Can the Mariners AFFORD Their Top Free Agents?

Can the Mariners AFFORD Their Top Free Agents?

In the latest Seattle Times, John Stanton penned a letter to Mariners fans. John and I are gonna talk about this letter and why, frankly, what he says doesn’t mean a whole lot to anybody. People are mad at John Stanton right now for this letter, which I find interesting. We’re going to talk about that and then we’re going to talk about the article from Ryan Divish in terms of how much money the Mariners are likely to spend going in to the 2026 season. We’ll give you guys our FanDuel favorites and then we’ll talk about the Jim Bowen article on top of the Ryan Devish article as to how much some of these free agents are going to get paid. Thank you guys so much for watching episode 244 of the Hit It Here podcast, part of the Believe Network and presented by FanDuel. And this is the Aaron episode of the podcast who I met at work the other day. Aaron, it was great to meet you at work. If you are watching, just don’t dox me. Thank you so much. I am here with Joe. Joe, we have power again. So that’s pretty cool. We’re not living in that dark age anymore. So that’s why this uh podcast is coming out a little bit late. But hey, nonetheless, you know, we have power again and we are no longer living like the pilgrims. My I I got home from work yesterday and my mom looked at me and said, “I hate being a pioneer.” And I’m like, “Yeah, yeah, I get it.” She’s like, “I’m cold.” Like that everything’s dark. Like Yeah. It was just it was just a funny time. I I am kind of glad one that like the cell reception was also really bad the last couple like days like whenever big power outages and stuff like that happen. And so I kind of missed a lot of the online buzz around the John Stanton letter. And I’m kind of glad that I missed it because I I really haven’t seen a lot of I think expanded takes. I saw obviously TJ he posted a short or you know some sort of like the the the vertical content short real everything right. Shout out the marine layer pod. um talking about it and I think I saw maybe Colby talk about it a little bit just again in passing glances of what I could get to load in between or poor cell reception where I live specifically bad but yeah just bad cell service in general. Um so I haven’t really seen a lot of the people being mad. I saw a lot of people saying and something I think that you’re echoing in the front of all this is doesn’t really matter and talk is cheap and kind of we we don’t care necessarily what you say. Sure, it’s a fine sentiment. It’s a like at its core it might just seem like a it really is a tonedeaf owner saying to fans, “Sorry we didn’t quite get there.” Not my fault though entirely. You know what I mean? Like I’m not not Hey, not me though, guys. Not me. Whereas like a lot of people would be like, I don’t know, man. Probably could just come straight back to you and say like if you spent more money historically, this this might have been this might be a more repeatable thing for us. And that at its at the end of it all is kind of the take a lot of people are getting at is talking about the this is the like, you know, the just a beginning, not not an end and like we’re about to be in a great era of Mariners baseball, etc. Okay, it’s time to prove it. It’s time to literally put your money where your mouth is and make open up the pocketbooks a little bit more there, John Stanton. So, I haven’t seen a lot of the outrage. I’ll let you expand on that a little bit more if you have more to say if it’s not something that I kind of indirectly said. But again, I taking it with a grain of salt, which I think is what a lot of people should do. And if you’re mad about it, feel free to be mad. It doesn’t affect me any. I just I don’t know if I could see that and be mad because I’ve been like I’m not going to let what John Stanton says really impact me that much any anymore. I feel like because nothing has nothing good has ever come out of me reading something or hearing something that John Stanton has to say and having a big reaction personally. Yeah. there. I feel like there’s two trains of thought about this and you kind of stated what I was kind of reading was, hey, put your money where your mouth is. We’ll believe it when we see it. Like that is I and understandably so how Mariners fans are feeling about this article from John Stanton. And there’s two ways to look at it. You can look at it like that. Like, hey, you know, this guy never spends money blah blah blah. This is all pandering, which frank frankly a lot of it is. A lot of it is just pandering. You know that they’re talking about how, oh, you stood for all 15 innings, blah blah. That’s great. I’d rather stay I I stood for all 15 innings. I was exhausted. I’d rather stand for the World Series. I don’t care about those 15 innings right now. I don’t care. Or you can take it as, you know what, maybe this is a turning point for ownership for this front office, etc. And we won’t know. We’re not going to know until the end of the offseason, frankly, and we can never know. So, don’t don’t take this as me like, you know, saying ownership is right because I’m not. No. No, but I just think that with the way that the Mariners have, including, you know, Justin Hollander, and this has been talked about a lot, Justin Hollander going on to 710, you know, calling in to one of the one of the morning shows or one of the one of the shows and, you know, just thanking fans. He didn’t have to do that. Nobody was expecting that. Like, you kind of expect a letter from John Stanton. You know what I mean? Like, after how far they got first interview, you kind of expect a letter. Justin Hollander didn’t need to do that. Nobody would have batted an eye had he not done that. Hollander and Dotto both, you know, tearing up at the uh at the press conference. Listen, this season, while it didn’t end the way that we wanted it to, may be pivotal for the future of this franchise because hopefully it opened the eyes of a lot of folks about what the Pacific Northwest is capable of when it comes to their baseball team. And we saw it firsthand. And you and I went to a couple of the games during the during the playoffs. We saw it firsthand and how just freaking cool it was to have everybody on their feet, everybody cheering, 47,000 people there. Like, it was incredible. So, looking at what John Stanton said, the biggest part of it, and I’ll read it for you here, is the Northwest deserves a World Series. I know we’re going to get there. This is the beginning of a special era of Mariners baseball. There is work to do to take that final step, and that work begins now. From John Stanton’s perspective, the only work that he can really do to ensure this happening is allocating more money. In the end, that’s all he can do, right? And it falls on Jerry and Justin. Obviously, Stanton like for a big like contract, he I think he has to have the final say or whatever. Yes, I will allocate that money, whatever. He has to have the final say in that, but it really falls on Jerry and Justin in that situation. So, what he’s saying, and we’ll get into what Ryan Divish says later, but it sounds like from what Jerry said, what John Stanton has said, the Mariners payroll at the beginning of next year will beund, we’ll just call it 165 million, which gives them about 30-ish million dollars to play with. That’s great. Listen, 165 million is one of the highest payrolls in Mariners history. Low. I’m not saying that’s a I’m not saying that’s a good thing because it’s not. But it’s just a fact of the matter. It’s one of the highest payrolls in baseball history. I think the the highest was 2019 or 20 Yeah, it had been 2019 when it was Felix. It was Kyle Seager. I think they were still paying Robbie Canó, like all those guys. right now looking at where this team is at the the funds are allocated a little bit differently than to you know three specific guys but there are still obviously the top ends of payroll in someone like Luis Castillo for example who I think is going to be the highest paid player on the Mariners payroll next year. Is that correct? I think so. um should be at like $22 million. Mhm. With if the Mariners have $30 million to play with ideally, and obviously, and I know you all agree with this, I know Joe and I agree with this. Priority is Josh Naylor. The Mariners front office has said that. We’ll talk a little bit later about what his contract could look like according to Jim Bowen. But if that is the case, that eats up pretty much your nearly all of your $30 million that you have to play with, which is a problem. And we all agree that Josh Naylor should be the guy the Mariners go out there and get. It is a problem if one player eats up most of the salary that you’re going to be able to add going into next season because there’s more holes than just first base. You know, I mean, third base is is something you could fill. Second base is certainly something you could fill as well. Not as much though. And then the relief core is something that I think the Mariners need to add to and potentially even right field. We’re going to talk about that a little bit later with like the Ryan Deish article, but where is your head at just based on what John Stanton said and kind of knowing what we know about where payroll is going to be at? Is it is this a is it just a nothing burger that John Stanton’s putting out there or is it like, hey, the Mariners may be in a worse spot than we thought? I don’t think it’s a worse spot than we thought. I I I don’t know. I I really do feel as if it is just kind of a good like it’s it’s a decent sentiment. It’s good practice I think in general, but of course it’s going to feel hollow when we’ve never really had the the he he is overpromising and underdelivering or he is flirting closely with that again. And I feel like for the last several years, it’s been a lot of overpromise, underdeliver in certain aspects with the rug pull last off season with the the funds that Jerry and Justin were expecting to be operating under and kind of got pulled out from underneath them. Obviously with the Root Sports situation, like there’s just a lot of the the broadcast network things that kind of inhibited the the previous offseason. But I don’t think it’s in a worse spot. I think there might just might have been a misunderstanding, at least from our perspectives, of what the starting like the starting payroll being 166, what that meant to us. And we definitely interpreted it wrong because we thought it meant they will be like that’s like their anticipation for the beginning of the offseason, not the beginning of the regular season. And that’s on us for I guess misinterpreting that. And if that puts us in a worse spot as like the Mars in a worse spot, I think that’s not necessarily again not saying John Sans’s good, that’s our fault for Yeah, that’s on us for misinterpreting. Um I don’t think John should be praised for this. I think this is very surface level stuff that he put out and said and ultimately 30 million is fine like you said, but it it should be a lot more. And again, not that money leads to everything. Obviously, the Mets didn’t make the postseason. Of course, that seems like more of an outlier, but it’s not the first time that the Mets have missed the postseason with one of the highest payrolls in all of baseball. So, is it something internal there? That’s really not part of the conversation, but spending does not inherently mean more wins. What it does do is provides you a larger safety net in theory that if some there are some shortcomings on your roster, you can probably fill them a bit better with the talent that you’ve bought in that situation or that you’ve paid for in free agency. I think a lot of good faith could be, for lack of a better term, bought this off season within the Mars fan base if John Stanton does allow the starting, you know, 2026 payroll to be higher than what we ended with in 2025. I think that could buy a lot of good faith from the fans in terms of seeing the investment in the offseason for the players in general and what that looks like going into 2026. But again, it’s a lot of talk and we’re reaching a point where it’s show don’t tell. We we need to see it happen. And I really think if it does and it goes the way that I think we all want it to, John Stanton could delete a lot of the negative outlook and outpouring of the fan base toward towards the ownership group for some years to come. It’s not a guarantee that it’s going to go away forever. You can’t just delete a bunch of bad history. But quickly, a word from our today’s sponsor, Delete. Delete Me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable. The New York Times wire cutter has named Delete Meir their top pick for data removal services. And as someone with an active online presence, privacy is very important to me. I don’t want strangers having data about me that I don’t even know that might be out there. Take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/hit. And use promo code hit. That’s hit at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindeleteme.com/hit and enter code hit. That’s hit at checkout. That’s jointdeme.com/hit code hit. I don’t necessarily think the Mariners are in a bad spot and I don’t want to. And the problem is is that we can’t put our faith into John Stanton to give them the money to do something extra this off season. And hopefully once the deal with MLB is worked out for how they’re going to broadcast their games, whatever, maybe some money comes from that. I don’t know. I I I can’t say that I am I am intelligent enough to have any idea what any of that means. But if the plan is to resign Josh Naylor, whose contract we’ll get into in the next segment, and after that, it’s like if you bring back Polo, you’re rolling with like a couple million dollars to go sh up a bullpen spot, maybe even a third base spot. If you’re not if you’re not interested in Ben Williamson or Colt Emerson being the guy over there at third base, I don’t know. Yeah. Like I don’t I don’t think that the Mariners are inherently in a bad spot with a payroll of 166 million. I think that they are in a bad spot with that payroll if the if the front office and the ownership is not willing to extend beyond that at the trade deadline and we can’t know because that’s not till July of next year. We can’t know. But it’s a situation where you can we we saw it this year. For example, if the Mariners would have done a little bit more in free agency than signed Donovan Solano and resign Jorge Palano, maybe they would have found themselves in a different spot. But that’s a bunch of whatifs. So it it’s a situation where if the Mariners only bring back, you know, Josh Naylor and Jorge Palano, which is something that Ryan Divish has mentioned a little bit, and we’re looking at the MLB trade rumors article here, um, talking about how Palano is likely to command a contract similar to Mitch Garver’s contract, which is a lot more in the Mariners range and what they’re comfortable with than Josh Naylor because of that, like cuz Josh Naylor is going to command at least a four-year deal, at least in my opinion, right? The Mariners have never gone beyond a at least in this current front office anyway for a free agent, gone beyond a 2-year, $24 million deal with an option for Mitch Garver. Now, they have extended Julio Rodriguez. They have extended even Luis Castillo. They signed Robbie Ray. like there there are contracts on the pitching side of things where they have been willing to go out and do that. But for Josh Naylor, you’re going to have to spend more than you’ve ever spent on a on a position player in this current regime in terms of free agency. Thankfully, I think that with the with what Josh showed this team in the short time he was here, I think they’ll be willing to do that. Now, Palano again is a guy that I think is fine to bring back on like a two-year. I mean, they’re talking about it being close to the Garver deal, a two-year, you know, $24 million deal. I think that’s fine with an option. If they want to if they were to sign Palanco to the exact same contract, I’m probably fine with that. Like, that that doesn’t bother me if they were to sign Palanco. He’s he’s obviously, you know, getting a little bit older, what have you, but I think that that would be fine in my opinion. Whereas the Josh Naylor contract is probably going to extend you four or five years at first base, but you have literally nobody at first base in your organization right now. You have to go out there and get Josh Naylor. So, are the Mars in a bad spot? I don’t think so. Are they in a good spot? I also don’t think so. They’re just kind of right there in the middle. And it depends on what they decide to do with those allocated funds because you can find a way with $30 million to go out there and make your team much better. You can find a way. It’ll get tricky. Now, do the Mariners decide to trade Luis Castillo and open up $22 million right there and all of a sudden you have a $50 million budget for the offseason? It’s certainly possible, but there’s just so many moving parts right now with the offseason and it’s very hard to know what the Mariners plan is when we’re still in the middle of the World Series. Yeah. Like literally game three of the World Series. So, it’s hard to know what’s going to happen. But we don’t even, frankly, we don’t even know. We’re pretty sure we don’t even know if Jorge Palano is going to decline his option. I mean, he might accept it, man. There’s like a 1% chance that he accepts it. I really think if if there is ever a good faith, you know, contract except like accept that mutual option. We’ll sign you to a now three-year like $54 million contract that like extension beyond that. Well, that would get him to four years. That’s the number. I know. That would get him to four years 60, which is $15 million annual average. Of course, that’s again in the realm where it’s a little bit further beyond what the Mariners front office typically has been comfortable. So, maybe it’s a 2-year extension and it’s 36 million. Whatever. Like, we’re we’re we’re getting the the numbers are getting all all silly. It doesn’t really matter that much. But I I do agree with Dvish in the sense that the polo extension or the the resigning of Jorge Palano makes makes more sense because it is more akin to what the Mariners have done in the past. Something I think that not only we’ve said, I think everyone said it at this point. They have to get uncomfortable this offseason if they want to make the moves that we feel are the most appropriate to make the team better. And like you said, you can make the team better with $30 million. You definitely can. And of course, you’re if you want to sign Josh Naylor again, he doesn’t have to resign with Mars on a on a discount because he liked playing here so much. No player has to do that. It’s never any sort of guarantee that a player is going to extend their good faith your way because ultimately it’s their job and they need to make money somehow. I think getting uncomfortable signing Josh makes the most sense. I don’t think that they’re going to try and fortify the bullpen with reliever help in the free agent market. Although Brent Sudter, he might be there. And lord, he’s calling out to me like the Green Goblin mask once again when I was looking at the trade rumors free agent list thinking about who’s going to be in my who’s going to be in my offseason plan and Brent Sudter was right there and he looked at me and said, “Norman’s on sbatical, honey.” and it was feeling good. Um, it’s just not something that they’ve done in the past. And if again, if there’s ever a time to deviate from what they’ve done in the past as far as how they’ve operated in free agent specifically, not just the offseason, but free agency specifically. Now’s a great time to deviate from it because there’s never been a better time to invest in this team. That’s probably not true. There’s never been a better time to instill good faith to invest in the team because the free agent class on its own not the best. Like truth be told, there there have been better free agent classes where there the 2021 class was better. Yeah. And looking at Otani in 2020, like there’s there’s there’s quite a few names that could have been better. But again, the realism of that and where the front office stood at that point, we know I I think with what Divish has outlined, the expectations from what a lot of us have been feeling are going to be met in the sense that one of Naylor or Palano will likely be back. And I think we might have been biting off more than we can chew, wanting to maybe if people were expecting to, biting off more than you can chew, wanting to is fine. You can have your cake and eat it too or whatever. There’s definitely a way that it can work. I know you eat cake a lot. U there’s definitely ways that it can work. And like again, if if Polo is the $6.5 million man in 2026 and Josh Taylor’s getting paid 20ish million, you still have threeish million to go sign a reliever if you really need to. If those are the numbers that we’re really playing with, you can also trade Luis Castillo. You could trade Randy Rosa rain. There’s plenty of places that you could free up some money if you wanted to, but that’s a conversation for a later day when more rumors are circulating because frankly in the middle of the World Series, you can’t really there’s not a lot floating out there right now. One thing I want to touch on at the tail end of this article is talking about like making an addition in the outfield where you have role and can zone in the corner outfield like sure and it’s talking about getting Luke a platoon at DH. I’m sorry if you were ressigning Jorge Palano. J Palano is your 50% DH and Luke is probably the other side of that on certain days if he is still on the roster in 2026. I don’t think that there’s anyone out there that you’re going to bring in to be a platoon partner for at the DH position that’s not named Jorge Palano. I think that makes the most sense in my head is part of the outfield cluster in right field if need be. He’s also still maybe a backup first baseman and he’s a part-time DH. Of course, that’s assuming he is rostered by the Mariners in 2026. If he’s not traded for bullpen help in some capacity, I again I don’t think that they need to the addition of the bullpen through free agency or the outfield. They’re not going to be big names. Th those would be the tertiary pieces that you feel like, okay, they brought in piece A and piece B. This is piece C. And that’s fine because that’s what they’re supposed to be. It’s what Donovan Solano should have been last offseason, but he wasn’t. He was the secondary piece unfortunately. And the the thing that I think is good with where this deadline and like players that were free agents and stuff because also they went very unconventional or out of their comfort zone this deadline by not getting a controlled player. They went all free agents. Oops. All free agents at the deadline. There’s no conversation this offseason of, well, Ry’s kind of like the, you know, he’s kind of like the a, you know, the the the primary move for this off seasonason because he’s coming back next year. There’s none of that baloney to go off of this year. It is strictly who you bring in and who you let walk. Plain and simple. Yeah. Yeah. That that’s kind of the the key difference. And I think that this this trade deadline back in July was the was was kind of the turning point for this team where they’re like, “Okay, we’re we are full boore, like we are going for it at this point.” And I feel like that shows a shift in both ownership mentality for giving them the ability to go out there and acquire, you know, Gino and Naylor and Ferguson, guys that were making, you know, a little bit of money and then going out and knowing like you just mentioned that those guys are going to be free agents at the end of the year because for the last god, call it like five years at least since basically the Mariners rebuilt, it’s always been about how can we get guys going to be under control for three plus years. This is what it has been for the longest time. The Mariners went for it this year. And I think that now that they have seen what happens when you go for it. Whoa. Oh my goodness. When you actually get good players, good things happen. Boom. Head explodes. like it’s it’s a situation where I think that hopefully this was a turning point in their mentality both on the front office side of things, on the on the ownership side of things to look at where we are at and say, “Yeah, odds are we’re probably going to go out there and add some guys that are going to help this team more even even in the short term.” Because you have a lot of long-term pieces there, right? Julio’s around for the next decade, whatever. Cal’s around for the next five or six years. Like even some of the starters and Brian Woo, Bryce Miller, etc. They’re they’re under contract. You, the Mariners have already said that their plan is to try to offer a contract extension. Why’ I say like that? A contract extension to Logan Gilbert this off seasonason. That is that is that was stated by Jerry Dotto. If they do that, that eats up a lot of their money in 2026 already. So, moves would have to be made. But odds are I, if I’m being honest, I think the Mariners are going to go over 170 million. I do. I hope so. I think that the I think the opening day payroll will be over 170 million, which will be good because you’re going to need that much money to compete with some of the guys that are in this World Series. Which brings us to our FanDuel favorites. As of this very second, 7:21 on October 27th. All right, it is tied 4 to4 between the Dodgers and the Blue Jays in the bottom of the sixth inning. And over on FanDuel, the odds to win the World Series for the Blue Jays are at plus 184. For the Dodgers are at minus 245. Now earlier today before this game started the odds for the Dodgers were at minus 205 compared to the Blue Jays at plus 175. So things have shifted a tiny bit. Now when we started this podcast it was way different because the Blue Jays were up by like three but or two or whatever it was. So, it’s an interesting scenario where I again I think that we all kind of believe the Blue Jays are not going to be able to beat the Dodgers. Do you feel that way? Like I think that’s that that is the predominant theory. Yeah, I think in my opinion it’s reflected in the odds and just the individual games, the World Series series long odds as well. They showed that they have fight in game one. They showed in game three at least so far that they’re able to fight back. It was two solo home runs, one from Teao, one from Show that gave the Dodgers a two nothing lead and then Alejandro Kirk took the lead three to two and then you know there’s a little bit of back and forth. Now it’s tied four to four. I don’t think that this is I don’t really believe that it is as far as a minus 240 to plus 180. Odds have already shifted since you said them by five little little points in terms of the total series odds. I would probably put it closer to like minus like 175 and like plus like 150ish. That’s probably where I would find myself where it’s not an it’s not a complete outside shot and I don’t think the Dodgers are as big of a slam dunk because it’s tied 1-1. Blue Jays have shown that they can win a game and they’ve shown that they could their offense could I scored nine runs in a singular inning in the first game. Who’s to say that they can’t do that in any given point because one we’ve also seen it we saw it happen to the Mariners. Sorry, flashback. Little little sour reminder for everybody. The Blue Jays offense in game one of the World Series is the one that we saw in two out of the three games at home in Seattle. And it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility that they could fly to fly to Los Angeles and do the same damn thing. And it’s going to take it’s not just one guy, but there’s certainly if there’s any player in all of baseball that it could just be one guy willing a team to victory Otani, who is currently the favorite to win World Series MVP at plus 100. homered in the the game tonight as we’re recording like I mentioned. Starts on Tuesday. Yeah. Starts on Tuesday. That, you know, long shot prop that you said where it’s strikes out 10, hits three home runs, which he did against the Brewers in the Championship Series there. There there’s some crazy things going on. But show at plus 100 to win World Series MVP. He won the championship series MVP. I mean, for all the flak that the Angels got for never getting him to the postseason and never seeing what him and Trout could do in the postseason, again, it’s a much different scenario with the two teams that are both in Los Angeles. Of course, one’s the Mickey Mouse team, the other is literally the Monstars from Space Jam. It feels like sometimes it’s no surprise to me that watching the best player to ever grace a baseball field, ever play the game, flourish in this environment, it should be no surprise. We saw what he did in the WBC. Like show at plus 100 to win World Series MVP is a no-brainer. Yeah. I look at what show has done over basically the past gosh four or five years at least. You know, when he first got to the major leagues, there were some hiccups and whatnot, but he he acclimated really well and then he of course had to have, you know, the surgery and so he wasn’t pitching last year. You look at him now and the amount of money that he is making because of just how incredible that guy is. I mean, we saw Babe Ruth’s numbers compared to Show Otani’s numbers. And it’s like when you think about the pinnacle of baseball, it is Babe Ruth right now. Like moving forward, I I feel like it should be Show Otani. He is, like you just mentioned, the greatest player to ever grace a baseball field ever. And yeah, he’s making $700 million and that’s a that’s a heck of a lot of money, but there’s some other contracts that we need to talk about, Joe, from Jim Bowen. Now, he posted a list of I believe it was was it the top 50 um free agents and like what he expected their contracts to look like. We’re going to look at the three important ones coming from the Mariners here because we already talked about bringing back Josh Naylor. We’re going to give you guys the numbers now. According to Jim Bowen, he expects Josh Naylor to sign a 4-year $90 million contract, which comes out to I think 22 a.5 um give or take in AAV, which based on what we talked about in the previous segment leaves you with like $10 million give or take, right? Jorge Palano is at two years, $26 million. So pretty close to that. Garver contract like Ryan Devish mentioned about $13 million a year. Now who knows how that’s broken up and whatnot. And then Au Heno Suarez at three years $72 million which is $24 million a year. So Gino being the most expensive there two years. I don’t think the Mariners would be willing to give him more than a one-year deal. I really don’t because of the because of the guys they have coming up in Colt Emerson, Ben Williamson potentially being ready. Palano at two years. I honestly think that could be a little bit low just based on he’s younger he’s younger than Gino. He frankly had a better second half than Gino. Like there there’s just so much there. But let’s start with Josh Naylor. Joe at 22 and a half million. Where is your head at on that? I know you wanted to make him the six or is that how that works? Yep. Six figure Matt. What? What is that how that works? Nine figure. Nine figure. Nine figure. I was Yeah. When you said it, I was like, “That’s so right.” And then now what I just said, I’m like, “Wait, that’s way wrong.” That’s wrong. Yeah, that’s my bad. No, that’s fine. Over 100 million is what you’re saying. But that was also in the idea of a fiveyear deal. Four years 90 I think it’s 22.25, but regard you’re a little bit north of 22 million. And I think it might be a little rich compared to obviously his market value on Sprack is at 15. So Bowden’s expecting a $7 million increase just for maybe the competition alone and how free agency works. I think you could reach 90 on incentives, but realistically I see probably see it falling closer to 80 than it does to like if it’s four years 85 million, whatever. Like I I don’t think this is too rich for the Mariners to pay. And I would still want the Mariners to pay this. And I could be very much so blinded by the recency bias of how good he was in the Mariners’s uniform, but of the of the contracts listed, I I don’t think it’s out of the realm of possibility for the Mars to pay. And I mean, you’re the guy who wanted to make him $100 million. I don’t think that you’re going to disagree with that. No. I mean, I was thinking, you know, a fiveyear, $20 million a year contract. And if you’re able to do that, right, if you’re able to do 5 years at 20 a year, am I more comfortable than four years, 22 a year, maybe potentially like or maybe you have an option for the fifth year based on what Bowen said, right, which is 490. Maybe you have a fifth year option for like 15 million and like that money kind of offsets and it ends up being what whatever what have you. I’m not sure. I think that 22 and a half million is fine for Josh Naylor. He’s not necessarily the the big power threat that you’re gonna find over there at first base, but he can still, you know, hit the ball out 20 plus times a year. Yeah, he all of a sudden stole 30 bases in 2025. I don’t think that’s going to happen again. But maybe Josh Naylor is the epitome of what the Mariners need to be. Josh Naylor is the epitome of what the Mariners should be looking for in free agency and even in trades. He is the smartest baseball player I’ve watched in a long time. He has that that edge about him which like you know when when you look at the way he plays the game jumping in front of a baseball in game seven like like he has that edge about him right he’s the guy that you hate if he’s on the other team you love him if he’s on your team and my goodness would I love to have him back. So if it if it takes $22.5 million a year, that’s fine. And again, I I I keep bringing it up. That’s what Luis Castillo is making. If the Mariners trade, Luis Castillo, when his uh no trade clause is up at the beginning of 2026 in January, it’s basically like you’re getting Josh Naylor for free. You know what I mean? That’s the most that’s the most girl math agency plan I’ve ever heard. But I’m in. Yeah. Yeah. So, I think that if you had Josh Naylor at 22 and a half, like I’d be willing to go to 24 with Josh Naylor on a shorter deal. If you’re doing like two or three years, but if you’re going to four, I think 22 and a half. And then if you’re going to five, I think 20 million is kind of where we’re going to see his market at going into 2026. In terms of Jorge Palano, two years 13 million. I honestly think he can beat that. I honestly think he’ll get I think he’ll get 15 plus somewhere. Yeah. And like now though this could be what we could see the Mariners offering like two for 26, which is fine, but I could 100% see, you know, another team out there offering him 15 million a year for two years plus a club option or something like that. And I think that that and now whether or not he’d take it, I don’t know because I hope I really do hope that he enjoyed his second year here a lot more than his first. He was bad. He was bad in his first year. But I hope that and the goodwill that he bought with us fans, the fact that we’re even like if you would have told me a year ago at this time we were talking about resigning again, I would have said you’re an idiot. But like it just goes to show like how actually injured and like not able to perform he was in 2024 and he came out in 2025 and put up his literal best season. Mhm. At the age of what 33 or something like that 32. Like I think that there’s a situation where the Mariner there’s a situation where the Mariners could resign both Naylor and Palano. I don’t think that it could happen at these rates that Jim Bowen put out though. Yeah. I mean, you’re already if if you are looking at it from this perspective where the Mars have roughly say 31 million to spend anywhere between 30 and 35. If you’re looking at them spending 35 million, hello, you’ve got it in these two specific contracts. Four years 90, two years 26. And that’s assuming that Polo might even be a little bit more expensive than this. And we could be wrong about our expectations for where Polo goes. I just think it’s hard because for the Mariners, they’re paying him to be half DH, half fielder, I think, right? Whereas any other team that’s probably going to sign him, in my head, it’s more so like a 7030 split where he’s playing the field 70% of the time. Whether or not that’s better for him, maybe he understands where his body’s at and he knows that the long history of knee injuries might be starting to catch up to him and if he wants to play out the rest of his career in the best way possible, it’s limiting his action on the field and dhing is more of the thing that he wants to do, sign me up. I’d be I would I will happily welcome Polo back just on the sense of he showed up in 2025 with a mission and it was to prove that hey I’m still a good ball player and I I’ll happily take him at two years 26 because I’ve been talking about 345 for him. I’ve been talking about giving him 15 million. So if it’s if that’s where Bowen’s got him, hey, I have no I have no issues with that. The one I do take a bit of an issue with is, and no disrespect to Aueno Suarez, but I mean, good lord, if some team offers him a threeyear, $72 million contract, I have bad news. And I’ll fill out the apology form right now for Au Henos Suarez. But what he showed in the second half of the regular season, yeah, big hits galore. He had plenty of them in the postseason as well. hit 189 in his tenure with Seattle in the second half after the trade deadline. Sure, 13 home runs in 53 games. Decent power output. When you compare it to the 36 that he hit in the first half, it’s a little like could maybe, you know, but three years 72 million is a lot for a 34 year old who I think it’s It’s difficult because in the same in the same sentiment like you’re looking at Kyle Schwarber who’s just a year or two younger and I don’t think possesses a similar skill set necessarily. This the one tool is the power tool that they both possess. It’s just he knows a better defender. Yeah, because Schwarber hasn’t defended in four years. Hasn’t had to. If Gino could just so solely focus on hitting, which is not something I think he would want to do anyways, maybe he could be commanding a fiveyear $160 million contract like Kyle Schwarber is potentially is what Bowen has. But again, I guess if if if it’s a weak position around all of baseball, third bases and specifically in this free agent class, like yes, Gino could find himself with the lion share of what is offered to third baseman in this class. It’s just if the Mariners if the Mariners choose to sign that to to ink that deal instead of Josh Naylor, I will have some big questions. Yeah, it’s an interesting situation because we know what we saw from Gino, right? But there was also first half Gino who was in conversations with Show Otani and Kyle Schwarber to be the NL MVP. Like had he continued in with the with the Diamondbacks exactly what he did for an entire year, he might be your National League MVP. It’s a situation where he came back to Seattle. He struggled and that’s one of the reason. I mean, I know that they said it sucked to trade Gino away, you know, when they did and it was very very fueled by money and whatnot, but at the same time, there were questions about Auano Suarez when the Mariners traded him the first time and it was, hey, you know, his bat speed’s slowing down, he’s striking out a lot, what have you. And he kind of revitalized himself with the Diamondbacks. He comes back to Seattle and once and starts to struggle and is the worst version of Gino we’ve ever seen. Like I don’t foresee the Mariners signing anything close to that deal. Nope. Now if if Gino wants to stay, if Gino wants to be in Seattle, which again it seems like he loved it his second time around, too, and he was with, you know, a lot of his former teammates and all those guys love him and whatnot. If he is willing to take a hometown discount, I’m in. But this is also probably his last big payday of his career. Like this is his last chance. He had 49 home runs this year. Like this is his last chance to make a decent chunk of change. I just I don’t see a situation where unless he is the last guy available if the Mariners strike out on Polo, on Naylor, on Pete Alonzo, etc. Gino’s still there, which I think I personally I think that Gino’s uh free agency is going to last well into 2026. I don’t think he gets picked up early. Interesting. If that’s the case, then sure, I could see the Mariners, you know, taking that plunge, but I don’t foresee him being a Mariner more than one or two more years at the most. And it’s unfortunate because again, he’s one of my favorite Mariners of all time. But unfortunately, he just didn’t perform for the Mariners when he was back here. So, it’s a situation where with where the Mariners are at with their free agents, are they going to have money to kind of finagle another free agent in there somewhere? Are they going to be able to make some trades? We’re not really sure, but we’ll just have to wait and see. I appreciate you guys watching episode 244 of the Hit It Here podcast presented by FanDuel. And go merits.

DeleteMe: Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to joindeleteme.com/ HIT use promo code HIT at checkout.

Well John Stanton wrote Mariners fans a letter and it likely means nothing. That is, if the Mariners owner is still all bark and no bite still. With the window as open as ever for the Seattle Mariners to go for it in the American League West this could be a great time to see a level of team salary we have not seen this decade.

– Stanton’s Letter 1:06
– Divish’s Outlook 15:33
– FanDuel Favorites 27:02
– Bowden’s Contracts 32:17

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