Several Blue Jays fans had voiced their displeasure at the time of the trade sending Teoscar Hernandez to Seattle in return for two pitchers, including Erik Swanson. According to them, the team sacrificed too much attack in order to get their hands on good arms.
Today, those same fans can only see that the winter trade favors the Jays, as Swanson gets the job done and Teoscar Hernandez has some ominous moments in his new uniform.
Now it’s Mariners fans who feel cheated by their team’s executives as Hernandez doesn’t deliver and Seattle struggles to play for .500.
Since the start of the campaign, Hernandez has only hit .215, which is far from the statistics accumulated between 2020 and 2022 in Toronto. We are talking about statistics that made him a recipient of two Silver Sticks during this period.
What hurts the Mariners the most, besides their current standings, is the fact that Hernandez will be eligible for free agency at the conclusion of the 2023 season and could sign for another team. If things don’t improve by then, the trade will have been clearly in favor of the Blue Jays, as they also acquired young pitcher Adam Macko during this movement of players between the two teams.
For his part, Swanson shows an excellent earned run average of 1.45 in 19 appearances on the mound this season and wants to be a good insurance policy for his manager.
Hernandez and Kolten Wong, two acquisitions aimed at making the Mariners a team that can take it to the next level, don’t seem like the answer right now.
The former Blue Jays member hits the ball hard, but his goals-to-walks (3.2%) and strikeouts (35.1%) ratios are disastrous. He is still on pace to end the 2023 season with a total of 27 long balls.
Perhaps he wanted to impress his new fans at the start of the season, but he was often taken out on shots clearly outside the strike zone.
Teoscar Hernandez is a veteran, he knows how to behave in difficult situations and he still has time to show what wood he is warming up, perhaps allowing the Mariners to move up in the standings. After all, he’ll have to step his game up a notch in order to demonstrate his true worth when the time comes.
