SEATTLE -- The Mariners are bringing back the piggyback Saturday, and this time it’s Logan Gilbert and Emerson Hancock taking the handoff.
After a one-week pause, Seattle will use the tandem setup against the Blue Jays, with Gilbert starting the afternoon game and Hancock coming in behind him out of the bullpen. Luis Castillo is set to open the series Friday, and George Kirby will work Sunday’s finale.
This is the same Gilbert-Hancock plan the Mariners had lined up for last Saturday in Cleveland before they changed course on game day. Gilbert wound up starting normally, and Hancock followed the next day.
That adjustment gave the staff a little extra breathing room, with everyone getting at least one more day of rest and some getting more than that. Dan Wilson said that was the real reason for the switch, not because Gilbert had been the hottest arm in the group.
“The way we had it set up provided a little flexibility there, so we were able to do that,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson said before Thursday’s game vs. the Angels.
Seattle is expected to use the piggyback at least one more time before the All-Star break, likely during the road trip that takes the club through Miami and St. Petersburg.
“Likely,” Wilson said. “Again, it's hard to know how it's all going to play out. But we'll likely have one more as we go forward.”
If the Mariners do it again after Saturday, Kirby and Bryan Woo would be the likely pairing, though Wilson wouldn’t lock that in. Woo has followed Kirby in the rotation since Opening Day, and with Kirby going Sunday, Seattle could line them up for a piggyback in the final game of the first half on July 12 at Tropicana Field, assuming Woo goes Tuesday in Miami.
“These guys all have wanted to shoulder the load,” Wilson said, “and we'll just, again, see how it plays out as we get there. But it's hard to say exactly at this point.”
When Seattle first announced the rotation-wide piggyback plan on June 16, the idea was for each of the six starters to work either the front or back end of a paired outing at least once before the break.
Bryce Miller and Castillo were first up, doing it in a June 19 loss to the Red Sox. Now Gilbert and Hancock get their turn.
“It's the way we kind of planned it out,” Wilson said. “As we talked about, everyone is sharing the load a little bit.
It was going to be those two before, and it will be those two again. So I think that's more of where it stands, rather than a strategic thing.
It's just a matter of trying to keep everybody stretched out as best we can.”
The Mariners have used a piggyback four times so far, and each of those outings has featured Miller and Castillo.
At the start, it was only those two, meant to cover Miller’s return from the injured list and his season debut while also keeping Castillo stretched out despite his early-season struggles.
Since then, Miller has settled in as Seattle’s most reliable starter over the past seven weeks, and Castillo has been much sharper overall.
The setup has worked reasonably well. Miller and Castillo were responsible for 36 of the 37 innings in those four games, and the Mariners went 2-2 in those appearances. It also gives the bullpen, already down an arm because the club is carrying six starters, a full day off.
Since the first piggyback game on May 19, Miller has posted a 1.79 ERA and Castillo a 3.03 ERA, though both pitchers have also made three standard starts during that span.
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