General manager Justin Hollander updated reporters (including Seattle Sports’ Shannon Drayer and MLB.com’s Daniel Kramer) about some injury situations in the Mariners’ camp, including some side soreness for Bryce Miller. The right-hander reported some discomfort on his left side on Thursday, and a subsequent MRI revealed inflammation. Miller received a PRP shot and will be fully re-evaluated in about a week, though he could begin playing catch in a few days.
Drayer described Miller’s shutdown as “very precautionary,” and the soreness was mild enough that Miller might not have even told the team if the issue has arisen during the regular season. That said, there obviously isn’t any reason for Miller or the Mariners to push things during Spring Training. It isn’t out of the question that Miller could start the season on the 15-day injured list as a further precaution, or if he isn’t able to get back onto the mound in a week’s time to continue his normal spring ramp-up.
Miller is already coming off an injury-marred season that saw him limited to 90 1/3 regular-season innings. Bone spurs in his throwing elbow twice sent Miller to the IL, though he returned in the last half of August to make eight more starts, and then posted a 2.51 ERA over three starts and 14 1 1/3 innings in the playoffs.
Rather than undergo surgery to address the bone spurs, Miller has opted for such non-surgical treatments as a cortisone shot, a PRP shot, and a Synvisc injection to try and avoid a procedure. It was just over a week ago that Miller stated he had been able to have essentially a normal offseason, though this seemingly minor bout of side soreness is surely unwelcome.
If things developed to the point that Miller did need an IL trip, Emerson Hancock would probably be Seattle’s top choice as a rotation fill-in. Blas Castano and long man Cooper Criswell are also on the 40-man roster, or the Mariners could opt to select the contract of a non-roster invite like Casey Lawrence or Dane Dunning.
Turning to the diamond, J.P. Crawford is expected to play in his first Cactus League game of the spring on Tuesday. The veteran shortstop will be in Tuesday’s lineup as the DH, as Crawford is still recovering from a shoulder issue that has slowed his progress in camp. Hollander said the plan is for Crawford to return to shortstop the following week, which should give him plenty of time to be ready for Opening Day.
There has never been any concern that Crawford would miss any regular-season action, as the M’s were simply easing Crawford into his spring work. He is taking part in a live batting-practice session today to get some at-bats against actual pitchers under his belt before his debut game.
After an oblique strain and a fractured right hand limited Crawford to 105 games in 2024, he rebounded for a healthy 2025 campaign and a .265/.352/.370 slash line with 12 homers over 654 plate appearances (translating to a 113 wRC+). Crawford is now entering both his age-31 season, and the final year of the five-year, $51MM extension he signed with the Mariners in April 22. With star shortstop prospect Colt Emerson on the verge of his MLB debut, Crawford’s future in Seattle could be in doubt, so he’ll need a strong season to impress the M’s or potential other suitors as free agency looms.
Prospect Victor Labrada made his Triple-A debut in 2025 and could be on the radar for his first big league call-up at some point in 2026, but his season could be delayed by an oblique strain. Hollander said Labrada hurt his oblique yesterday while swinging in the batting cage, and an MRI today will determine the extent of the injury.
Labrada hit .265/.397/.376 over 235 plate appearances with Triple-A Tacoma, and he has an overall .267/.365/.402 slash line across 2155 PA in his minor league career. The 26-year-old doesn’t have much power, but he has terrific speed, with 172 steals out of 222 attempts. This speed and solid glovework at all three outfield positions could make Labrada at least a backup outfielder at the MLB level, and his ability to stick as a regular will depend on how well he can reach base and capitalize on what Baseball America describes as “solid bat-to-ball skills to hit the ball to the alleys.” BA ranks Labrada as the 26th-best prospect in the Mariners’ farm system.
WRONG Bryce Miller. Very lazy reporting!!
Not good at all. Already without Evan’s and now this. We all know Woo will miss time and Castillo can’t be trusted anymore. If they are still hanging aroumd at the deadline, they need to be in on a TOR or start a sell off.
Right, the same Woo who made 30 starts and pitched 186 innings last season.
Not to mention Castillo was the lone regular starter who didn’t hit the IL and was arguably the most consistent.
Chicken Little is that you? By your logic, the team needs to trade away everyone!
What are you even talking about? Woo pitched the whole season. As has Castillo since he’s been with the Mariners. The way you’re speaking, the team should just “Sell off” the players now. Why wait? The season’s already over!
Yeah..you would think as much as your paying for these articles the link would be right.
Sarcasm here if you didnt know it.
Agreed! These free sources of information must be held accountable and punished when appropriate.
Free content or not I’d like for it to be the correct information.
That’s fair, but you missed a comma between ‘not’ and ‘I’d’.
Yeah, I was gonna post a reply offering to refund your money but a few dudes beat me to the sarcasm. But I’ll go another route and say that having an incorrect link has nothing to do with the actual reporting in the article (which was very well done, BTW), so if you want to be taken seriously with your complaint, you should have said “very lazy linking”. I find your post to be very lazy whining……
Slider With Cheese muted me but with worthless takes like this I may as well mute him back. Obviously a Mariners hater who is already seeing the projections for the M’s being the top team in the AL but yeah, thinks M’s will be having a sell-off in no time.
Not even worried. Everyone’s gonna be a little sore as they get used to playing ball again. Better to slow play them for a bit now than to run them into the ground before the games actually matter.
I agree to an extent… but for a guy in Miller who seemed to have multiple bouts of soreness and tiredness and is playing through bone spurs… it is a little more concerning than others.
They also just wrapped up the first week of games so there’s still a ways to go before we even think about hitting the panic button on him yet though. The way they made his side issue sound, it’s not anything we should worry about at all because it’s something he’d just live with during the regular season.
This is just a precursor of what this pitching season could become a lot of concern. If I was Miller physician I would have told him without the surgery the continued stress from pitching will eventually catch up with you, and this is only the begining. No time to rest for Dipoto.
Things appeared to have really dried up.