5/27/19: Open Game Thread, plus news and notes

Have some Memorial Day baseball!

To all of you who have Memorial Day off and are doing traditional things like camping or BBQing or hanging with friends, I salute you, and to my fellow folks who have to work—like my mom, who’s working her regular shift at Bed Bath & Beyond today—I double-extra salute you. Memorial Day does serve as a sort of unofficial benchmark: the end of the spring, the beginning of summer. The baseball season is no longer new, although there’s a lot of it yet to be played. Unfortunately, the Mariners aren’t playing it very well, and now have to face the Rangers, again, who just swept them in Texas. I am probably on the extreme end—all I’m rooting for is a good draft pick in 2020—but even I have to admit this is some nearly-unwatchable baseball. At least Tommy Milone will be a new flavor of bad.

Lineups:

Game time is 6:10, available on ROOT and 710 ESPN, and MLB.tv if you’re out of area.

Personally, I will be watching Justus Sheffield in Tacoma (although not actually in Tacoma, sadly) starting at 5:35, and then listening to Ljay Newsome start for the Modesto Nuts to see if the MiLB strikeout leader can add to his lead. He struggled in his last outing against the prospect-packed Ports back on May 5, when he was seeing them for the third time in less than a month. More like the Smallifornia League.

News and Notes:

• The Mariners claimed RHP Jimmy Cordero off waivers from the Blue Jays (Cordero was DFA’d to make room for Zac Rosscup, so essentially the two teams just swapped relievers). The Mariners will be Cordero’s fourth organization (fifth if you count his two stints with the Blue Jays separately). Cordero is another high stuff/low command reliever in the model of Connor Sadzeck and Austin Adams, and comes from another organization that’s struggled to develop relief pitching (Toronto and, if you count it, Washington). Cordero might have the biggest stuff out of this crew with a fastball that averages 98, along with a hard curve (85), slider (90), and change (90). He also has some of the most wildly inconsistent numbers out of the crew; his Brooks page looks like an early Jackson Pollock. The Mariners will likely pare down Cordero’s offerings to two pitches and hope they can work with him on his command, betting again that their internal development can unlock something previously unseen.
• RHP Gerson Bautista was transferred to the 60-Day IL to make room for Cordero, but this is likely a paper move, like Sam Tuivailala. As always, the roster is due for a reshuffle soon.
• One of those moving parts might come from Ryon Healy, whose back injury is apparently more serious than initially thought. He’s yet to begin baseball activities.
• Dee Gordon’s wrist injury is a deep bone bruise, and he suspects he re-aggravated it attempting to return to games too soon.