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Drayer: Seattle Mariners weren't done – How Polanco addition fits

Published

2 years ago

January 30, 2024

Drayer: Seattle Mariners weren't done – How Polanco addition fits

After the Seattle Mariners’ trades that brought in Mitch Haniger, Anthony DeScalfani and Luke Raley to the Seattle Mariners three weeks ago had been completed, there was a clear air of relief in a reply to a question posed to president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto.

Mariners Trade Breakdown: Who is new 2B Jorge Polanco?

“I feel like today is the first time all offseason that we can say if we were playing the opening day game tomorrow, we feel good about the team that we have,” Dipoto said in the media call later that Jan. 5 evening. “It’s a complete team.”

While some interpreted that as “the Mariners are done this winter,” in reality it was a statement of fact – and a significant accomplishment given the turn the offseason had taken early on, with Dipoto and general manager Justin Hollander needing to subtract from the roster before they added due to financial constraints.

For the vast majority of the offseason there were missing pieces – vital pieces. And no, the plan was not to just fill them with utility players. Nonetheless, it was an uncomfortable place to be.

On Jan. 5, they felt they could at least field a good team with the numbers adding up at most positions, some via the platoon, but the hope was they could add.

The target: Jorge Polanco.

Mariners make trade with Twins for All-Star Jorge Polanco

“He’s a guy that we have liked and tried to acquire for years,” said Hollander. “I think I personally made more calls on this trade than I ever have on any trade before at the behest of both my own want to add him to our group, so a really big day for us. (I) feel like it makes us a lot better and excited to add him.”

The addition of the switch-hitting Polanco at second base will eliminate a planned platoon at that position, likely moving it to third base where the platoon can be better utilized with Luis Urías and Josh Rojas.

Instant Reaction: Drayer with Wyman and Bob on trade for Polanco

“The switch-hit is huge for us the way our team is constructed,” said Hollander. “To have a guy who’s platoon neutral who can hit in the middle of our lineup from either side is a big advantage for Scott (Servais) as he stacks the lineup up to be able to go left, right, switch.”

Polanco, who hit primarily in the top three spots of the order for the Twins in recent years, could slide into the No. 3 spot for the Mariners, solidifying the top of the order before mixing and matching through the middle. The addition gives length to the lineup, and it builds a stronger bench. One of Mitch Haniger, Dominic Canzone or Luke Raley will be available off the bench each night, plus utility player Dylan Moore, catcher Seby Zavala, and Rojas or Urías.

The addition did come at a price both in the immediate and perhaps future, though, with outfielder and top-100 prospect Gabriel Gonzalez and pitching prospect Darren Bowen included in the trade. Off the big league roster, the Mariners could afford to lose the recently acquired DeScalfani, but key reliever Justin Topa will need to be replaced.

“I definitely do want to take a moment to praise Topa on this call,” Hollander said to the media Monday night. “Justin Topa was awesome for us last year. From Day 1 of spring training, he showed up. He was open to coaching, he was open to new ideas, worked his butt off to make sure he stayed on the mound every day. He was available to us and got huge outs for us all year long. Topa was great, we’ll have to replace that. I think it most likely will be internally with a possibility, like always, that we could add externally as well.”

The bullpen does appear to be thin in established talent, but a strength of the Mariners in recent years has been in uncovering pitching gems. Is the next Topa or even Paul Sewald in the current group of spring training invitees? There are candidates with Jackson Kowar, Carlos Vargas and Prelander Berroa all possessing stuff, though none have yet put it together at the big league level.

Time will tell how it all shakes out, but on paper – multiple projection systems ranked the Mariners second in the division before Monday’s trade – this team is better than the team that finished last season.

Pitchers (and it’s very worth noting the starting five was kept intact) and catchers report to spring training in just over two weeks.

More on the Seattle Mariners

• Mariners sign utility player who is married to Hollywood star
• Baseball America’s Glaser: Mariners prospect Emerson ‘on a rocket’
• Video: Grading Seattle Mariners’ offseason with Mike Salk and Shannon Drayer
• Close Look: Two Mariners legends set to enter Baseball Hall of Fame race
• The fun story of how Cal Raleigh heard about Haniger’s Seattle Mariners return

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Seattle, WA

Winning Thoughts: Blue Jackets get a needed win in Seattle | Columbus Blue Jackets

Published

4 hours ago

November 12, 2025

Press Room

Winning Thoughts: Blue Jackets get a needed win in Seattle | Columbus Blue Jackets

After CBJ wins, we’ll give three takeaways about what stood out or what we’ll remember from the Blue Jackets’ victory.

BLUE JACKETS 2, KRAKEN 1 (SHOOTOUT)

1. The Blue Jackets got to celebrate a win … even if it took a second.

With the game on his stick, Charlie Coyle crossed the blue line and ripped a shot off the post and past Matt Murray to give the Blue Jackets two much-needed points Tuesday night.

And with a four-game losing streak in their past, the Blue Jackets excitedly jumped off the bench to mob their shootout hero, right?

Not exactly.

After Coyle’s perfect shot got past Murray to secure the second point, neither the shooter nor his teammates went crazy. Coyle skated back to the bench with a square jaw, and the Blue Jackets on the bench took a second to look around before they streamed off to celebrate the victory.

So, what happened?

“I think guys kind of forgot that it was over,” Zach Werenski said. “They went first. I feel like guys kind of were just like, I know (Damon Severson) looked at me and was like, ‘It is over?’”

Or maybe it was just, after three games in four days, while switching time zones twice, and also dealing with a flu bug going through the team, the Blue Jackets were just too tired to celebrate.

“I think it was a little bit of a grind for everyone with the sickness and the bug going around,” Mathieu Oliver said. “I think was it more kind of relief when we saw him go bar down there, which was unbelievable, but a lot of relief for our group.”

Whatever the reason was, Coyle’s goal didn’t set off a massive celebration, but it did clinch a crucial victory for the Blue Jackets to finish off a long road trip right but also put two points in the standings. The veteran went on to joke that he thought the delayed celebration was just because everyone was so stunned he scored on such a sweet finish, but he was more than happy to celebrate once everyone congregated by the CBJ bench.

“Maybe it was like a mutual thing because I didn’t really react fully, and then they didn’t react,” Coyle said. “And then Jet (Greaves) slowly kind of skated out so everyone kind of jumped, but that’s gonna be funny looking back. But that’s the long road trip, so it’s a sigh of relief, I think.”

2. Coyle’s goal clinched a huge victory marked by the Blue Jackets battling through adversity.

Think of it this way. The Blue Jackets lost in one of the most stunning ways possible Monday night at Edmonton, then flew to Seattle for the second half of a back-to-back against a rested foe. Illness has been working its way through the team, and things got even worse for the Blue Jackets when captain Boone Jenner left early in the second period with injury.

Given all those factors combined, you probably wouldn’t have expected a CBJ win tonight, but the Blue Jackets delivered.

“I think it speaks a lot about our character,” Werenski said. “Obviously the road trip hasn’t gone our way and we’re obviously not happy about how some of the games have gone, but we just dug deep and found a way to win this one. We got three of four points in the last 24 hours, and I’m really proud of our group.”

And in some ways, maybe that adversity helped the Blue Jackets along the way.

“To do that with the guys who have been sick and out of the lineup, with the mid-game adjustments, I think it helps guys zone in more because you have to know who’s up,” Coyle said. “It’s not the regular lies and all that, so that definitely could help.

“Hey, we came through, and that’s a sign of a good team.”

3. The Blue Jackets exercised patience on the way to the victory.

Seattle has one of the best defensive teams in the NHL and speed to burn, so their game plan has been relatively simple this season. The Kraken want teams to have to earn it, turning up the pressure and trying to force turnovers before going the other way.

But on a night where it would have been easy to fold up the tent, the Blue Jackets showed an enviable level of discipline. Instead of opening themselves up to mistakes in the middle of a taut game, Columbus stayed the course and did what it had to do on the defensive end to get it to overtime.

“What we liked, and we’ve talked about this a lot, is we were on the right side (of the puck),” head coach Dean Evason said. “We were on the Jackets side. We didn’t cheat the game tonight. We didn’t give them those freebies, the odd-man rushes, and the odd-man rushes, the ones that have hurt is here this year.”

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Seattle, WA

Cardinals Coach Gets Real on Blowout Loss to Seahawks

Published

23 hours ago

November 11, 2025

Press Room

Cardinals Coach Gets Real on Blowout Loss to Seahawks

ARIZONA — The Arizona Cardinals were, for perhaps the first time in Jonathan Gannon’s career, outmatched to epic proportions in their Week 10 loss to the Seattle Seahawks.

Cardinals fans blinked, and they were down 7-0. They got up to get some snacks and came back to a 35-0 deficit that surely wasn’t going to be reversed.

“(We) didn’t play our best ball against a good team and got beat up pretty good, but they understand why that happened and what we need to do better moving forward,” Gannon told reporters this week.

“I did tell them we have to learn from it and then we have to flush it because just like any win or loss,(it) doesn’t matter how you get there. The most important thing is the next week, so that’s where our focus will be going to San Francisco here.”

READ: Which Arizona Cardinals are on the Hot Seat?

Arizona has now lost their last six-of-seven games entering their Week 11 matchup with the 49ers, and the team will practically need to win-out in order to do the unthinkable and make the postseason.

As for their drubbing in Seattle, Gannon says digging that massive early deficit didn’t do the organization any favors.

“We had some assignment issues, some technique issues. We actually won the double positive, but when you spot a team 14 points on offense and they score the first three drives and you find yourself down 35 to nothing, that’s a tough hole to come out of,” he said.

“Games can get away pretty quick from you when that happens. What I do appreciate though, (is) they did battle, and we had a chance, honestly, in my opinion, at the end of the third to cut it to a two-score game. The effort was there, and they reset themselves, but no one feels good about how that game unfolded.”

READ: Cardinals Not Sugarcoating Anything After Loss

It’s rare to see a Cardinals loss where they were truly outmatched over the course of 60 minutes, though that was the case at Lumen Field.

Is this the most frustrated Gannon’s been as a coach?

“When you say frustrated, I don’t know (if that’s) the right word. You learn and move on. That’s why I said no one in that team meeting today—nobody’s looking around (asking) how did that happen? We collectively allowed that to happen. All of us in there. You take that on a chin, and you move on. Frustration (is) just a waste of time,” said Gannon.

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Seattle, WA

Nike releases new Seattle Seahawks-inspired ‘Air Max 90’ shoes; a detailed look

Published

2 days ago

November 10, 2025

Press Room

Nike releases new Seattle Seahawks-inspired ‘Air Max 90’ shoes; a detailed look

If you purchase a product through a link on our site, we may receive compensation.

Nike has released their latest line of NFL football-themed sneakers under the “Air Max 90″ running shoe model. As per past releases, the Seattle Seahawks are one of the prominently featured teams in the collection. The NFL team-inspired Seattle Seahawks Air Max 90 Rivalries Collection running shoes have a different look than past rivalries edition shoes, going with the white and gray base over the dark blue of years past.

Get a pair of the Nike Seattle Seahawks Air Max 90 shoes on Fanatics