Watching Carlos Peguero putting up numbers in winter ball, it's easy to get the idea that this is a guy who was born to hit. Blessed with great power, the Mariners outfielder can put ball after ball into and over the cheap seats. That's when he's on his game.
It's clear that lefthander Bobby LaFromboise no longer throws like he did in high school.
Most minor leaguers playing winter ball do it at the request of their big league organization. That is not the case for righthander Danny Farquhar.
Brad Miller made huge strides during his first full season with the Mariners. For the 6-foot-2, 185-pound shortstop out of Clemson, the year was about more than honing his skills at the plate.
The Mariners thought they might have something good when they drafted Stefen Romero out of Oregon State in 2011, but they would have had difficulty believing he would be putting up numbers this good this soon.
Mariners watchers have spent the last year or so talking about the big three—lefthanders Danny Hultzen and James Paxton and righthander Taijuan Walker. The Mariners themselves never quite bought into that. To their minds, there were other good young starting pitchers in the organization, and narrowing the field to just three was unnecessarily limiting.
Baseball history is full of special September stories: Players getting called up for their first look, clicking and never looking back as they headed off to great careers. It's not going to be like that for Carlos Triunfel.
John Hickey selects end-of-season award winners for the Mariners system, selecting the Best Player, Best Pitcher and a player to keep an eye on.
When the draft rolls around, the big names are no secret. Insider fans may know who is going in the first few round. But only the scouts are likely to know the players drafted in the later rounds, which is why Matt Brazis isn't a household name.
Just like all big league wannabes, Stephen Pryor had visions about what it would be like to make it to the big leagues.
The Mariners knew they were getting a hard thrower when they used their third-round pick in the 2011 draft to take Carter Capps out of small-college Mount Olive in North Carolina.
It may have seemed like a door was closing on Darren Ford's future when he broke his index finger back in April.
Correspondent John Hickey files a midseason report for the Mariners, highlighting a Best Player, a Biggest Leap Forward and a Biggest Disappointment for the first half.
It took four years for Patrick Kivlehan to get back to baseball. Now that he has returned, he's not giving it up.
The Mariners are happy to take the safe route in the draft with Florida catcher Mike Zunino.
The Mariners have reams of press clippings and reels of video on three high-profile starters at Double-A Jackson: lefthanders Danny Hultzen and James Paxton and righthander Taijuan Walker. So the first Jackson starter to be promoted to Triple-A Tacoma was, naturally, Andrew Carraway. Er, who?
While plenty of attention is being focused on Double-A Jackson's starting staff, there are other pitchers on the roster who could be making a mark in Seattle sooner rather than later. One of those is Generals closer Stephen Pryor.
Few players in the minor leagues got off to a quicker start than Mariners shortstop Brad Miller, who hit four home runs and drove in 14 runs in his first 11 games for high Class A High Desert and won California League player of the week honors early in the season,
Munenori Kawasaki was not the typical minor league invitee to a big league camp. The eight-time all-star shortstop in Japan came to spring training with a minor league contract and major league dreams.
It's a good spring to be Forrest Snow. He's in a major league camp for the first time with the Mariners. And Seattle isn't just any team for Snow. The Mariners are the team he grew up with while at Seattle's Lakeside High and the University of Washington.
Baseball America
