Warren is another reliever similar to Riley Ferrell, but a bit more to the extreme. Warren has no experience beyond AA yet, but he’s shown to have elite strikeout numbers to go with his plus fastball and slider. Command has killed him so far in his career, however, as we walked 8 batters per 9 innings in 2018. Although it was over only 15.2 innings, Warren’s 1.72 ERA and 3.32 FIP this past season gives some hope for 2018, but he still appears to be more of a project as a way to get a future back-end bullpen piece in future seasons, rather than someone who will successfully contribute in 2019. Control problems or not, Warren’s stuff is too good for teams to let him slip too far.
Whalen is much different than most prospects as he’s actually pitched in the Majors for a limited amount of time (and actually with multiple teams). It’s unlikely that Whalen is even selected given that he was DFAd near the end of 2018 and no team picked him up, but things can always change.
MLBPipeline.com ranks him as the 21st best prospect in the Mariners farm, slightly lower than Art Warren. They see his repertoire as having 3 average or better pitches, and he has been able to locate well enough to find success in the minor leagues. His ceiling likely isn’t that of someone who will be starting playoff games, but he could be useful for any teams looking for someone for 2019. Steamer projections project Whalen to strikeout just under 20% of batters and have a 4.45
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