Cotillo: Cora Says Marcelo Mayer Will Play A Lot of Second Base

It is the only thing that makes sense to stop Toro playing every day 

Yoshida took grounders at 1st base today!!! That could help with the logjam!!! 

Seattle infielder Cole Young provides an interesting comp with Boston infielder Marcelo Mayer, who is seven months older than Young.

Mayer was the No. 4 pick in the 2021 draft one year before Young was the No. 21 pick in the 2022 draft. Each was drafted as a shortstop but made his MLB debut this year elsewhere in the infield.

This season Mayer has posted an 86 OPS+ and 81 wRC+ in 124 plate appearances while posting 0.3 bWAR and 0.5 fWAR in 40 games. Young has posted a 92 OPS+ and 88 wRC+ in 129 plate appearances while posting 0.8 bWAR and 0.1 fWAR in 35 games.

FanGraphs projects Mayer with an 84 wRC+ and 0.4 WAR in 47 remaining games while projecting Young with a 96 wRC+ and 0.6 WAR in 48 remaining games.

Entering this year, ZiPS projected Mayer with 1.1 WAR in 87 games in 2025, 1.2 WAR in 92 games in 2026 and 1.5 WAR in 96 games in 2027. ZiPS projected Young with 2.1 WAR in 134 games in 2025, 2.3 WAR in 138 games in 2026 and 2.7 in 141 games in 2027.

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/marcelo-mayer/29668/stats?position=3B

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/cole-young/31680/stats?position=2B

Despite the similarities, Baseball Trade Values recently assigned Mayer a surplus value of $54.6 million and Young a surplus value of $26.6 million.