The Mariner Monitor

Here’s an interesting profile on Mariners prospect Chris Minaker.   The shortstop was taken in the tenth round of last years draft and he’s progressed nicely.  He could return to Low A or the Mariners might see how he can do at High A in 2007.

If you’re a Mariners fan, Felix Hernandez is someone to get excited about.  While he didn’t quite live up to some enormous expectations in 2006, he can now start with a clean slate in 2007.  So far so good because he came in under weight and he recently impressed Mike Hargrove in a bullpen session today.  It’s also nice to see they’re going to let Hernandez pitch deeper into games.  I know he’s in that period where a heavy workload could derail his career (i.e. Dwight Gooden), but you also can’t baby him forever.

There’s no doubt that Jon Huber’s numbers look nice after he got his cup of coffee in September of 2006.  The converted starter was rock solid in 16 games out of the pen and now he’ll be competing for a bullpen spot out of the gate in 2007.

PECOTA sees Huber coming back down to earth in 2007.  His weighted mean average puts him at a 1.51 WHIP and a 4.84 ERA in 60 innings.  Although he has both a high breakout rate (22%) and collapse rate (22%) so he really could go either way.

Beyond on the Boxscore wrote up a nice player profile on Mariners first base prospect Bryan LaHair.  I do like the idea of going out and getting Justin Huber.  Good stuff here.

Jeff Sackman recently wrote up a Mariners preseason preview at Beyond the Boxscore.  The nutshell analysis isn’t good and he didn’t like the Mariners pickups for the rotation.  While I don’t neccesarily like them, I don’t think the Mariners will do as bad as the analysis portends.  The bullpen analysis was done particularly well and it very well could be a crap shoot.  But I have to agree that a record above .500 with this team will feel like an accomplishment.

Kevin Goldstein recently wrote up his list of the top ten Mariner prospects in his latest Future Shock column.  None of the Mariners fall in the “excellent” category but there’s some interesting names and the final prognosis (lack of depth and star power) is a little discouraging.  Still, there are some guys to keep an eye on here.

Coming in at number one is centerfielder Adam Jones.  The Mariners first round pick in 2003 played mostly in Triple A but he did get a call up where struggled at the plate.  His biggest weakness is patience at the plate though and it looks like Jones is slated for one more season down in the minors.  It wouldn’t surprise me if Jones got an extended look on the Mariners though.

Number two is catcher Jeff Clement who looks like he could be a solid catcher yet faces a road block.  He split time between Double A and Triple A and it looks like he’ll return for a stint at Triple A. 

Brandon Morrow comes in at number three and he’s the top pitching prospect.  Morrow was the Mariners first round pick this last season and he had a solid yet short stint in the rookie league.  This kid has a long way to go but it looks like he’s skipping a couple of levels and he’ll be starting 2007 at Double A.

Two pitchers round out the top five.  Lefty Tony Butler and righty Chris Tillman comes in at numbers four and five.

A community projection as to how well Jose Lopez would do in 2007 was posted on Minor League Ball yesterday.  I could definitely live with .282/17/78 out of a second baseman.  Now we just have to get the rest of the Mariners to hit around him.