{"id":780837,"date":"2026-07-24T00:28:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T00:28:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/780837\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T00:28:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T00:28:08","slug":"mariners-reportedly-willing-to-trade-emerson-hancock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/780837\/","title":{"rendered":"Mariners Reportedly Willing To Trade Emerson Hancock"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Mariners are looking for more offense and are apparently willing to subtract from their rotation in order to do it. Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of The Athletic<\/a> report that the M\u2019s are telling teams they are willing to trade right-hander Emerson Hancock<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite a lackluster 51-52 record, Seattle is just half a game back of the Rangers in the American League West. They probably should be on top. They have a stronger roster on paper and a +17 run differential, compared to a -30 mark for Texas. The Mariners are clearly going into the deadline as buyers.<\/p>\n

The willingness to subtract from the big league rotation is simply a matter of having a surplus. The Mariners already have six viable big leaguers in Hancock, Logan Gilbert<\/a>, George Kirby<\/a>, Bryan Woo<\/a>, Bryce Miller<\/a> and Luis Castillo<\/a>. They also have two of the best pitching prospects in baseball in Kade Anderson<\/a> and Ryan Sloan<\/a>. Logan Evans<\/a> is rehabbing Tommy John surgery but should be back in the mix next year.<\/p>\n

Trading from a pitching surplus is risky because injuries are so common in the modern game. A team can weaken its depth only to quickly regret it if a few guys hit the IL. But the Mariners are the team best positioned to take that risk.<\/p>\n

There are various ways they could go with the decision. As Rosenthal and Sammon point out, they Mariners could have tried to push Castillo to the trade block. At 33 years old, he\u2019s a bit older than the other guys in the big league rotation, who are all between 26 and 29. Seattle could try to move him while keeping the younger, cheaper, controllable guys.<\/p>\n

But Castillo surely has the least trade value of the bunch. Beyond his age, he\u2019s also more expensive and not quite as effective in terms of his results. He is making $22.75MM this year and will have the same salary next year. There\u2019s also a $25MM vesting option if he throws 180 innings next year and passes a physical at season\u2019s end. He has a 4.85 earned run average this year, a career worst for him. As of a few years ago, he was striking out about 27% of batters faced but that\u2019s now down to just 20.1% this year. Some teams might be willing to trade for Castillo but they likely wouldn\u2019t give up a lot. They might even ask the Mariners to pay down some of that contract before even considering a trade.<\/p>\n

The other guys, meanwhile, are either in their arbitration or pre-arbitration seasons. Gilbert is making $10.927MM and Kirby $6.55MM. Miller is collecting a $2.4375MM salary and his deal has a $6.075MM club option for next year with a $15K buyout. He\u2019s controllable via arbitration through 2029 even if that club option is turned down. Woo and Hancock still haven\u2019t qualified for arbitration.<\/p>\n

Per Rosenthal and Sammon, the Mariners are most willing to move Hancock because he\u2019s the least established of the younger guys. He came into 2026 with 162 2\/3 innings under his belt. He had a 4.81 ERA in that time and had only punched out 15.6% of batters faced.<\/p>\n

He has been far better this year but with some asterisks. He has a 3.16 ERA and 23.4% strikeout rate through 105 1\/3 innings. He has gotten some help from a .245 batting average on balls in play and a 79.5% strand rate. His 3.72 FIP and 3.82 SIERA are a bit more pessimistic than his actual ERA.<\/p>\n

The Mariners are seemingly willing to sell high on Hancock while holding onto the other guys with longer track records. Perhaps clubs will view Hancock more as a serviceable mid-rotation arm than a front-end stud, but he would still have huge value. Controllable starting pitching is one of the toughest things to find at the deadline. Hancock can be controlled for four more seasons after this one and won\u2019t qualify for arbitration until after 2027. With that window, he could fit with just about any club, whether they are contending or rebuilding.<\/p>\n

Seattle\u2019s offense has been lacking, particularly against left-handed pitching. As a team, they have a .216\/.302\/.334 line and 87 wRC+ against southpaws. Only the Rockies and Blue Jays are less effective in that split. They have a strong farm system and could trade prospects to accomplish that task but making Hancock available would allow them to hold young position player prospects and keep the rotation in really strong shape.<\/p>\n

Ryan Jeffers<\/a>, Zach Neto<\/a>, Taylor Ward<\/a>, Ty France<\/a>, Lane Thomas<\/a>, Spencer Steer<\/a>, Heliot Ramos<\/a>, Matt Vierling<\/a>, Austin Martin<\/a>, Jos\u00e9 Ferm\u00edn<\/a>, Oswald Peraza<\/a>, Luis Robert Jr.<\/a> and Matt McLain<\/a> are some of the right-handed bats who could be available at this year\u2019s deadline. Hancock should be more than enough to land most guys in that group or at least start a conversation.<\/p>\n

Photo courtesy of Jonathan Hui, Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Mariners are looking for more offense and are apparently willing to subtract from their rotation in order…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":780838,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[4698,98111,107754,116953,98114,4709,99],"class_list":["post-780837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-bryan-woo","tag-bryce-miller","tag-emerson-hancock","tag-george-kirby","tag-logan-gilbert","tag-luis-castillo","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=780837"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/780837\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/780838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=780837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=780837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=780837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}