SEATTLE — Erik Goeddel learned he was to be called up to the Seattle Mariners, but not whose spot he’d replace until he looked at his phone. He’d received a text from his father.
The roster spot opened because future Hall of Famer Ichiro Suzuki was removed to transition him into an advisory role and a member of the front office.
“My dad noticed it before I did,” Goeddel said. “He was like, ‘Did you know about this?’ And I was just like, ‘No, that’s wild.’
“(It’s) kind of wild and kind of a humbling thing. It’s exciting, obviously, getting the chance, but at the same time I walk in and it’s Ichiro’s last day and here he is addressing the team about it.”
The Mariners added Goeddel to the 40-man and 25-man rosters on Thursday after the right-hander had been impressing as the closer with Triple-A Tacoma. He appeared in nine games, pitched nine innings and hadn’t allowed a run for the Rainiers.
He struck out 10 and allowed six hits and four saves in that span.
And that’s a wild ride from almost two months ago, when the Texas Rangers told Goeddel they didn’t see much playing time for him on their big-league club nor on their Triple-A team. Goeddel asked for his release, got it, and then signed with the Mariners. Before that he was pitching with the New York Mets.
He knows Thursday’s moves are likely to land him as the answer to some sort of bar trivia question one day as the guy who took Ichiro’s place on the Mariners’ roster the day the Mariners’ franchise icon didn’t retire, but wasn’t released, yet wasn’t playing.
But Goeddel wasn’t star struck by the moment. Not like when he was a month into his first full season in the big leagues with the Mets in 2015 and he took the mound at Yankee Stadium to face Alex Rodriguez.
“I just kind of had a moment when I had to step off of the mound, kind of take that in for a minute and I kind of laughed to myself like, ‘Well, here I am,’ ” Goeddel said.
Rodriguez send a long line drive to left field, but it was an out.
But since then Goeddel has continue to craft his out pitch, a split-fingered fastball. That pitch is a big reason why he’s now in a Mariners uniform.
The Mariners already have a few right-handed bridge relievers in Chasen Bradford and Casey Lawrence, but Goeddel’s splitter provides a different matchup problem than Bradford’s hard sinker.
Goeddel also has a four-seam fastball and curveball, but he didn’t develop that splitter until four years ago when he was with Triple-A Las Vegas. The pitch played in a very hitter friendly ballpark.
“I needed something that when I was in trouble, I could get a swing and miss on,” Goeddel said, “and I started messing around with it. After about a month it was pretty good and about a month later is was my best pitch.
“I really had never tried it before. Everyone said it was bad for your elbow and bad for your shoulder or whatever. But I was like, ‘I’d rather be good and maybe get hurt than be stuck in Triple-A.’ ”
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