As we talked about the other day, the Seattle Mariners are headed for an uncomfortable conversation either with, or about, left fielder Randy Arozarena.

The Mariners are 4-9, tied for the worst record in baseball, and while the offense gets most of the blame for that, the defense has been poor in multiple spots as well. 

Through 13 games, Arozarena has been at the center of multiple defensive miscues or lapses, including two plays where he dove for balls that got past him and became doubles instead of singles. He also had a poor throw home on a walk-off sacrifice fly against the Los Angeles Angels last Sunday.

As I've indicated before, the very best alignment for this team might be calling up Colt Emerson to play third base with Brendan Donovan moving to left field and Arozarena moving to designated hitter. The problem? Arozarena is a proud player who likely won't take kindly to moving out of the outfield, especially in a contract year.

So how do the Mariners handle things moving forward? We spoke with Buster Olney of ESPN on a recent edition of the 'Refuse to Lose' podcast.

"He's at the age now, 31, where it can be a tipping point in that 31 to 33 range for outfielders. We saw it with Nick Castellanos with the Phillies, who, by the end of last year, the Phillies kind of viewed him as unplayable defensively.

And so I think that what probably, especially early in the season, is you take the information to Arozarena, and I'm sure they have their internal metrics. They talk about adjustments and hopefully he embraces those and understands that, look, they're not trying to hurt you personally — they're trying to get better.

And if they see things that they feel like you can get better at, I think you take it to him, as the Phillies did with Nick Castellanos, and ask him, 'hey, how about this adjustment? How about this adjustment?'

I can remember Dino Ebel, longtime coach, now with the Dodgers, used to be with the Angels, telling me about Mike Trout coming to him and saying, 'hey, you know, tell me about the metrics, tell me what they mean, let's work on some things.' That's got to be Randy's approach, especially at this age.

Let's face it, he's a little bit like a pitcher who's thrown 95 his whole career, and if he now is throwing 93, you're going to make adjustments. If adjustments are needed, I think he has to embrace those.

And I know the Mariners staff well enough to know that they're going to take it to him with the idea of let's improve — not, we're not trying to make you look bad or feel bad — but if changes need to be made there in his preparation and some of his positioning, they should do that."

Well, let's hope that the Mariners are preparing to approach Arozarena with that data, and let's hope that he's willing to be receptive to it. It will only help the team, while also helping Arozarena in his future contract negotiations.

The M's will open up a four-game series with the Houston Astros on Friday night (6:40 p.m. PT) at T-Mobile Park.

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