Commentary: Does Julio Rodriguez have to make an MVP leap for the Mariners to go the distance?

SEATTLE – The Mariners’ immediate future might be affixed to two critical questions:

1) Can Julio Rodriguez be the best player in baseball?

2) Does he have to be?

From a skill set standpoint, the first answer seems obvious. This man is 228 pounds of tools and twitch and terror, a tornado of untamed talent. The 23-year-old in known for launching baseballs into orbit. He is grace and speed and wall-climbing catches; he is excellence in excess. He is Bo Jackson in Tecmo Bowl, lapping pixelated opponents. He is all baseball and no body fat, all stats and swagger and smiles.

For a franchise beset by frustrating phrases – think payroll flexibility and 54% – he is a mashing mountain of unmitigated hope.

He is also incomplete.

Which makes Rodriguez’s resume all the more remarkable. In his second major league season, the Dominican dynamo produced a .275/.333/.485 slash line with 32 homers, 102 runs scored, 103 RBIs and 37 stolen bases, finishing fourth in the American League MVP vote. He ranked second in the AL in hits (180) and extra-base hits (71), third in RBIs and stolen bases and fourth in FanGraphs Wins Above Replacement (5.9). He became just the second Mariner to exceed 30 homers and 30 stolen bases in a season, joining Alex Rodriguez in 1998.

This, he said, was a “sophomore slump.”

Which says something about his ceiling.

But can Rodriguez be the best player in baseball? That depends on – cue manager Scott Servais’ new favorite phrase – “swing decisions.” The 6-foot-3 center fielder amassed 175 strikeouts last season, eighth most in MLB. His 24.5% strikeout percentage sat 30th, while his 6.6% walk rate dipped down to 99th.

In attempting to lift his team, the then-22-year-old all-too-often expanded his zone, negating his own gifts. His greatest obstacle was his own impatience, not a steady diet of deceptive sliders.

“His swing decisions are a big thing of Julio’s camp, making sure he’s in a good spot,” Servais said. “Physically, he feels good. His swing feels good. But is he swinging at the right pitches?

“We’ve seen some really good things. He has a group of players around him that are talking about that a lot among our team. We have a competition going right now here through the final days of camp to put heightened awareness around our swing decisions and what we’re doing and the value of that.

“So that’s where Julio’s been at. Some days, it’s been really good. Other days, he gets a little too crazy. But he’s got a group of veteran guys around him that are really good to watch how they go about it. Because we all know if he swings at the right pitches and takes a few more walks, it’s only going to help his numbers at the end of the year, and help us.”

Rodriguez is also hunting consistency over the course of a six-month season. In his final 77 games and 360 plate appearances, Rodriguez posted a .312/.364/.561 slash line with 61 RBIs, 23 doubles, 19 homers and 19 stolen bases. That included an unparalleled August, in which he batted .429 with 45 hits, 30 RBIs, 11 stolen bases, 10 doubles and seven homers in 114 at-bats.

So then, the task at hand: Get rid of the valleys. He entered July hitting just .238/.302/.407 with 42 RBIs, 14 homers, 10 stolen bases and 94 strikeouts. He also sputtered down the stretch, managing four hits and three RBIs (with 14 strikeouts) in 42 plate appearances (an .095 average) in the Mariners’ last 10 games. When he cooled, they cratered.

Rodriguez was the best player in baseball in specific spurts.

Can that stretch across a season?

“I don’t need to (set personal goals),” said Rodriguez, who eliminated offseason obligations and trained with strength/speed coach Yo Murphy in Tampa, Florida. “Because I feel like, when you play to win, you put all your abilities on display. That’s a way to not focus on too many things. You have 162 games, and if you help your team win 162 times you’ve got to put up pretty good numbers. I’m the type of person that likes to look back at the end and not worry so much about it during the process.”

Which brings us back to the beginning.

If he makes consistently disciplined swing decisions, if he extends his excellence from April through October, if health and ability and opportunity coalesce …

Then, yes: Rodriguez can be the best player in baseball. He can join Ken Griffey Jr. (1997) and Ichiro (2001) as the franchise’s third MVP.

But for this team to go the distance – a return to the postseason, an American League pennant and a parade down Edgar Martinez Drive – does he have to be?

The answer, of course, depends on a flood of factors:

The health and productivity of roster-patching arrivals like outfielders Mitch Haniger and Luke Raley, second baseman Jorge Polanco and designated hitter Mitch Garver. The viability of a bullpen attempting to compensate for early injuries to Matt Brash and Gregory Santos. The legitimacy of an uninspiring third-base platoon between Josh Rojas and Luis Urias. The continued ascension of perhaps baseball’s best starting rotation, an armada of unrelenting arms.

The Mariners’ bleeding budget left little room for injury or error, which could put unfair pressure on their two-time all-star center fielder. Is this team talented enough to overcome its opponents’ overflowing payrolls?

That, of course, is another critical question.

But Rodriguez believes.

“We have a really good team,” he said during a 12-3 spring training win over Colorado. “It doesn’t matter if people talk about it or not. I feel like we’re going to show up regardless and go out there and do what we do, control what we can control.

“At the end of the day, we’re going to win as many games as we can. It’s going to be exciting to be part of this team moving forward.”