Is Ketel Marte The Seattle Mariners’ Best Shortstop?

Once again, the Seattle Mariners have a logjam at shortstop. Between Brad Miller and Chris Taylor, the team has two talented players and only one big league job. Last year it was Miller and Nick Franklin, with the former winning a job and the latter raking in Tacoma before being traded for Austin Jackson. It’s a familiar problem, and a good one to have, at that.

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But just as Taylor was lurking in the shadows a year ago, there’s currently another potential everyday big league shortstop in the system. He’s probably ticketed for AAA, but has some pretty outstanding talent and could hypothetically force his way to the bigs. And he’s starting to generate some buzz.

Jon Paul Morosi stopped by Mariners camp in Peoria and left with this story, which makes mention of the above Miller/Taylor battle. But neither of them is being referred to by club as “a younger version of Jose Reyes.” That distinction is reserved for Ketel Marte.

We’ve talked a little bit about Marte here, but based on what Morosi gathered from M’s brass, perhaps we should be paying even closer attention to the 21-year-old middle infielder. Apparently the team likes the chances that Marte could force his way to the bigs this season. And that means they’d be more comfortable dealing a shortstop if the opportunity arose.

Notably, it doesn’t sound like Marte would be the one to be dealt. He’s gaining some positional flexibility down in the minors, but is blocked at second base in the big leagues by Robinson Cano and is viewed as a natural shortstop. Considering the wealth of shortstop prospects the team’s had in recent years, it’s somewhat odd to already hear talk of Marte uprooting the MLB guys.

Look again at what Marte did in the minors last year. Across 472 AA plate appearanes he hit .302/.329/.404. This, coupled with his defense, earned him a promotion to Tacoma, where he hit .313/.367/.450 over 90 plate appearances. Hell of a season, for sure.

But that was the first time since a 2011 rookie ball stint where Marte had been an above-average hitter. He saw a little power spike in Tacoma, but the sample was small and he’s not really viewed as someone who will fill out and start raking. He could stand to draw some more walks, though he is good at making contact and avoiding the K. His young age makes it hard to nitpick his profile.

It doesn’t take long before Marte starts to look awfully similar to Taylor. They’re both defense-first types who are only big league hitters if they make consistent contact and hit balls where the defenders aren’t. Like Taylor, Marte lacks the power of Miller. But like Taylor, Marte knows how to put the ball in play.

The team would seem to be pretty high on Marte’s BABIP-fueled 2014, though as a speed guy it shouldn’t be too alarming that he turned an abnormally high number of balls in play into hits. That’s what players like this do. What’s apparent is that Marte has a big league ceiling. What’s not apparent is if he can repeat his 2014.

Ketel Marte is not an obvious upgrade over Brad Miller and/or Chris Taylor. He’s a pretty similar player to the two guys the team already has, though Marte obviously has the most to prove of the three. He’s someone who should get a lot of AAA playing time, and it sounds like he’s going to, regardless of which MLB shortstop gets sent down at the end of camp. He could force his way into the Mariners’ lineup in 2015, but that would likely require him to repeat his offensive successes from last year. Which he could do, but isn’t a lock to do.

Ketel Marte could be a star. He could be Reyes 2.0, as some with the team seem to think. The club is high on him, and they have more to go off of then a few videos and four seasons’ worth of minor league data. But as far as April is concerned, the shortstop on the big league team is going to be Chris Taylor or Brad Miller. But with Marte so close behind, there’s less room for error than ever before.