What the Future Holds: First Base Edition

By Anthony

A rare Justin Smoak home run

This is part of a series of articles I will be writing on each position and where the Mariners stand at each position. This will be an attempt to look at the present and future for the Mariners at each position. 

There is definitely an ideal first baseman mold in the MLB these days. They are supposed to be big power hitters that hit in the middle of the order and drive in a bunch of runs. See Prince Fielder, Adrian Gonzalez and Albert Pujols. Defense is not really as big a deal since most plays a first baseman makes is catching a ball. So what makes a good first baseman is their hitting. That’s promising.

First base is kind of an awkward position right now for the Mariners. Justin Smoak was supposed to be the savior after we dealt away Cliff Lee. Hmmm… I don’t really want to call him a failure just yet but he is definitely running out of time. Mike Carp was filling in for Smoak for a while, until he hurt his hip stretching for a ball. Super Duper! In the farm system the position is not well represented. Awesome.

Patrick is still in the camp that Justin Smoak deserves a third year because if we get rid of him that means we give up on the Cliff Lee trade. I’ll just throw it out there that we have both Blake Beavan and John Jaso as leftovers from that trade and we certainly know where the pitching staff would be without Beavan around (In roughly the exact same place) and we know Eric Thames would never have tasted shaving cream without Jaso here. So I don’t really care about that whole win/lose a trade thing. Smoak has always hit well in September, in a super annoying way. We always look at his Septembers and say “Wow, he may have turned that around, we should keep putting him out there” then he rides the Mendoza line and gets sent to Tacoma. I do not think Justin Smoak should be in the Mariners future plans at first base. 

Mike Carp is a little more interesting, mostly because he hit way over his head last year and has been trying to upstage Franklin Gutierrez for the DL crown. He was supposed to be a corner outfielder this year, then he got hurt and ended up eventually at first. His offense has been lacking this year, whether it is regression to his skill level after last years outburst or his shoulder injury. Either way, Carp deserves more of a shot than Smoak at this point and hopefully will get it when he returns.

Jesus Montero can also play first base. I use the word play here kind of loosely. I call Mike Carp the starfish because of his lack of mobility; I will need a new animal nickname for Montero if he starts playing in the field because he is one of the least mobile players I have ever seen. Montero definitely will not stick at catcher based off what we have seen this year and first base could be an option for him.

Now we delve into the minor leagues to try to solve the problem. Tacoma really does not offer much help. Alex Liddi and Luis Jimenez are playing there for Tacoma. Jimenez is a journeyman DH who can play at first but really should not. Despite the fact his bat is probably the best in Tacoma, he has never found success in the MLB and won’t start now. Liddi has already seen some time in Seattle and is still striking out way too much. His contact problems are still present and until he fixes that he won’t stick in Seattle.

AA Jackson is slightly more interesting, mostly because of Rich Poythress. He had been slowly moving through the Mariners system and after struggling in Jackson in AA in 2009, he has bounced back this year. He is hitting .310 and has an OPS of .845. A bit of a warning flag is that he has only hit 4 home runs all year but he is also walking 14% of the time and is only striking out 9% of the time. While 4 home runs is not good, its especially bad in 309 at-bats. But those peripherals are very nice and his gap power should be decent in Seattle.

I don’t really want to go below AA just because of the difficulty of projecting players below this point. But some names that people may want to remember in the part of the brain where potentially useless information is stored. I have already discussed Taylor Ard on this blog from Everett. Dennis Raben is still in the California league for his third year (A bad sign). Jharmidy De Jesus has an awesome name but has already been demoted once this year and seems to be dropping off the radar.

So this position is looking awfully bleak. Smoak is not the answer right now and Carp isn’t looking much better. When Rich Poythress is your best option in the farm system, things could be better. It looks like a Montero platoon is the best option in the near future and Ard/ Poythress/ a draft pick help in the future.