Mariners trade starting pitcher Taijuan Walker to Blue Jays for player to be named later
Instead of making his next scheduled start for Thursday afternoon at Petco Park in San Diego, Mariners pitcher Taijuan Walker will be getting ready to head east to join the Blue Jays.
The Mariners have again traded their former first-round draft pick, this time to Toronto, general manager Jerry Dipoto confirmed on his weekly radio show Thursday morning on 710 ESPN Seattle. The club officially announced the trade not long after.
Seattle will receive a player to be named later, indicating the player is likely a lower level minor leaguer who is not in Toronto’s 60-man player pool. Only players within a team’s player pool can be traded in this shortened 60-game season.
Walker, the 28-year-old right-hander the Mariners signed as a free agent ahead of spring training, had been rumored as Seattle’s most likely trade piece ahead of Monday’s deadline after signing a one-year, $2 million deal with the Mariners in February.
Walker’s prorated salary for the season following baseball’s shutdown is about $740,000, meaning Toronto’s interest was likely to acquire Walker as a one-month rental to try to make a playoff push. The Blue Jays sit in third place in the American League East as of Thursday, and are 4.5 games behind the Rays in first with the Yankees just ahead of them in second.
Walker, who returned from a three-year stint with the Diamondbacks and a long Tommy John surgery recovery this spring, has been brilliant for the Mariners the first month.
“You talk about maturing as a pitcher, as a person, what he was able to do in our clubhouse, let alone what he was able to do on the field, and how he’s grown there, I’m happy for Taijuan,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said during his daily pregame video call. “He gets this opportunity to continue really good season. ... I think it’s a very good environment for him to continue to grow and produce.”
Walker went 2-2 with a 4.00 ERA in five starts with Seattle, and those numbers are even somewhat skewed by his first outing of the season in Houston back in July, when he gave up five earned runs across 3 1/3 innings.
In four starts since, he has a 2-1 record with a 2.66 ERA, including tossing seven scoreless innings against the AL West-leading A’s in Seattle’s home opener, and has limited opponents to a .165 batting average. Three of those four starts have been quality.
Both Dipoto and Servais noted the Mariners intend to be involved in discussions to bring Walker back to Seattle for a third time when he reaches free agency again this fall.
“It is his free agent year, so as I got a chance to talk to him this morning, I would love to see him go out and dominate the rest of the season, and then come back and sign with us going forward,” Servais said.
Walker was initially acquired by the Mariners as a 17-year-old out of California’s Yucaipa High School in the first round of the 2010 Major League Baseball Draft. He spent the first seven seasons of his professional career in Seattle’s system and debuted with the Mariners in 2013.
Once viewed as the heir apparent to longtime ace Felix Hernandez, Walker went 22-22 with a 4.18 ERA in 65 games (62 starts) with the Mariners in parts of four seasons before he was traded to the Diamonbacks as part of a five-player deal following the 2016 season.
Walker left with shortstop Ketel Marte, and the Mariners received shortstop Jean Segura, outfielder Mitch Haniger and left-handed reliever Zac Curtis in the deal. Haniger is the only player still with the organization from that trade, but has spent long stints on the injured list since early last summer.
Walker was the scheduled starter for Wednesday night’s game against the Padres before the Mariners voted unanimously to not play in protest following the police shooting of Jacob Blake on Sunday in Kenosha, Wis.
“Glad to be apart of this organization and group of people,” Walker tweeted after the postponement was announced. “Thank you for standing with us always!”
Servais has consistently spoken about how Walker has matured both on and off the field since leaving Seattle for the first time, and what he has meant to the clubhouse during this abbreviated season.
“Very selfishly here, I just love having him in the clubhouse, and what he was able to bring there from a leadership standpoint, Servais said. “And not just with our young players, we talk about (Justus Sheffield) and (Justin) Dunn and (Nick Margevicius) and being able to help those young starters out, but we have a first-year pitching coach here, too.
“And (Walker’s) meant a lot. Where a young pitching coach can get up and talk about things that are important to us organizationally, and to have veteran players quickly jump on board with that, it is huge. It’s really huge. It makes your job easier. Now the younger players jump in. There’s no things going on behind your back, and things like that, and Taijuan was a big leader, making sure that we were driving the right messaging and everybody was understanding the importance of it.”
Walker was rescheduled to start the first game of Thursday’s doubleheader, meaning the Mariners had to scramble to find a replacement ahead of the 12:10 p.m. start.
Ljay Newsome, who has been primarily a starter in the minors in his six seasons with the organization, was tapped to make his first big league start.
The Mariners plan to keep their six-man rotation in tact as the season moves into its final month, but haven’t yet made a decision on who will fill Walker’s spot moving forward.
Reliever Zac Grotz, who was already with the club on the road trip as part of the five-man traveling taxi squad, was also recalled Thursday morning as an additional bullpen arm.
Recent acquisition Seth Frankoff, who has been a starter in the A’s, Dodgers and Cubs minor league systems in his career, remains on the taxi squad as another option should Seattle need an additional pitcher as the road trip continues.
Yusei Kikuchi was scheduled to start the second of the two seven-inning games in his normal turn.
Utility player Jose Marmolejos was appointed as the club’s 29th man for the doubleheader.
Relievers Carl Edwards Jr. and Taylor Guilbeau were both transferred to the 45-day injured list Thursday in additional moves.
This story was originally published August 27, 2020 at 8:54 AM.
