August 13, 20214 yr Author Quote Jarred Kelenic has made hard-learned adjustments, and he’s starting to flourish with the Mariners By Adam Jude Seattle Times staff reporter There it was again Thursday afternoon, another small snapshot — click, click — in a growing sequence of them featuring the new Jarred Kelenic. He pounded his hands together excitedly as he walked back to the Mariners dugout — two, three, four, five times — to celebrate another quality at-bat, and another small step forward in his maturation as a major-leaguer. The Mariners’ 22-year-old rookie center fielder did his job in the fourth inning, lofting a ball the other way to left field for a sacrifice fly to score the Mariners’ first run Thursday against the Rangers. The version of Kelenic the Mariners saw during his first major league call-up in May might not have been ready to deliver in that kind of moment. “You know,” Kelenic said the night before, “the more and more I’m around this environment, you kind of have the mindset of, ‘If it doesn’t happen, if I don’t capitalize here, I’ll do it the next at-bat; if I don’t capitalize (again), I’ll do it next one; if I don’t capitalize today, I’ll capitalize tomorrow.’ “And that’s the fortunate thing while playing every day, is you get so many opportunities that — I think that’s something I struggled with early on when I first came up (in May). You know, every at-bat to me was kind of like a life-or-death situation. And now … I’m getting over stuff a lot faster.” On Wednesday night, Kelenic scored the game-winning run on Luis Torrens’ walk-off hit against Texas, a run Kelenic created with a hustle double — click, click — to lead off the bottom of the ninth. He also was responsible for the Mariners’ first run in the sixth inning Wednesday when he drew a two-out walk with the bases loaded. Had he been in that situation in May — bases loaded, two outs, his team trailing — he might have tried to hit the ball over Lake Washington. Looking back, he acknowledged he was trying too hard, trying too much, trying to do the impossible. “Absolutely,” he said. A much-hyped prospect, Kelenic was demoted to Class AAA Tacoma in early June and spent a month working through things. He was recalled to Seattle after the All-Star break. He made a couple of mechanical adjustments at the plate — he’s standing up straighter and wiggling his shoulders less — and he has been particularly productive in August. Entering Thursday, he was hitting .278 with a .909 OPS, two homers, three doubles and four RBI in 10 games this month. “Jarred’s a good player — I’ve said that since Day One,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said Thursday. “He got off to a rocky start here. The expectations that he put on himself, that a lot of people put on and maybe they were not really fair, but they are what they are. In today’s world, everybody knows about young players, when they’re coming to the big leagues and what everybody’s looking for. “… Now we’re starting to see him play and flourish and be the player that we know he can be. I don’t know what his numbers are going to look like (at the end of the season), and quite frankly I don’t really care. I’m just more excited about now he is headed down the right path — the arrow’s pointed up. He understands he’s gone through some struggles, by his own admission he got kicked in the teeth a little bit. And he’s now understanding the value and how you bounce back from that.” https://www.seattletimes.com/sports/mariners/jarred-kelenic-has-made-hard-learned-adjustments-and-hes-starting-to-flourish-with-the-mariners/?amp=1&__twitter_impression=true
August 13, 20214 yr 18 minutes ago, MC Fresh Breath said: https://www.seattletimes.com/sports/mariners/jarred-kelenic-has-made-hard-learned-adjustments-and-hes-starting-to-flourish-with-the-mariners/?amp=1&__twitter_impression=true Convince me. Show me on the field. For the hype, he needs to end up above .300 for me. Or at least be there next season.
August 13, 20214 yr Author July: 14 games - 5 BB / 22 Ks August: 11 games - 6 BB / 7 Ks They're small sample sizes, but he has certainly looked better.
August 13, 20214 yr Author also, if batting average is your metric, its Toro (also small sample size, but he looks good) and two pitchers as the only M's above .300. 😜
August 13, 20214 yr 36 minutes ago, MC Fresh Breath said: also, if batting average is your metric, its Toro (also small sample size, but he looks good) and two pitchers as the only M's above .300. 😜 This is why we can't have nice things. Like playoff appearances.
August 14, 20214 yr Author Brad Hand came in and walked Kelenic for a walk off win. Um, ok. If you watch the replay, it was 4 balls in a row, not even close. Well, thanks Blue Jays.
August 14, 20214 yr Author This Ty France play, though, is worth a click: https://mlb-cuts-diamond.mlb.com/FORGE/2021/2021-08/13/c8ebeed5-07aa9837-b77d6cf3-csvm-diamondx64-asset_1280x720_59_4000K.mp4 And I do like how pumped Kelenic gets:
August 15, 20214 yr May want to check that Torrens guy in bot 7. Edited August 15, 20214 yr by shadow_operative2.0
August 15, 20214 yr Author Kelenic and Toro also. Gonna get Biff to love Jared any day now. Edited August 15, 20214 yr by MC Fresh Breath
August 15, 20214 yr 19 minutes ago, MC Fresh Breath said: Kelenic and Toro also. Gonna get Biff to love Jared any day now. Well he took a good walk.
August 16, 20214 yr Author Quote Despite Jarred Kelenic, Logan Gilbert, Jake Fraley, and Taylor Trammell graduating, the Seattle Mariners now have the #1 farm system in baseball per Baseball America. The venerable scouting organization released their midseason update to their “organizational talent rankings” today. The metric is both helpful and mildly misleading, as BA does not consider any player who has lost prospect eligibility by playing in enough big league games in these rankings, hence the exclusion of Kelenic, Wander Franco, and a few other top prospects from the start of the season. By the same coin, Seattle has graduated two of its top prospects as well as a handful of other members of its organizational Top-15, yet still has improved at both the top and with depth throughout enough to impress Baseball America, who ranked Seattle dead last as recently as 2018 and started them at #2 behind Tampa Bay in 2021. The Mariners have three prospects in BA’s present league-wide Top-15 (OF Julio Rodríguez at #2, SS Noelvi Marte at #8, RHP George Kirby at #11) as well as another in the Top-50 (RHP Emerson Hancock at #50). https://www.lookoutlanding.com/platform/amp/2021/8/16/22627137/despite-graduations-baseball-america-ranks-seattle-mariners-farm-system-1-in-mlb-mid-season-update?utm_campaign=lookoutlanding&utm_content=chorus&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&__twitter_impression=true Future is hopefully brighter. I guess it has to be?
August 16, 20214 yr 48 minutes ago, MC Fresh Breath said: https://www.lookoutlanding.com/platform/amp/2021/8/16/22627137/despite-graduations-baseball-america-ranks-seattle-mariners-farm-system-1-in-mlb-mid-season-update?utm_campaign=lookoutlanding&utm_content=chorus&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&__twitter_impression=true Future is hopefully brighter. I guess it has to be? I mean, I keep seeing this, over and over, year after year. Granted, this season is actually better than normal, but for having so many amazing prospects, how have we not consistently been in the top 2 of the division? Feels very much like the Longhorns in that regard.
August 16, 20214 yr Author Just now, Biff Tannen said: I mean, I keep seeing this, over and over, year after year. Granted, this season is actually better than normal, but for having so many amazing prospects, how have we not consistently been in the top 2 of the division? Feels very much like the Longhorns in that regard. Well, not to be argumentative, but our farm system has not been highly rated year after year. Jack Z did nothing to improve it. That was what Dipoto has been addressing. Whether or not it pays off in the long run, we'll we will of course have to see.
August 18, 20214 yr 1 minute ago, shadow_operative2.0 said: Damn, Torrens almost got robbed by a SICK catch. But not quite.
August 19, 20214 yr 53 minutes ago, MC Fresh Breath said: The exact same score two nights in a row? unpossible
August 19, 20214 yr 1 hour ago, shadow_operative2.0 said: This one’s over, 2 runs is insurmountable. What about 5 runs?
August 19, 20214 yr Welp, y’all got out of 1st & 2nd, no outs in bot 10. Now 2-run France yack in top 11.
August 25, 20214 yr Author Baseball reference goes for it: https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/SEA/2021.shtml
August 26, 20214 yr Author I'm pretty sure we're awesome fun as long as we aren't playing the Astros or NYY.
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