Episode 476: The Mariners Are Down To Two Finalists For Manager

00:00:00 Speaker 1: Welcome to episode number 476 of the Marine Layer podcast. We'll react to the Mariners narrowing down their managerial search to two candidates and Joe Espada and Jason Kinsler. And we'll also react to some free agent contract predictions from Jim Bowden. 00:00:15 Speaker 2: Reminder to you guys, if you're watching these episodes, just make sure to hit subscribe on YouTube. If you're listening, make sure to rate and review. Please leave a five stars. It helps the channel a ton if you do. Check out our website, which is marinelayerpod.com. You'll find our merch there, Patreon there, a whole bunch of different stuff. And then follow us across social media at marinelayerpod. Let's get it rolling. Let's get it rolling. 00:00:49 Speaker 1: And we welcome you to this episode of the Marine Layer Podcast, part of the Just Baseball Podcast Network, recording here on Tuesday evening, October 27th. The offseason should start within the next couple of days, and Lyle, it sounds like the Mariners have narrowed down their search to two candidates. Not two mysteries, two guys we have talked about plenty. Now that those names are like announced and they're finalists and officially reported finalists, how do you feel? 00:01:18 Speaker 2: I would say I feel fine. There's no names in the group of finalists that really have me jumping for joy, but I don't think either of these names have me incredibly furious either. Like, you know, there's no Tony La Russa's in here, which I would hope the Mariners would never even come close to entertaining. I guess people, well, I guess we weren't doing the podcast back when Tony La Russa got hired in Chicago to manage the White Sox. I mean, TJ and I, would basically like root for that guy's downfall because it was like, this guy is horrendous. This guy shouldn't be managing. This guy has no business running a baseball team full of these young stars with a boomer mentality. So there's nobody like that managing like in, in contention to manage the Mariners. Am I overwhelmed by the finalists? No, I think that's where I stand as we sit with Joe Espada and Jason Kanzler likely to be one of the two guys named the manager. 00:02:08 Speaker 1: As we've said a few times, I don't think there was a candidate we were going to be over the moon for except for Kai Correa. And Kai Correa has seemingly not made the finalist cut for the Mariners. Per Daniel Kramer and Adam Jude, there's still a chance that the Mariners. 00:02:23 Speaker 2: Could consider other options. 00:02:25 Speaker 1: These are the two guys they are bringing into Seattle this week for in-person interviews with front office staff, with other retained coaching staff, with players, all that stuff. So these are just the guys that have made it the farthest. I guess now there's still a chance there is a Brewers or Rays employee they might want to talk to that perhaps they couldn't talk to during the playoff run. Always possible, but it just doesn't seem quite as likely. I know people have thrown Daniel Vogel back out there. Unfortunately, he breaks my rule. 00:02:57 Speaker 2: Yeah, no, he will not be managing here. I get he's a fun character, but I'm sorry, he will not be managing here. 00:03:03 Speaker 1: I mean, he has less experience than Jason Kanzler has at coaching. So yeah, and I know Voguey wants to manage, but maybe he should be in the dugout for maybe a couple more years. Because this is only his second year in the dugout, I want to say, because he was with the Pirates last year and then the Brewers this year. Yeah, two years he's been in the dugout. So yeah, I'd say I'd want more experience. And again, Lyle, he played. 00:03:29 Speaker 2: For the Mariners. 00:03:30 Speaker 1: Correct. 00:03:30 Speaker 2: Wait, he was with the Pirates? I don't remember that. Yeah, last year. 00:03:33 Speaker 1: I think he was like a special hitting coordinator. When he stepped away, he said he wanted to get back in coaching. He didn't know how fast he wanted to get back into coaching, but he had opportunities, and clearly he's got a lot of buy-in from the Brewers. Right. 00:03:51 Speaker 2: Yeah, so maybe one day for Daniel Vogel back. But anyway... I would say the only other names I would have been overwhelmed about were obviously Steven Vo, but we found out that one's not happening. Other than Vo and Kai, were there any others? 00:04:06 Speaker 1: I mean, Lyle, what do we make of the fact that the Guardians were open to letting the Mariners talk to Steven Vo? 00:04:15 Speaker 2: I mean, I think it's a little weird that they didn't even want to call. Now, if they called and found out, well, the price for Steven Vo is you're going to trade us Brian Wu. And it's like, okay, nice knowing you, Guardians. We're going to hang up the phone. What does it hurt to pick up and call? That's what I was wondering. One phone call. A phone call could be an unproductive phone call, but at least you pick up the phone. You know what John Schneider does across the street? He picks up the phone, as evident from the Seahawks just trading for Quentin Nelson here on Tuesday. Now, if there was a world where Quentin Nelson was going to be the Jamal Adams trade package where it costs you two first-round picks— I'm sure Schneider hangs up, but you pick up the phone and dial. I don't understand what the harm in picking up the phone is. If the reports are right, and I don't have any reason to doubt Kramer or Jude or anybody who is on the Mariners beat. So if they're right that the Mariners didn't even call, why not? 00:05:12 Speaker 1: It's a great question. Maybe there's this consensus in front office with all these really smart people out there. that trading any sort of baseball asset for a manager is just not worth it. Where the Guardians know we're going to get surplus value no matter who the Mariners trade us, and the Mariners know they're going to lose surplus value no matter who they trade to the Guardians for Steven Vogt. And everyone just collectively realizes like a good manager is good, but maybe having George Kirby is, even this version of George Kirby is better than having Steven Vogt. 00:05:48 Speaker 2: What if the price was Weston Wilson? 00:05:51 Speaker 1: Well, then, of course. But you know that's not going to be the price. The price for Lou Piniella two decades ago was an all-star outfielder. 00:05:58 Speaker 2: Correct. But you know how you find out what the price is? You pick up the phone and dial. It's like what Jordan Belfort says in The Wolf of Wall Street. Pick up the phone and start dialing. Pick up the phone. If the price is Brian Wu, then yes, you can hang up. But why would you not even ask? Uh, it's a great question. That's what I don't have an answer on. Just like, just like two years ago when the Mariners came to the conclusion of who they wanted their next manager to be is why did you not interview other people? Anybody else? We'll never get an answer to that. Same thing here. Why are you not picking up the phone and asking if the price is Brian Wu? Okay. You hang up. If it's something of too much surplus, you hang up, pick up the phone. 00:06:47 Speaker 1: Hmm. I like, there's always a chance they did and it didn't get reported. 00:06:52 Speaker 2: Um, I don't know. I don't have a good answer for you. 00:06:55 Speaker 1: I don't, I mean, it didn't sound like Steven vote had much interest in coming back. Now I will say, given that he hadn't talked with him at all, he had no reason to suggest he'd be interested going somewhere else without previous communication. 00:07:07 Speaker 2: Cause that would just kind of look bad. Oh yeah. I'm ready to go somewhere else. 00:07:10 Speaker 1: Even, even though we just made the ALCS and they haven't talked to me at all about it. 00:07:14 Speaker 2: Like that would be, that would be kind of silly. I don't know, Lyle. 00:07:18 Speaker 1: I was wondering aloud on our social post this morning why they didn't even bother to pick up the phone. I'm just going to guess front offices around the league realize that trading for a manager is never. 00:07:27 Speaker 2: Worth it these days. Yeah, it could be. But as a result, now we're down to two candidates. And one is a guy with experience who is from your own division, who I'm sure the Mariners know decently well just from getting to see him over the years. And another is a guy with absolutely none. What do we make of this? Again, I think our overall takeaway, because you didn't give your take, I'm guessing your overall takeaway is similar, right? Where it's like, okay, I'm not overwhelmed, but I'm not furious about either of the finalists. It's whatever. 00:07:59 Speaker 1: Here's the job of the next Mariners manager. The job of the next Mariners manager is to not steer the Titanic into the iceberg. 00:08:09 Speaker 2: Because the last manager. 00:08:11 Speaker 1: Essentially, see, he took the Titanic out of port and there is, you know, national news like, oh my God, look at that launch. It looks so great. Everyone's on the dock cheering. All the people on the boat are cheering like this is amazing. We're all going so well. And then they get out into the deep, dark ocean and the visibility, the visibility gets a little tough. And all of a sudden you can't see quite as far in front of you and you're not paying attention as closely as you should. And then all of a sudden, bam, you hit in the iceberg. The job of this manager is to simply not to steer the ship into the iceberg. 00:08:47 Speaker 2: That's it. 00:08:48 Speaker 1: So it's not going to take some whiz kid to come in here and not steer the ship into the iceberg. It takes a steady hand and clear communication, which sounds like exactly what Jerry DePoto wanted when he talked after the season ended. 00:09:05 Speaker 2: And if we're going to start with Joe Espada, because I think we're going to list out some pros and cons of each guy. My gut feeling is of the two, we're going to get Joe Espada. That's who it feels like the next manager of the Mariners is going to be. Joe Espada might not be the Stephen Vogt home run hire, but he also should be perfectly capable of taking a roster that's this talented and winning minimum 86 games and putting them in a position to make the playoffs. He should not drive the Titanic into the iceberg. That's for sure. He might not have the highest ceiling of any manager out there, But he certainly should be capable of doing enough to get enough out of his players where they're in the postseason and competing for an American League pennant. 00:09:48 Speaker 1: Can you come in in year one and not have it be a disaster? Because missing the playoffs would be a disaster. As we talked about plenty on Monday's episode on whether or not this job was actually desirable. Like when you walk into this clubhouse in spring training and you're talking to these guys, are you able to keep yourself from being a story and have things blow up in your face? I don't really think Joe Espada is the kind of manager where it would just be a disaster. I mean, the guy just managed for three seasons in a row. with moderate success. How would he not at least have moderate success if he came to manage the Mariners? I don't know. I would be very surprised given that he would have more talent at pretty much every position except for DH. 00:10:35 Speaker 2: Is that fair? 00:10:35 Speaker 1: I mean, he's got better starting pitchers. He has better top-end relievers. Josh Hader and Andres Munoz. I mean, you could juggle that one. 00:10:44 Speaker 2: Well, this past year, Hader was a hell of a lot better. Dude, the Mariners bullpen this past year was not good. 00:10:51 Speaker 1: But I mean, if you're expecting to have a healthy Munoz and a healthy Brash and a healthy Spire, you would at least feel a little bit more comfortable with that as opposed to who is his next best reliever? 00:11:03 Speaker 2: Brian Abreu, the last two years really tailed off. That's for sure. He's awful. He was bad. He was awful. 00:11:08 Speaker 1: Yeah, really, really, really bad. So that's kind of hard to manage, right? And then around the position player front, you're younger and probably more talented around the diamond. So, yeah, that makes Joe Espada's job a lot easier to not crash and burn. You do not have a more talented shortstop. That's the one other spot. No, you don't. But the same shortstop could also get traded because, well, he's not signing an extension. 00:11:37 Speaker 2: In Jeremy Pena, yeah. I'm just saying if you're comparing the rosters, right now the Astros have a more talented shortstop. Mariners might have a shortstop with more upside, who's certainly signed for a long time now in Colt Emerson. But this second, I think you have a better shortstop in Houston. 00:11:55 Speaker 1: I'd say another pro for me, Lyle, is that Joe Espada has dealt with controversy in his clubhouse before. And it seems like there were some mixed reviews on how he handled it. I went back and I listened to his press conference after the fact. And the incident I'm referring to is when Frambois Valdez purposely threw at his own threw out his own catcher after he gave up a grand slam, and Joe Espada, in his pregame media session the next day, communicated in detail to the media what he did afterwards to try and get to the bottom of the issue and mend bridges. Everyone in the baseball world pretty much understands how much of a headache Frambois Valdez is, so I'm not sure how much we can chalk that one up to Joe Espada not having control over his clubhouse when... It's pretty well known that Frambois Valdez is a bit of a loose cannon in general. Lyle compared him to Randy Rosarena before we started recording. I think that's very accurate. Is he not just the pitching version of Randy Rosarena? 00:12:54 Speaker 2: He might be. I mean, got well paid. He is obviously very talented. 00:12:59 Speaker 1: I don't think Randy like lashes out at people like Frambois throws at guys. 00:13:06 Speaker 2: And Randy cusses out the captain of his team in four languages. 00:13:11 Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I mean, Randy's not throwing things at people, but yeah, I mean, moody players, it seems like. 00:13:18 Speaker 2: Very, very moody players who are not easy to deal with inside a clubhouse, yes. Who are very talented and are going to get paid well in free agency, but they're not easy to deal with. 00:13:29 Speaker 1: And again, so I listened to Joe Espada with that, and again, the bar is, does this sound like a reasonable way to go about something? comparative to what the Mariners did last year when controversy arrived. And I would say, yes, it sounded significantly better. So while I will count that as a pro. 00:13:47 Speaker 2: I agree. If he has a explanation for what went down without airing everything out, if he has an explanation for what went down, why he handled it the way he handled it. And was the situation handled internally? That's what we're asking for. Yes. Again, unlike after what happened in the WBC, when, uh, The spam button that the former manager just kept hitting and hitting. It's like, we're moving on, we're moving on, we're moving on, we're moving on, we're moving on. They didn't move on because that kick started a disastrous culture throughout all of 2026. What's another pro for you? I think the fact that he has a Latin background and can relate to a lot of the Latin players on the team is important. I know that, you know, you had Manny Acta there in the past who would do a lot of that stuff. I'm not saying it's the end-all be-all. Jason Kanzler is apparently pretty fluent in Spanish, so that should help if he's the one that's hired. But I always think having some type of Latin background is a very, very beneficial thing because, again, you have players that come from all different places and cultures are different. And when you have somebody who can relate to a lot of the Latin players on the team, I think that helps. So I'm sure if you're somebody like Julio Rodriguez, there is a level of appreciation there for somebody like Joe Espada. 00:15:05 Speaker 1: Another pro for me is that he is by far the more experienced of the two. Spent time in the Yankees dugout. Spent plenty of time in the Astros dugout before he was manager. And he has three years of being a big league manager under his belt. That's quite a lot more experience than the Mariners have had in either of their last two managers. This will be, out of their last three hires as manager, if it's Joe Espada... they will be the first time they've hired a manager to manage their baseball team. 00:15:37 Speaker 2: Correct. 00:15:37 Speaker 1: That sounds silly, but like 12 years in, it'll be the first time they've actually hired a manager. One time it worked out, one time it did not. Right. 00:15:47 Speaker 2: Right. I think that's most of the jealous spot of pros, unless there's anything absolutely catastrophic that we're missing. I have one more. 00:15:55 Speaker 1: The other pro is that this Astros, his Astros tenure might not be his fault. Oh, I think I think that's a. 00:16:01 Speaker 2: Pretty big one. That's what I like. People are using the fact. 00:16:03 Speaker 1: He only I think he maxed out at 87 wins as Astros manager and saying like, oh, see, clearly he doesn't get enough out of his roster. 00:16:11 Speaker 2: He's not a good enough manager. 00:16:13 Speaker 1: And then I point out, well, I mean, Jeff Bagwell went on a firing spree for a lot of the smart people in their front office. I know they fired a lot of their scouts. I know Dana Brown was not a good GM given that he was fired in season. for the Astros. And those two were hired alongside of each other, right? And then the talent level on the Astros degraded season after season after season. And they didn't really establish, try to establish any sort of like new core. It was essentially continuing to run back the old version of the Astros that peaked in 2022 and then have been on a, like a downward trend sense. And then you can also look at it in this fact, Lyle, where the reason, the real reason Joe Espada was not brought back to the Astros for this upcoming season is because they fired Dana Brown. And the job of Astros general manager is not as attractive to candidates. If you hire the manager for them before they get, they get, they get to take the job. So of course they're not going to bring Joe Espada back. 00:17:18 Speaker 2: Yeah, GMs want their own guy. Right. And that's not Joe Espada's fault. That specifically is not. And it very well might not be his fault that Dana Brown constructed a very poor roster, that he had an owner in Jim Crane that was meddling all the time. He had a I don't even know what you call his role in Jeff Bagwell, who seems to think who's advisor, I guess, who seems to think any tool in analytics is essentially a sham. So that probably makes things pretty difficult for Joe Espada. I'm not saying nothing was his fault. But it is hard to be dealt an aging roster with players who are on the wrong ends of their career and Altuve and Correa, guys who are very highly paid, who, I mean, the Astros already rank pretty high up in payroll. They're not going to have a ton of room to add. You know that Jeremy Pena might be on the trade block. Their farm system's not very good. These are things Joe Espada can't really control. I'm not saying nothing was his fault in Houston. But there's also a chance that he didn't get as fair a shake as people are giving him. Again, I'm not saying nothing's his fault. But this is why it's hard to just judge a manager on wins and losses. The situation around him was not perfect. 00:18:30 Speaker 1: What about a con for Joe Espada? 00:18:34 Speaker 2: Doesn't have the highest ceiling in the world. Again, he hasn't proven that he can take a team deep into the playoffs. Miss the playoffs in 2025. made it in 26 and got bounced by the White Sox. He doesn't have a long history of winning. So again, maybe now I sound like I'm contradicting myself because I just said you can't take win-loss record into account totally. But if you're looking for what could be a potential concern of Joe Espada, managing in the playoffs is very different than managing in the regular season. The last manager certainly learned that was, you know, Kerry Carpenter and George Springer. But Anyway, Joe Espada hasn't proven he has a ton of lucrative playoff managerial experience. So that is something that he hasn't really dipped his toes far into. And that could be something that potentially costs them at some point. Can't know for sure, but it is something to think about. 00:19:28 Speaker 1: A con for me, and this was a very big point of the last manager that we did not like, is that we asked someone who. 00:19:36 Speaker 2: Would know, who was. 00:19:39 Speaker 1: In the Astros organization about Joe Espada, and one of the concerns about him as manager was that he mismanaged the bullpen. That's a red flag. 00:19:51 Speaker 2: For sure. And if you look at that graph that Tiger's data account put out earlier in the year where he was going through and trying to make a statistic for manager success rate with bullpen decisions, Espada only ranked about 20th. That's not great. And he ranked out in the negative because there was positive and negative grades for these managers. He did rank in the negative. Now, I will say, if you're Joe Espada and you were managing your bullpen in certain ways in collaboration with the front office that certain people didn't like, there is a chance that again goes back to the Jeff Bagwell problem or the Dana Brown problem. Where in Seattle, I'm sure these two sides are going to be much more cohesive than the last Mariners manager in the front office, where it's like things were in one ear and out the other, or how in the offseason you had to have Jerry DiPoto essentially teaching Dan Wilson analytics a year into the job. At least Joe Espada has, I'm sure if the Mariners are hiring him, has a sense on the modern feel of the game. and how to operate a bullpen in the modern era. His bullpen also wasn't very good last year. So, yes, it is a concern. He did not grade out great as a bullpen manager. There's also a chance that a change of scenery could shake that up. 00:21:07 Speaker 1: I'd say the last con I wrote down is scooping up a manager that your division rival just fired, a division rival that has been significantly more successful and consistent than you over the last 10-plus years. Yeah. 00:21:23 Speaker 2: Which again could go back to the higher powers. But yes, that is a concern. I mean, there's two ways to look at that. You can look at that in the Astros organization is the problem, or you can look at that in Joe Espada is the problem. 00:21:36 Speaker 1: And again, that's for people to decide whether or not that's a pro or a con that Joe Espada is available and a favorite to take the Mariners job. 00:21:44 Speaker 2: He wasn't so good at the job that by letting go of Dana Brown, the Astros organization said, hey, No matter what, Joe is our manager. Even if a new GM comes in, this guy is so good at his job that we're going to leave him as the manager. That did not happen. They let him go. 00:21:58 Speaker 1: How many Astros you think will keep their job of note? That's players included, Lyle, of this current set. 00:22:07 Speaker 2: Dead serious. I mean, there are guys on long contracts who you probably can't trade away. 00:22:14 Speaker 1: I mean, Hunter Brown will stay there. Peña' s not. Jordan probably won't. Like, why are they going to pay Jordan? 00:22:22 Speaker 2: But you can't get rid of Altuve and Correa. Those guys have monster contracts. Well, right. Well, okay. So they're there because they have to be there. 00:22:29 Speaker 1: Right. But, like, every other person in this. 00:22:33 Speaker 2: A hater, yes. 00:22:34 Speaker 1: But most everyone else in a decision-making spot for the Astros, yeah, not great. 00:22:40 Speaker 2: So Joe's spot is not alone in that. 00:22:42 Speaker 1: Right. 00:22:43 Speaker 2: Agreed. 00:22:44 Speaker 1: Agreed. What about Jason Kanzler? Let's do the same thing. Some pros with Jason Kanzler and some cons with Jason Kanzler. Let's start off with the pros. 00:22:52 Speaker 2: Man, I mean, there's so much less you can go off of with Kanzler than Espada because there's so much unknown about Jason Kanzler. But the fact he's 36 years old and a finalist for a big league job that involves a roster that has World Series potential seems like a pro. If he's that smart and that insightful and that new age minded that the Mariners think he's so bright that he's one of the two finalists that has to signal something. It has to signal that they think he could really be good at this. He certainly has a higher floor or a higher ceiling than Joe Espada does. So that's probably a pro. 00:23:31 Speaker 1: Uh, one pro for me is that he has a hitting background where this is probably somebody who, uh, Different than Joe Espada, where Joe Espada, one of the things we said we wanted the Mariners to ask around in this hiring process is you essentially get a self-scout. You get the opinion of the person you're interviewing, what they think of your roster, where you're struggling, and what you can do better. Joe Espada was probably doing that based off of the probably over 100 games he's played against the Mariners as a member of the Astros. since 2018, where he gets to see this core come to fruition together. And he's playing against them the whole time, communicating with Dusty Baker, with players on the Astros, some of the best players in baseball, about what makes the Mariners good and where the Mariners' weaknesses are. Meanwhile, Jason Kanzler is probably coming at this with more of, like you said, like a scouting focus or video focus on what he's picking up and what are some numbers they're picking up. Just a guess, not something I actually know, but given that he's not playing the Mariners a ton and he doesn't have a ton of coaching experience outside of his couple years in Houston, that he's able to probably diversify his scout of the Mariners. And where does this come back to? That he has a hitting background. If he's taking a look at the Mariners hitters and he's pitching to Jerry DiPoto and Justin Hollander, the hitting identity he wants to have of this team, I'd be curious to hear what he's prioritizing and what he's not. Given that a clear philosophical hitting philosophy, I just said philosophy twice, clear hitting philosophy is going to win the Brewers a World Series championship this World Series. 00:25:22 Speaker 2: Now, it's also going to involve employing the right people around Kanzler if you really want to overhaul the philosophy at the plate. He can do some of it, but you need the right hitting coaches around you. You need the right systems in place, which would actually probably lead me to my next pro of Jason Kanzler, which is the fact he's worn so many different hats in different roles and different organizations probably means he has a pretty sound idea of what the right systems are that need to be put into place. I mean, he has experience with the farm system. He has experience at the big league level. He has experience at the minor league level. He's seen this through at so many different levels of multiple different organizations. He's probably got a pretty good feel on the systems that need to be put into place, especially offensively, because the Mariners, it seems like, aren't going to overhaul their pitching philosophy. Their pitching coaches are still there. So this becomes much more about hitting and defense. And you would think that with the time he's spent in different organizations and different roles, he would have some pretty good ideas of systems to be put into place to help players best succeed. 00:26:31 Speaker 1: He'll get to lean on Edgar Martinez and build out that hitting philosophy. 00:26:33 Speaker 2: Good. 00:26:34 Speaker 1: Uh, the last pro I wrote down is since he is an unknown, there are pros we could be totally unaware of because there's almost nothing. 00:26:45 Speaker 2: On him online. Okay. 00:26:50 Speaker 1: And, and now the cons, uh, first con for me, he started coaching in the big leagues, uh, Six months before this podcast started. 00:27:00 Speaker 2: That is a con. Serious. Yeah. 00:27:04 Speaker 1: He started during the 2022 season. We started the month after the 2022 season ended. That's not a long time. No. 00:27:13 Speaker 2: No, it's not. 00:27:14 Speaker 1: Look, we're on episode 476. That's a lot of episodes. But in terms of like years, really not that much. 00:27:21 Speaker 2: Actually, I lied. One more pro. Because Jason Kanzler was in the Astros org, does he have a relationship with Kyle Tucker to get him to Seattle? That's a great point. 00:27:32 Speaker 1: You could make that point with both Espada and Kanzler. 00:27:37 Speaker 2: True, but Espada was around when they traded him away. Maybe Espada wanted him gone. Maybe Kanzler saw... I mean, Kanzler got hired in 19 as a minor league hitting coordinator. He probably saw K-Tuck in the minors. Probably worked with him in the minors and the big leagues. 00:27:51 Speaker 1: But then you had Joe Espada with Kyle Tucker in his best. 00:27:55 Speaker 2: Well, that's true too. Anyway, yes, that is very true. He is very, very inexperienced is what TJ is basically trying to say with that. Inexperienced with coaching in the big leagues. 00:28:05 Speaker 1: He was teaching your favorite classes in high school. I think he was like a physics and chemistry teacher from like 2015 to 2019 to when he got hired by the Astros. Like this is the kind of jump this guy took. Yeah. 00:28:21 Speaker 2: Agreed. I would say the other con, and again, there's just not that much on Kanzler, but the other con is we have done some recon on this and tried to talk to some people. And from multiple different places, from people we certainly trust and would have a feel of the situation, Jason Kanzler is apparently very, very, very intense, which we mentioned on Monday's podcast. And I'm sure to some people you hear that and say, great. I'm tired of these players getting off scot-free with everything. He's going to tear them a new one. Well, the sound of that is great because you want to keep people in line. The potential fallout of that is you lose your clubhouse. And that is a real concern. 00:29:03 Speaker 1: Does that work with an established team that is already in place, has already made the ALCS, has already seen success, where there's like a brand new 36-year-old coming in And he's the most intense dude in there. Does that land? Like, does the ship need that much correction? Does Jason Kanzler need to grab the wheel of the Titanic and do a 360 around? 00:29:29 Speaker 2: Or does he just need to steer it to the side? 00:29:32 Speaker 1: Right. 00:29:33 Speaker 2: Also with players that are very highly paid. And when a player gets a contract, whether it's right or not, sometimes you... say you know who are you to be bossing me around look at my value to this team look at what this organization just paid me. 00:29:46 Speaker 1: On top of that one of the reasons Scott service was let go is that he was also pretty intense and it wore on the players by the end and it strained a lot of relationships and it weakened the effectiveness of his message in the clubhouse as that relationship wore on. So, and that's from someone who had been there the entire time, who had seen the likes of Logan Gilbert and Cal Raleigh and Bryce Miller and Brian Wu all debut and flourish in the big leagues. But this is someone who's being dropped in while these guys are all established at that point. Yeah. 00:30:22 Speaker 2: I mean, again, the intel we got is, is, He is about as intense of a person in both organizations as you can possibly draw up. Again, that can be good and bad because he clearly wants to win. He's clearly got drive. But when you are, quote unquote, the most intense person in each of your organizations, there is room for a meltdown there. 00:30:52 Speaker 1: The last con I wrote down is that he has executed as many in-game bullpen decisions as Dan Wilson did when he took the Mariners' job in 2024. 00:31:05 Speaker 2: Hasn't done it. He hasn't made pinch hit calls either. Nope. 00:31:10 Speaker 1: Can he communicate a pinch hit call to a player in the middle of a game? Right. Seems something that would be very simple, but something the last coaching staff really struggled with. 00:31:20 Speaker 2: Really struggled with. Yeah, apparently that stuff, especially the pinch hit stuff, was not well communicated at all. 00:31:26 Speaker 1: No. And it left people pretty frustrated. 00:31:29 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:31:31 Speaker 1: These are little things you would think the average major league coach could do, but it doesn't happen all the time. And with someone who has barely been in a major league dugout as a coach, how well are you going to deal with that? Especially as a first-time manager, juggling all these things in a one-year sprint to make the playoffs. Because that's what this is at the end of the day. It'll be a one-year sprint to make the playoffs to determine your future and the rest of the front office's future. So you want to go safe with Joe Espada or would you go with someone that you could potentially hire for 15 years, like Jason Kanzler, to be your next Kevin Cash? 00:32:07 Speaker 2: Agreed. Man, this thing's coming down to the wire, isn't it? We're finally going to get an answer on this thing. 00:32:14 Speaker 1: Maybe we'll have a manager by Friday. If not, and they name it on Friday, then we'll just have another podcast on Friday to talk about Whoever the manager is. 00:32:23 Speaker 2: Right. Do we want to get into any of this free agent stuff now? I mean, it feels like the news is truly on these two managers. Do we want to save some of the free agent stuff, or do we want to do it now? 00:32:35 Speaker 1: Well, you can hit on a couple bullet points that, I mean, you texted me today about things you thought were important slash relevant. 00:32:44 Speaker 2: So Jim Bowden put out a lot of potential projected free agent contracts for a handful of guys. We don't have to go through every single one. We can do more of this as the offseason goes on. But I will say this, because there are a lot listed out. I mean, Scooble's projected to get anywhere from $ 300 to $ 500 million. Freddy Peralta's going to get a huge contract. Michael King's going to get well-paid. Randy's going to get well-paid. I mean, the projection on Randy, for anybody curious, from Jim Bowden, is about the same as Spotrak's prediction. Spotrak projected five years $ 127 million. Bowden projects five years $ 124 million. And let's just be clear. If Randy's getting any money close to that, as they say on Shark Tank, I'm out. 00:33:27 Speaker 1: He's not coming back. The Mariners would not pay him that money. They barely paid any player that money, let alone a player that they don't think would be as seamless a fit back with them, or that would age well. 00:33:41 Speaker 2: Correct. The other one is, I mean, you can look at, say, a Suzuki, five years, $ 120 million. That is a high AAV, that's for sure. That would be a lot. 00:33:52 Speaker 1: So your decision is, like, if you don't want to pay that to Randy... but you're serious about winning, you need to be comfortable paying that to someone, and that someone would be Seiya Suzuki. Right. 00:34:04 Speaker 2: Agreed. And that's $ 24 million a year. 00:34:06 Speaker 1: You don't know how he's going to age. You don't know how that contract is going to work out. But I feel like you're comfortable, given that you know the personality of Randy Rosarena more, and you're banking that it would work better with Seiya Suzuki, given you do your proper research on him. 00:34:22 Speaker 2: The final guy on here, Teej, this is the one that made me stop in my track seeing this list. the projected contract on Adrian Morajone is three years for $ 42 million. That is the fastest contract I would ever give out in the history of my life. If I was the Mariners front office, I would literally give Adrian Morajone that contract before SpongeBob can say, want to see me run that mountain back? Want to see me do it again? 00:34:49 Speaker 1: And this isn't even, you wouldn't even need to set a new record as a Mariner, like giving a hundred million dollar contract or a reliever. Like, no, they've given out this contract to a number of players. It's like, paying Mitch Garver one extra year. Like you, you would very easily do that for, for Adrian Morojo. Now I'm kind of skeptical. That's actually the deal he's going to get, especially given that in the same production projection from Jim Bowden, he's projecting Teriyuki Sato to get five years for one 80, which I, I just, I'm calling cap on that. 00:35:17 Speaker 2: There's no way that's happening. 00:35:19 Speaker 1: So maybe it will fall somewhere between what you originally projected Lyle and what, what he's Jim Bowden is projecting here. 00:35:27 Speaker 2: I think Sato's getting three to four years for about $ 60 million. Murakami got 17 million a year for two years. Maybe Sato gets a little bit more. Yeah, I think a lot of these Bowdoin projections are very off. So let's be clear. I'm not putting gospel into these projections from Bowdoin by any stretch. And I think Adrian Morajone, when it all comes down to it, probably gets $ 100 million from somewhere because he is 28 years old hitting free agency. And he is, I'm not going to mince my words here. He is the best left-handed reliever in Major League Baseball, hands down. He is one of the best relievers in Major League Baseball. He is certainly the best left-handed reliever in Major League Baseball. So I think he's going to get something like $ 100 million, especially with Scott Boris running his free agency camp and being his agent. But if, and I mean if, he was actually in the market for a three-year deal for $ 42 million, sign me up as fast as humanly possible. 00:36:25 Speaker 1: The Mariners better hope his number stays at $ 42 million if that's where his market starts, because that's going to be their best chance of signing him. You and I both know they're not going to spend $ 100 million on a reliever. 00:36:36 Speaker 2: Even though they should, they won't. I would spend $ 100 million on Adrian Mourahone, that's for sure. Because most relievers, when they hit free agency, are too old. Warhol's 28. And if he was actually going to get $ 42 million, yeah. Like, the highest I'd go, yeah, I'm sitting here saying I'd pay $ 100. If you want to go a little less than that and you're a fan that says, okay, I'm not paying a reliever that much, fine, I'll give him, I'll max it. And if he wanted four years for 80, yeah, I'd do that. Okay. All right, so we'll see. 00:37:09 Speaker 1: Or, I mean, five years at the current rate, Of what's $ 42 million. He's making what? 00:37:16 Speaker 2: $ 16 million. 00:37:16 Speaker 1: Yeah. 00:37:18 Speaker 2: I would sit. No, it'd be 14 a year, but I would sit there and say, okay, more homes going to try to get another free agent contract if he's going to take that deal. But at the same time, his value is never going to be higher than right now. He's probably going to try and cash in. So will Boris. They know that. I don't see how he gets this contract, but if he does sign me all the way up as fast as humanly possible. Yeah. I'm right there with you. Yeah. We'll dive into more of this as the off-season goes on, but we wanted to keep people up to date on just that bit of news that came out today. With that, that'll just about wrap up this edition of the Marine Layer Podcast. You guys know the drill. If you want to listen to the full-form podcast, you can do so wherever you get your audio pods. Make sure to go rate and review. Please leave it five stars if you're watching. It really helps. Go hit subscribe on YouTube. You can check all of our stuff out at our website, which is marinelayerpod.com. You can find our episodes, our podcast merch, our Patreon. It's all there. And then follow us across social media everywhere. at marine lyre pod that's tj i'm lyle as always we thank you guys for tuning in we'll talk to you soon