Jerry Dipoto should resist urge to trade Seattle Mariners into contention

Seattle Mariners GM Jerry Dipoto needs to resist the urge to attempt to deal the Seattle Mariners into contention at the trade deadline.

Dipoto, famous for being one of the game’s most peripatetic general managers, isn’t likely to follow that advice. He’s already made several moves.

Jerry Dipoto and Seattle Mariners should stand pat

On Tuesday, he traded reliever Kendall Graveman to the Houston Astros for infielder Abraham Toro and reliever Joe Smith.

On Wednesday, DiPoto acquired pitcher Tyler Anderson from the Pirates for minor league catcher Carter Bins and minor league pitcher Joaquin Tejada.

The temptation for DiPoto to get frisky as the trade deadline approaches is understandable. Seattle begins play Wednesday with a surprising 55-48 record. That puts the Mariners just two games behind the Oakland Athletics for the second wild card spot.

Given low pre-season expectations for his team, if DiPoto is able to lift the Mariners into any post-season position, it would be a huge feather in his cap.

The temptation is only intensified by the fact that the Mariners still have 10 games remaining with the division-leading Astros.

Still, there are several good reasons for DiPoto to proceed cautiously over the next few days. The danger is that in what is likely to be a fruitless pursuit of that wild card berth, the M’s could sacrifice their future.

Although it’s difficult to do so, this is actually an excellent time for an honest assessment of the Mariners. It is a team being built for the future, not the present.

The best evidence of this is Seattle’s Pythagorean record. That represents the number of games the team should have won and lost based on the number of runs it has scored and given up.

To this point, the Mariners have scored 432 runs and given up 490; that’s a deficit of 58 runs. The team may have a 55-48 record, but its Pythagorean record is a significantly less positive 46-57. That’s a difference of nine wins.

When a team’s Pythagorean record is five or more games worse than it’s actual record, that’s a strong indicator that the team is getting by on luck or, if you prefer, breaks…either of which is likely to even out.

In other words, the numbers strongly suggest that the Mariners are in for a fall over the next few weeks.

That’s OK because Dipoto’s Plan A should always have been to view 2021 as a building year. He has infused young talent into the team’s picture – Chris Flexen, Logan Gilbert, Ty France, Taylor Trammell, Justin Dunn, Kyle Lewis and Jarred Kelenic being the most notable.

Not all of that talent has come to full fruition yet, but some of it will, perhaps as early as 2022. The trick is to stay the course with it.

The other strong indicator that this is not a time for the Mariners to go all-in on 2021 is the team’s relatively average performance on the field. Forget that record and look at the position-by-position data. What you see is a team that has yet to fully develop.

At only one position – designated hitter, where they are seventh – does Mariner performance rank among the game’s top 10 as measured by Wins Above Average. Kyle Seager’s numbers are 13th best among major league shortstops, Mitch Haniger is the  14th best right fielder and the catching tandem of Tom Murphy and Luis Torrens stands as the 15th best.

At all other positions, Mariner contributions rank among the game’s bottom half, often toward the lower reaches of that bottom half. The M’s have the fourth worst production in both left field and center field, the seventh worst at first base, and ninth worst starting pitching, second base and third base play, and the 10th worst bullpen.

If Dipoto’s goal is to plug gaps this week, that’s simply too many gaps to tackle without risking blowing up the future.

It’s a big challenge for a naturally aggressive general manager to restrain himself under the circumstances of a pennant race. But the cold hard facts of the case are clear: The Seattle Mariners are on a good course for 2022, but not for 2021.