After a long layoff where players were locked out of training facilities and late to return to spring training, some degree of sloppiness is to be expected, even above that of the typical early spring training contest. Crisp baseball, this was not, as the Mariners fell to the Padres, 4-6, to notch their first loss of 2022. However, some players looked crispier than others, so let’s dive a little deeper:
Marco Gonzales
Crispness level: freshly changed sheets, Egyptian cotton, 800 thread count
Marco was slated to go three innings to open his 2022 season, and he worked through those three innings looking like Exactly Marco Gonzales, pounding the strike zone, mostly locating his pitches, inducing weak contact.