New Seattle Mariners manager Jason Kanzler is making an early point of contact with one of the club’s biggest names.
Per a report from Adam Jude of the Seattle Times, Kanzler is headed to Florida in the coming days to meet with centerfielder Julio Rodriguez. The two have crossed paths before - they were both at a recent Seattle Kraken game with Cal Raleigh and Patrick Wisdom - but this trip is meant to go beyond a quick hello.
Kanzler has already stressed how important it is for him to build real connections with his players, and the timing matters. With the offseason compressed by the looming lockout, which is set to take hold of the sport on Dec. 1 at 9:00 p.m.
ET, he needs to move fast on relationship-building. This meeting with Rodriguez is part of that push.
It may be a small move on paper, but it says plenty about how Kanzler wants to operate. It is about trust, communication and making sure the manager and one of the team’s cornerstone players are on the same page. Communication was identified as one of the biggest weaknesses of the 2026 Mariners, and conversations like this are one way to start closing that gap.
Rodriguez, almost 26 years old, is already a five-year veteran in Seattle. He’s a three-time All-Star, the 2022 Rookie of the Year and a player with three Top-10 MVP finishes on his résumé.
He owns a career .269 batting average, along with 134 home runs and 138 RBIs. His best power seasons have come in 2023 and 2025, when he hit 32 homers in each year, and he also drove in 103 runs in 2023 while stealing a career-high 37 bases.
The 2026 season, though, was a step back by his standards. Rodriguez hit .247, the lowest mark of his career, while posting a .307 on-base percentage, also a career low. He finished with 22 homers and 22 stolen bases, and his OPS+ of 103 showed him as just barely above league average offensively.
His defense slipped as well. After being viewed as a Gold Glove candidate, he regressed into one of the worst centerfielders in the American League.
That’s another area Kanzler will want to address, and it lines up with the broader goal for Seattle: getting Rodriguez back to the level he’s shown before, both at the plate and in the field.
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