2012 Fish Watch: Seattle Mariners – Final Update
By Wally Fish
Mariner Moose in all his spledor (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
The first thing you need to know about The Fish Watch is that it’s not a list of sleepers. It is instead a list of players at various points in their respective minor league journeys that for one reason or another have piqued my interest enough that I am watching their development more closely than the bulk of prospects out there. To read more about this project, check out the introduction and master list.
Obviously since the season is over and some teams have had two updates, some have only had one and the NL West team’s have had zero coverage thus far, this project did not work out as I had planned on many levels. Undeterred I’m going to sally forth and finish off this round of updates and call it good. Next season if I attempt this again I’m going to have to make some major changes to the structure, plan and concept of this series.
Feel free to check out the category archive to read previous installments of the series.
Seattle Mariners (S2S 2012 Mariners Team Prospect List)
RHP – Brandon Maurer (21) – Mariners 2008 23rd Round Pick
2011 – Clinton/High Desert: 4.99 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, 75 H, 25 BB and 81 SO in 79.1 IP
2012 – Jackson (AA): 3.20 ERA, 1.32 WHIP, 133 H, 48 BB and 117 SO in 137.2 IP
Maurer’s ERA benefited from not pitching in the Cal League – as he did to finish out the 2011 season – but if you look at his 2012 overall you will find that his BB and SO rates were actually worse than those he compiled with High Desert last season. He did, however, cut down on his hit rate and allowed just 4 home runs with the Generals after allowing 8 with the Mavericks in roughly a third (42.1) of the innings pitched.
Pitching against Double-A hitters obviously played a factor in his BB and SO rates moving in the wrong direction but if you look at his monthly splits, you see that after an adjustment period to start the season Maurer was much better than his season stat line with Jackson would suggest. In 14 starts after July 1st, he pitched to a 2.51 ERA, 1.15 WHIP and 81-29 SO-to-BB in 86.1 IP. By doing so he set himself up nicely for a likely assignment to Triple-A Tacoma when the 2013 season kicks off and has surely elevated his name in the various prospect rankings that will be released this offseason.
SS – Martin Peguero (18) – Signed out of the Dominican Republic as a NDFA on December 7th, 2010
2011 – AZL Mariners (Rk): 0.279/.309/.382, 12 2B, 1 3B, 1 HR, 17 SB, 6 BB and 22 SO in 176 PA
2012 – Pulaski (Rk): 0.231/.269/.294, 11 2B, 2 3B, 3 SB, 12 BB and 32 SO in 256 PA
The $2.9 million bonus the Mariners gave to Peguero for signing was the largest handed out in the 2010 international free agent class (though his bonus was later reduced to $1.1 million). His debut season as a 17-year old in the AZL was respectable enough and given that he was lauded for having an advanced bat it seemed reasonable to believe that he would take another step forward or at least hold his own in the Appalachian League this season.
However, as you can tell from his stat line, that simply didn’t happen. In fact 2012, proved to be a rough season for Peguero nearly throughout. He started out just 7-45 with just one extra-base hit in June, before hitting 0.272/.323/.326 in July. If he had continued to trend upward in August there would have been a silver lining to his season but he instead faltered in the final month slipping to a 0.228/.271/.317 slash line in 25 games. To make things look even worse he ended the year in a similar fashion to how it started with an 8-48 slump in his last 13 games.
Obviously Peguero has youth and thus time on his side at this point but it’s impossible to cast is 2012 season as anything but a disappointment. Beyond his performance at the plate, the Mariners already began to transition him away from SS and had him playing primarily 2B with Pulaski. While this move was expected to take place at some point in his professional career, I’m surprised by how early it happened and it further suppresses his value as a prospect.
OF – James Zamarripa (18) – Mariners 2011 6th Round Pick
2011 – AZL Mariners (Rk): 0.266/.329/.331, 5 2B, 2 3B, 6 SB, 13 BB and 38 SO in 156 PA
2012 – Pulaski/Clinton/Everett: 0.238/.297/.329, 9 2B, 2 3B, 3 SB, 12 BB and 40 SO in 159 PA
Zamarripa started the 2012 season with Pulaski (Rk) then moved up to Clinton (A) before finishing with Everett (A-). It might come as a bit of a surprise to learn that it was in Clinton that Zamarripa was at his best with the bat in his hands. During his 12 game stint in the Midwest League he hit 0.273/.304/.341, and while that’s nothing to write home about it’s far more impressive than the 0.226/.294/.258 he accumulated in 9 games with Everett. Regardless of the level he was assigned to at any point in the season, Zamarripa never had a notable, standout performance and never even managed more than two hits in any of his 41 games on the year. I wasn’t expecting him to set the world on fire or anything, but I was expecting more than what he showed. As with Peguero above, I’d classify his 2012 as a disappointment.
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For more on the Seattle Mariners, check out Sodo Mojo!