The Mariners are expected to fire manager Scott Servais, per a report from Ken Rosenthal and Marc Carig of The Athletic. He will be replaced by Dan Wilson in an announcement that is expected later on Thursday.
Servais, 57, has been the skipper in Seattle since 2016. The club has had its share of ups and downs in that time but the move seems to be related to the club’s recent slide in the standings. The Mariners were cruising at the beginning of the season, while clubs like the Astros and Rangers were slowly getting moving. As recently as June 18, the M’s had a ten-game lead over the Astros in the American League West.
But things have flipped since then, with the Mariners hitting a bad skid as the Astros corrected course. The M’s are now exactly .500 at 64-64, putting them five games back of Houston and 7.5 games back in the wild-card race.
Whether a club’s failings can be placed on the manager is always a matter of debate, but it’s not uncommon for them to be scapegoated when things go bad. Seattle has a strong pitching staff, but the hitters have a collective batting line of .216/.301/.365 this year, which translates to a wRC+ of 96. The team-wide 27.7% strikeout rate is easily the worst in the majors, with Colorado second-worst at 26.1% and every other club below 25%.
Each fan will decide whether that has something to do with Servais, the club’s overall roster construction, or some combination. Either way, the decision-makers have opted to shake things up with just over a month remaining on the schedule.
The club has stuck by Servais through some other ups and downs, though some were planned. The Mariners hovered around .500 in his first three years, including an 89-73 finish in 2018, but then the front office decided to embark on a rebuild. They traded away players like Robinson Canó, Edwin Díaz, James Paxton, Jean Segura and others going into 2019. They also finished below .500 that season and in the shortened 2020 season.
Things have been much better lately. They won 90 games in 2021, just narrowly missing the playoffs. Another 90-win season followed in 2022, enough for a wild-card spot that year, the club’s first playoff berth since 2001. Last year, they slipped slightly to 88 wins, missing the playoffs by just one game.
Despite a fairly strong three-year run, the ongoing collapse this year has prompted the M’s to pivot to Wilson. It’s a curious choice, as midseason managerial firings usually see the club pivot to another key staff member, such as the bench coach, but that’s not the case this time.
Wilson played in the big leagues from 1992 to 2005 as a catcher, most of that with the Mariners. The M’s hired him as a minor league catching coordinator in 2013. Per the report from Rosenthal and Carig Thursday, he has been around the club in spring training as a special assistant coordinator. He has never been part of a big league coaching staff or a manager at any level.
The question of whether the club envisions Wilson as a temporary skipper or a long-term replacement will be revealed in time. Perhaps it depends on how things play out in the coming weeks as the Mariners look to avoid another disappointing finish here in 2024. Overall, Servais has a managerial record of 680-642 in the regular season and two wins and three losses in the postseason.
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