The Mariners are hot. The Angels are not. They’ll play two this week in Seattle.
The Mariners began the season 3-7, rediscovering the cellar beneath the AL West. The offense looked feckless, with the “RISP batting average” chyron burning a hole in my television. The few opportunities they had were TOOTBLAN’d away. The rotation couldn’t work past the fifth, and Dan Wilson was allowed to showcase his bullpen philosophies. The defense looked as bad as expected, save for Victor Robles, who exploded his shoulder making a miracle catch for not. After another disappointing season and offseason, the “it’s early” asterisk was applied mostly out of compulsion.
The Mariners have since gone 13-5 to move to four games above .500. They sit alone atop the AL West. They’ve won six consecutive series, including taking five games from the Astros and Rangers. The lineup has produced at a level seen rarely (if ever) in the Dipoto era. The division looks weak, and the Mariners are setting the pace.
Still, the issues of the first 10 games remain. The rotation suffered another big blow. The defense remains prone to blunder. The base running is electric, but sometimes in the way that means “shocking.” The Mariners are simply barreling their way through opponents right now, and they’ll need to refine at least one area outside the batter’s box at some point this year.
The season began with a projected three-way tie for the AL West. We’re not yet to the 30-game mark.
Note: we’ll be using 2025 stats in all the tables from here on out. I’ve noted that in all the tables, but added this note just for clarity’s sake.
In a convenient symmetry, the Angels began the year 7-3, ascending to the top of the AL West. They’ve since gone 5-12 and were just swept in Minnesota (badly).The Angels were not projected to be good, and they have not been good. They rank in the bottom five for hitting, fielding and pitching, and there aren’t many encouraging signs from Baseball Savant to suggest better days lie ahead. Their run differential (-33) is the third worst in MLB. While the Angels rank fifth in MLB in homers, most of them have come with the bases empty, as they’re dead last in both total hits and total walks. And it doesn’t appear there’s much hope for the future, with the consensus worst farm system in MLB. The Angels have returned to their residence in the AL West’s cellar, perhaps for good. Nobody touched the phone charger they left behind last summer, still plugged in, slowly burning carbon towards nothing.
Still, the Angels were similarly bad last year and managed to take the season series. They took three straight in Anaheim to enter the All-Star Break, bleeding the Mariners division lead down to one. They finished the job shortly thereafter with a three-game sweep in Seattle.
Kyren Paris was partially responsible for the panic I felt in the first week of the season. On April 9, Paris had a 355 wRC+, a .680 ISO, and the top spot on many relevant leaderboards. Since then, he has a -20 wRC+, a 45% strikeout rate, and the bottom spot on many relevant leaderboards. Shortstop Zach Neto is the Angels current wRC+ leader at 175; he has not drawn a walk this season. Catcher Logan O’Hoppe has been their next best batter; he also leads the league in strikeout rate at 40%. I like Nolan Schanuel, as he reminds me of a young J.P. Crawford with the bat, though Schanuel is a first baseman (and not a particularly good one). You will recognize more names in the Angels lineup this week, but whatever relevance they once carried to stick in your brain is now mostly gone.
And then there’s Mike Trout, with a 93 wRC+. Trout is obviously still some level of good. He has nine homers and an impressive quality of contact portfolio, even if the eye may be starting to slip. It’s an interesting period for Trout. He was once the best player in history through age 27, and then he was the best active player when healthy (even if he rarely was). Now he’s something new that I can’t quite place. It feels weird to see Aaron Judge, while not exactly on his tail for career fWAR, making a case for the player of the generation. That an active contemporary, a player just months younger than Trout, could rival his legacy is not something I considered until now. But it’s a mistake to doubt Trout, and a third act is the common thread among the players at the top of the career WAR charts. He can still catch Mantle. There’s still time.
Probable Pitchers
Photo by Luke Hales/Getty Images
Jack Kochanowicz debuted last season as a classic sinkerballer, making 11 starts with an ERA just a hair under four. I used the word “classic” purposefully above because there was nothing modern about Kochanowicz’s approach or pitch mix. He threw his bowling ball sinker nearly three-quarters of the time and that resulted in a single digit strikeout rate. His K/9 started with a three. He did benefit from a ton of groundball contact, but he just couldn’t miss bats. This year, Kochanowicz has dropped the usage of his sinker down to just over 50% in favor of his four-seamer and slider. The results aren’t that promising; his strikeout rate now has a second digit, but it’s only up to 11.4%, and his walk and groundball rates have both trended the wrong way.
Way back in 2022, Tyler Anderson enjoyed a late-career breakout with the Dodgers thanks to a revamped changeup. That pitch has continued to hold the foundation of his repertoire in the three years since but his overall results have flagged since joining the Angels. The two other ingredients of his breakout — a 4.8% walk rate and a 6.4% home run rate — have both ballooned in Anaheim, which has led to an ERA and FIP both above four. At this point in his career, the approach against him should be pretty clear: try to avoid his changeup, crush his four-seamer, and let him get himself into trouble.
The Big Picture:
The Mariners continue to hold onto first place in the division thanks to the collapse of the Rangers. Texas is 3-7 over their last 10 games and started a four-game series against the Athletics with a loss yesterday. Meanwhile, the Astros have snuck into second place in the division with a win over the AL-best Tigers yesterday.