close to where George Kirby is going to exceed his previous high in innings pitched by a worrisome amount. To help manage his innings, I thought for sure that they would move George Kirby to the bullpen and leave Chris Flexen in the rotation.
George Kirby only threw 67 2/3 innings last year total, and between the minors and the majors, he has already thrown 106 innings this year. If they want to limit his workload to make sure he doesn’t have too big an increase from year to year, they very much need to move him to the bullpen or shut him down for the year.