As the current Mariners look to write their names in the history books, some of tomorrow’s Mariners were at T-Mobile Park yesterday to be honored for the annual Mariners Minor League awards.
The winners are:
– OF Lazaro Montes (AA), Ken Griffey Jr. Minor League Hitter of the Year
– RHP Ryan Sloan (A+), Jamie Moyer Pitcher of the Year
– INF Colt Emerson (AA), Alvin Davis Mr. Mariner Award
– RHP Tyler Cleveland (AA), Dan Wilson Community Service Award
– INF Blake Rambusch (AA), Edgar Martinez Dominate The Zone Tournament Winner
– RHP Nick Davila (AA), Dominate The Zone Tournament Winner (Pitcher)
– Shawn O’Malley (AAA), Hitting Coach, Dave Henderson Staff Member of the Year
Montes, Sloan, Rambusch, and Davila were at T-Mobile Park on Tuesday to accept their awards. Emerson and O’Malley are otherwise occupied as the Rainiers make a Pacific Coast League playoff run, and Cleveland is in Arizona preparing for the Arizona Fall League.
Cleveland is recognized for his volunteer work; he consistently volunteered at every youth baseball clinic hosted by both High-A Everett and Double-A Arkansas. He also earned the distinction of a selection to the Arizona Fall League (AFL), where he’ll pitch as part of the Peoria Javelinas against some of baseball’s top prospects.
Cleveland will be joined in Arizona by top prospect OF Jonny Farmelo, who was also at the park last week as the team hosted the Northwest League Champions, the Everett AquaSox.
Rambusch and Davila are this year’s Dominate The Zone winners, a tournament the team has been running across the affiliates since the hiring of Jerry Dipoto and company. Formerly known as the Control the Zone tournament, the contest recognizes one pitcher and one hitter who post the best strikeout-to-walk rates, respectively (hitters can also earn points for lengthy plate appearances). Winners earn an automatic invite to big-league spring training.
Rambusch, who posted a .364 OBP this season, reached base safely in 79 of his 103 games. At Double-A, Rambo walked 11.5% of the time while striking out just 15.5%. Davila’s strikeout-to-walk numbers took a bit of a hit after an early-season promotion to Double-A, but he actually cut his ERA down pitching outside the bandbox of Funko Field. He’s a groundball-inducing pitcher who’s one to watch this spring training.
“The reason those guys are up here is because they buy into the pillars of our organization,” said GM Justin Hollander. “They represent what we believe in, and they excel at that.”
The Mariners surprised many by promoting Colt Emerson, their top prospect per MLB Pipeline, to Tacoma late in the season after a short stint in Double-A. This was already an aggressive move for the young shortstop, who just turned 20 on July 20th. Since then, Emerson has continued to rake, storming into Tacoma and dazzling in his brief time there as he’s accompanied the Rainiers on their playoff run.
The Mariners value Emerson as much off the field as on it, recognizing him for his leadership abilities with the Alvin Davis Mr. Mariner award for the second straight season.
“You see AD over there,” said Hollander, gesturing to Alvin Davis who was on hand to present the award. “He’s Mr. Mariner for a reason. It’s not just about winning Rookie of the Year or being one of the best hitters in the history of the organization. It’s about what he represents on and off the field.”
Unfortunately for Emerson, his path to winning the award named after Seattle’s most iconic hitter is blocked by Cuban-born slugger Lazaro Montes, who took home the Ken Griffey Jr. Hitter of the Year award for the third straight year.
Montes is coming off a tremendous season split between High-A Everett and Double-A Arkansas, a challenging assignment for the 20-year-old. Montes struggled with strikeouts at Double-A, but also proved that Dickey-Stephens Park isn’t too much for him, walloping 14 homers in the notoriously power-sapping park.
Montes’s 32 total homers across both levels tie for the third-best home run mark in MiLB this season.
“They told me that in that park, nobody can hit homers, but for me that was an exciting moment, because I said, okay, let me show right now what I can do,” grinned the affable Montes.
Montes says his plan is to go to High Performance Camp (HPC) in the coming weeks, and then return to Miami for off-season training. He plans to work out again with teammate and fellow Cuban Randy Arozarena, who had a significant impact on Lazaro this past off-season.
“The way that [Randy] plays with his personality, that made me feel comfortable to be myself and to compete. He talked with my mom, and he’s got family close to my family in Pinar del Río, so we’re almost family,” beamed Laz.
This past off-season, Montes worked intently on moving more fluidly, a criticism that’s often been lobbied at the titanic slugger, who many outlets see as a future designated hitter.
“My dad was like, ‘Oh, why are they talking like that?’ I said, ‘Papi, chilllll out.’ That’s good for me, because I take that as a challenge, and I challenge myself every day. Everything that people say, for me, I see that and I say okay. We’ll see in the future.”
Montes said he’s spoken to Julio, who was also once labeled as a corner outfielder, and was inspired by Julio showing up to spring training having worked hard on speed and agility over the off-season.
“He got to spring training and he was like, ‘I’m here. I’m the centerfielder of this team. And I’m going to prepare like that, for that. I’m gonna play right field, left field, any part of the field, and be ready for that moment.’”
It was a thrill to follow along with Ryan Sloan’s first year as a professional, culminating in his award for Jamie Moyer Pitcher of the Year.
It’s funny that this award is named after Seattle’s soft-tossing lefty because Sloan couldn’t be more different: a big, physical righty, Sloan’s fastball zips in the upper 90s with plus ride. He says getting even more on it is his number one goal this off-season. “Well, maybe number two.”
Sloan is laser-focused on making improvements in his mental game, especially after getting knocked around a little in his brief stint at High-A.
“I think it was good that I failed,” said the 19-year-old. “I always like to take stuff from outings, and when I fail, it’s much easier to take stuff away.”
Sloan’s arsenal is impressive — along with the big fastball, he added a cutter this year as a bridge pitch between his fastball and slider, and a changeup that he continues to work on the consistency of (he calls it a confidence pitch) but he believes could be his best weapon.
Even more impressive is the maturity and work ethic of the 19-year-old, who Seattle selected with their second pick in the 2024 Draft, pitching in his first professional season.
“I like to put it like, it was a year of learning. For me, first year, but there’s a lot of guys that have played a lot more than I have, so being able to see what everyone has to say, what everyone experiences, what they’ve been through, what they’ve learned. Just hoping to pick everyone’s brain and try to become a better player, better person — not just pitching, not just the stuff that’ll come through practice and all the above, but trying to become a better person, better mentality on the mound, better mental stuff, better routine.”
Sloan said to do that, he leaned heavily on his teammates and pitching coaches, drawing from their experience. At the end of the season, he’s very proud of having finished his first professional season healthy, which he credits to the thing he’s most proud of: maturing and developing a pro routine, figuring out what he needs as a pitcher in order to go out and be successful.
“I think coming in, I thought my stuff was good. All the data and statistics info proved that it was pretty good. So just going out there and being able to have a non-cluttered mind. Just go out there, have a simple plan, have a simple thought. I think that was my biggest stride, just overall learning a bunch of stuff as you go along trying to mature.”
Sloan, like Montes, will head to HPC before heading home to the Chicago area for the off-season, where he says he’s got a solid place to train.
“Big old dome in Chicago. I’ll stay warm there.”
For as impressive as some of these performances are, Justin Hollander stresses that these awards are about celebrating the players’ contributions on and off the field.
“You can be that 80 grade human in a lot of different ways. And I think our organization has done a great job of not forcing a cookie-cutter mentality on every player. Laz is different than Colt Emerson. They’re both 80-grade human beings and teammates and players, but they do it their own way, in the same way that Cal and Julio are different people, and Logan and George are different people, and Bryan and Bryce are different people.
“We really believe strongly in making sure that we let the players know, like, these are our core values. This is our foundation. Now you go identify how you can make that your own and bring it to life.”
https://www.lookoutlanding.com/seattle-mariners-minors/134723/mariners-announce-milb-award-winners-lazaro-montes-ryan-sloan-hitter-and-pitcher-of-the-year
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