Seattle Mariners Infielder Cole Young Discusses Up-And-Down Season After Walk-Off

The 2022 first-round pick was called up after a dominant month of May with the Triple-A Tacoma Rainiers. In 26 games, Young scored 28 runs and hit 10 doubles, three triples and five home runs with 21 RBIs, and slashed .366/.467/.673 with a 1.140 OPS.

What makes Young's walk-off and month of May most impressive is how his season started.

The 21-year-old was a non-roster invitee to spring training with a chance to break camp as the Mariners' starting second baseman. His hopes of suiting up on Opening Day at T-Mobile Park were squashed due to an arm injury, which limited him to a designated hitter role for half of his Cactus League games. That setback carried over into his first month in Triple-A. In April, Young hit .200 with no home runs and five RBIs.

"The struggles I went through the past couple months, I feel like have helped me a lot," Young said in a postgame interview Saturday. "Hurt my arm in spring training. I was getting at-bats like every other day, and then go to Tacoma, I was hitting like .170 with no homers a month ago. I think that kind of made me take a step back and realize what I need to do different."

Young was praised for his bounce-back May by manager Dan Wilson before Saturday's game. But those emotions briefly resurfaced during Young's debut.

"I kind of felt those feelings the first at-bat," Young said. "And I think since I learned my lesson that whole month, it helped me adjust my mindset after that first at-bat and just realize what got me through that struggle. And whenever I'm feeling those type of emotions, I can handle it."

Young is still a young player. He's became one of the youngest players in the majors when he debuted, and will likely go through some growing pains in the rest of his rookie season.

Young has proven that he can respond to a down stretch. The Mariners held off on calling him up until they felt he was ready.

Based on Saturday, Young is more than prepared to ride the ebbs and flows of baseball, and he could potentially be a key player as Seattle hopes to make just its third playoff appearance in 24 years this season.