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The Seattle Mariners started the offseason with guns ablazin’ as they signed 2021 AL Cy Young winner Robbie Ray to a five-year, $115 million deal in November. Fast forward to the post-lockout offseason and the team is at it again, showing that the franchise is all in on competing in 2022.
On Monday, the Mariners landed two of the Cincinnati Reds’ top hitters, outfielder Jesse Winker and third baseman Eugenio Suarez, in exchange for pitchers Justin Dunn and Brandon Williamson and outfielder Jake Fraley. The Reds will also receive a player to be named later.
While the 2021 Mariners came out of almost nowhere to compete for the playoffs and finish the year 90-72, the 2022 squad is going to have much higher expectations. In today’s article, we’ll cover what Monday’s trade means for the five traded players and any other Mariners and Reds affected by the deal.
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Jesse Winker
Both Winker and Suarez will be shifting from one of the most hitter-friendly ballparks in the league to one of the toughest parks to hit in.
Over the last three years, Cincinnati’s Great American Ball Park has a Statcast park effect factor of 106, the third-highest in the majors. Meanwhile, over that same stretch, Seattle’s T-Mobile Park has a 94, which is tied for the lowest mark in the majors with Busch Stadium in St. Louis and Okland Coliseum.
Winker’s career thus far has been defined by splits. Here’s a look at his home and road splits over his five-year career. You’ll see that his numbers were up across the board when he was at Great American Ball Park as opposed to a road venue.
The biggest splits for the left-handed Winker over his time in the majors has been his righty/lefty splits. Winker has absolutely mashed right-handed pitching in the majors, but he has been awful in same-handed matchups against lefties. Here are his career righty vs. lefty splits:
The Mariners had the fewest amount of at-bats against righties in the majors last year (3,426) and they had the third-most at-bats against lefties (1,929). Meanwhile, the Reds ranked 27th in at-bats against lefties (1,395) and 4th in at-bats against righties (4,028). If those trends carry over for the Mariners next year, we could see Winker’s season-long numbers take a big hit or we could even see him regularly sitting on the bench against lefty starters, meaning a lot of games out of the lineup.
Winker currently has an ADP around 100. The move to Seattle is clearly a negative development for him. It’s just a question of how negative it will end up being. Feel free to let him slide a bit in your draft, but if he’s still there with about 150 picks off the board, he’s worth jumping on.
Eugenio Suarez
Suarez hasn’t seen his home and road splits over the past few years be quite as drastic as Winker’s. In fact, last year, apart from drawing far more walks at home, Suarez’s home and road splits were about even.
In 2019, on the other hand, we saw more of a home/road disparity as he had an .895 OPS on the road and a .970 OPS at home.
As with Winker, this trade is a net negative for Suarez. He’s already being drafted pretty low with an ADP around 180, so he really shouldn’t drop too much more. He hit 31 home runs last year, but was plagued by a 29.8% strikeout rate and .198 batting average. He’s a career .252 hitter with a 25.9% career strikeout rate, so if he can settle in with the Mariners, he’s got a shot at bouncing back. If you need a late round third baseman with some power, he’s still a fine player to target.
The Three New Reds
There’s a good chance that none of the three newly acquired Reds makes much of an impact for fantasy purposes this year.
Brandon Williamson, who was one of the Mariners’ top pitching prospects, was the headliner in the deal from the Reds’ perspective. The 23-year-old has shown tantalizing strikeout upside in the minors. Last year, over 19 starts across High-A and Double-A, he averaged 14.0 K/9. The Reds are certainly trending towards being a bottoming-out team for 2022 and as such, it likely won’t make sense for the team to call up Williamson as soon as next year. It’s also notable that you can consider Williamson a bit of a dynasty faller as he moves from a franchise with a pitcher-friendly ballpark to a franchise with a hitter-friendly one. Luckily, he may have the strikeout potential to help neutralize the mashing at Great American Ball Park.
Justin Dunn, meanwhile, is coming off a surprisingly strong year in which he made 11 starts and went 1-3 with a 3.75 ERA, a 1.31 WHIP and a 22.5% strikeout rate. However, he was far more effective at home than he was on the road, with a 2.70 home ERA and a 4.67 road ERA. Here are the full splits:
The 26-year-old will likely slot into the middle or back of the Reds rotation, but he’s going to struggle to get wins and it’s hard to expect much better than an ERA of around 4.00 given his unfavorable home park.
The one new Reds player from the deal with the best shot at being a fantasy contributor this year is Fraley. Last year, in his first extended run in the majors, the 26-year-old saw 78 games in the majors and slashed .210/.352/.369 with nine home runs, 10 stolen bases, 36 RBI and 27 runs.
There’s a lot to like about Fraley’s minor league profile. He showed both power potential and stolen base upside. In 2019, over 99 games split across Double-A and Triple-A, he hit 19 home runs and swiped 22 bags while posting a .910 OPS. Clearly there’s some fantasy potential here, but whether he can tap into it as soon as next year is unclear. The Reds figure to have an uninspiring lineup surrounding him, which will limit his counting stats. But on the bright side, a weak Reds lineup could enable Fraley to take more chances on the base paths, making him a potentially valuable stolen base contributor. At this point, he can go universally undrafted, but he’s someone worth keeping an eye on.
The Others
Since Suarez has primarily played third base in the majors, it seems most logical to consider Abraham Toro as one of the big losers from this trade. Toro was projected to be the Mariners’ starting third baseman prior to the deal. However, the Mariners have the ability to do some shuffling with their lineup and it’s not a sure thing that Toro is demoted to a utility role. Either Suarez or Toro could wind up as the team’s primary designated hitter, a spot that the team doesn’t have a clear favorite for at this point. Additionally, Suarez has over 200 MLB appearances at shortstop and could wind up playing mostly there and shifting J.P. Crawford to another position or to the bench.
Winker’s arrival doesn’t change much for the Mariners’ outfield. He’s primarily played left field in the majors and he’ll take that position from Fraley, who had been the team’s projected left field starter this year. Jarred Kelenic and Mitch Haniger will round out the outfield, leaving Kyle Lewis as either a reserve outfielder or the top designated hitter option. Lewis is currently dealing with a knee injury, carrying over from last year, and he won’t be ready for Opening Day. He's someone who could end up as a loser from this deal, but he could also usurp Kelenic in centerfield if Kelenic struggles again out of the gate this year, making Kelenic a loser.
Bottom line: We still don’t know exactly what the Mariners lineup will look like throughout the bulk of the season. If there’s someone you like in the bunch, don’t overthink the Winker and Suarez additions and feel free to stick with your guy.
Joey Votto and Jonathan India are both notable losers on the Reds side of things. Winker and Suarez were solid middle-of-the-lineup guys who could drive in runs and help bolster the counting stats of both Votto and India. This trade should cause both players to fall about a round or so in drafts.
The Reds have had an uber-clogged outfield for a number of years now, but the team’s downgrading from Winker to Fraley – and the addition of the designated hitter in the NL – could enable for additional playing time for some relevant names. Aristides Aquino, Tyler Naquin and Nick Senzel have all been victims of platoon playing time over the past few years. We could certainly see that come to an end for at least one or two of those hitters this year. None of them are high-end enough to warrant drafting in standard leagues, but deep league managers could take a shot on one of them or maybe just monitor them as the season begins. If I had to pick one name from that trio, I’d go with Aquino. He has clear 30-homer upside if he can stick in the lineup and cut down his strikeouts a bit.
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