Seattle Mariners: Taylor Trammell Should Be The Opening Day Left fielder
Joe Swenson
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The Lineup Is Mostly Set
It would appear that most of the offense is set. Evan White is at first with some Ty France or Jose Marmolejos as his back-up. Dylan Moore starts at second with Ty France sharing some time there too. The everyday shortstop is JP Crawford, but perhaps Sam Haggerty makes the club in a utility aspect. Seattle’s most tenured player Kyle Seager returns to the hot corner with France as the back-up.
Center field is Kyle Lewis’ territory, and Mitch Haniger in right field, though he might have a few extra off-days coming back into the fold. DH will be Ty France most of the time. Tom Murphy and Luis Torrens share the backstop duties. This leaves the only true opening on the Mariners to be left field.
Who will play left field?
For the Mariners, left field and the sixth starter situation are the only spring battles compelling enough to discuss. While the final starter in a six-man rotation, which won’t be necessary until around April 24th, is important, finding a starting left fielder is more pressing.
The Mariners lineup is in flux as well. Manager Servais has tinkered with dropping J.P. Crawford down in the order recently, which I think is the right decision. Adding Trammell to the mix brings an additional measure of speed and gap-power that could fit anywhere in the line-up. He’s also a left-handed bat, which the Mariners desperately need to keep from being too right-hand heavy.
Jarred Kelenic is still in the running to be the opening day left fielder. Service-time situation aside, Kelenic has to make up for lost time due to the recent abductor strain. While he looked great in his return, Trammell looked great all spring.
Kelenic and Trammell are both left-handed, so having them play the same position has a redundancy that wouldn’t work as a platoon situation. Neither has value at any other position unless France ends up in the infield more often than previously imagined, or Mitch Haniger isn’t as healthy as the team says he is.
More Taylor Trammell content: A broken-bat, infield single.
He beat Kyle Freeland by going home-to-first in 4.35 seconds, with an approaching-elite sprint speed of 28.9 ft/sec. pic.twitter.com/j9HqERVflb
— Daniel Kramer (@DKramer_) March 13, 2021