The Seattle Mariners are not going to be bringing top pitching prospect Logan Evans up to help the major league bullpen. Evans is currently pitching at Double-A Arkansas.

Shannon Drayer of Seattle Sports 710 reports that the M’s are ending that experiment and will be allowing Evans to transition back into a starter. They had hoped utilizing him as a reliever would help the big league club and would accelerate his timeline for a major league debut.

Per Drayer:

Of his 10 relief outings, seven were scoreless. His performance out of the bullpen was satisfactory, but the Mariners did not see the uptick in stuff they thought they might. Placing a high value on his arm, the decision was made to end the experiment.

“When we did get it (the uptick), it came at the expense of command,” said assistant general manager Andy McKay. “This kid’s telling us he’s a starter. It’s just who he is.”

The Mariners have made this move before with rousing success, so there was optimism that it would work with Evans. The team previously turned Edwin Diaz into an All-Star closer and also turned Matt Brash into a dynamite reliever. They also turned Prelander Berroa into a reliever, but he was traded to the Chicago White Sox this past offseason.

Evans is the highest-ranked prospect in the organization and is a Top 100 prospect in baseball, according to Baseball America.

He’s 8-2 for the season with a 2.17 ERA. He’s worked 62.1 innings on the year so at the very least, the relief experiment has helped keep his overall workload down for the year. He threw only 15.0 innings a season ago.

The Mariners are 47-41 at the major league level and lead the American League West by 2.0 games over the Houston Astros. They’ll play the Orioles one last time on Thursday at T-Mobile Park. First pitch is set for 1:10 p.m. PT.

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SEATTLE — Jessica Campbell will become the first woman to work on the bench of an NHL franchise after the Seattle Kraken hired her as an assistant coach Wednesday.

Campbell has spent the past two seasons working as an assistant coach for Seattle’s AHL affiliate in Coachella Valley alongside Coach Dan Bylsma, who was hired in late May to take over the head job with the Kraken. There were immediate questions about whether Campbell would be making the move with Bylsma to Seattle.

She will, breaking through another barrier for women in hockey. Emily Engel-Natzke was hired by the Washington Capitals in 2022 as video coach, making her the first woman with a full-time assistant role in the league.

Now, there will be a woman on the bench.

“During our tenure in Coachella Valley, I saw firsthand Jessica’s commitment to player development,” Bylsma said. “Her ability to establish relationships with her players, specifically Tye Kartye, Shane Wright and Ryker Evans, was an important factor in this hire. I’m looking forward to continuing to work with her at the NHL level.”

Campbell was a decorated player in the NCAA, the Canadian Women’s Hockey League and Canada’s women’s national team, with whom she won silver at the 2015 world championship.

With the exception of a short stint with the Malmo Redhawks in Sweden in 2019-20, she hung up her skates in 2017 and had become highly regarded as a skating coach when she joined Coachella Valley in 2022. She had also worked as an assistant coach for Germany during the 2022 IIHF World Championships.

The 32-year-old native of Rocanville, Saskatchewan, was the first full-time female assistant coach in the AHL when she was hired by Coachella Valley before the start of its first season. She also had a one-game stint as an assistant on the Kraken bench for a preseason game against Calgary last September.

But having a woman on the bench as a coach has been an area where the NHL has lagged behind the NBA, MLB and NFL.

The NHL Coaches Association launched a Female Coaches Development Program in 2021 with the goal of growing the pool of available candidates.

Even before joining the league in 2021, the Kraken were at the forefront of giving women opportunities in hockey operations. Current assistant general manager Alexandra Mandrycky was one of the first front-office hires made by the franchise in 2018 as director of hockey administration and was part of the group that led the search for a general manager that ended with the hire of Ron Francis.

Namita Nandakumar was hired in 2020 and is a senior analyst in hockey operations.

Seattle also hired Hall of Famer Cammi Granato as a pro scout in 2019, a role she held before joining the Vancouver Canucks as an assistant GM in 2022.

Along with Campbell, the Kraken filled another spot on the coaching staff by hiring Bob Woods as one of Bylsma’s assistants. Woods was an assistant with Minnesota since 2017, but was let go when Dean Evason was fired as head coach early last season.

Assistant coach Dave Lowry, goaltending coach Steve Briere, video coach Tim Ohashi and video assistant Brady Morgan complete the rest of the coaching staff.

    FILE – Germany’s assistant coach Jessica Campbell fist bumps with head coach Toni Soderholm after winning the group A Hockey World Championship match between Germany and Italy in Helsinki, Finland, Friday May 20 2022. Jessica Campbell will become the first woman to work on the bench of an NHL franchise after the Seattle Kraken hired her as an assistant coach Wednesday, July 3, 2024.(AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)
  

    FILE – Jessica Campbell, left, assistant coach for the Coachella Valley Firebirds, works alongside Seattle Kraken coaches behind the bench during the second period of an NHL preseason hockey game against the Calgary Flames, Sept. 25, 2023, in Seattle. Jessica Campbell will become the first woman to work on the bench of an NHL franchise after the Seattle Kraken hired her as an assistant coach Wednesday, July 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Jason Redmond, File)