Harry Ford is on his way to join the Mariners.
How long the top catching prospect remains with the big-league club is still to be determined.
Ford was scratched from the Tacoma Rainiers’ lineup Thursday night in Round Rock, Texas, shortly after an injury scare involving Mariners catcher Mitch Garver in Minneapolis.
Ford, 22, will join the Mariners on the taxi squad Friday in Arlington, Texas, in case he's needed to fill in for Garver as the M's backup catcher, sources with knowledge of the situation said.
Garver took a foul ball off his chin/jaw in the fifth inning of the Mariners’ 10-1 loss to the Twins at Target Field.
Garver was scheduled to have medical scans to determine the severity of the injury. The M's will wait on results before making a decision on whether to formally call up the star catching prospect.
The Mariners begin a three-game series Friday against the Texas Rangers.
After getting off to a slow start in April, Ford's bat has heated up in Tacoma. Through 60 games, he has a .311 average, with eight home runs and 43 RBI.
He ranks second in the Pacific Coast League with a .426 on-base percentage in 277 plate appearances, and he has a career OBP of .407 in 1,927 minor-league plate appearances.
The M's have been in a tricky spot on how to handle the rising star catcher, because Cal Raleigh is blocking Ford's path toward immediate playing time in the big leagues.
In an interview earlier this month, M’s president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto called it an awesome problem to have."
"We have the best catcher in the world in the big leagues right now," Dipoto said. If we don’t have the best catching prospect in baseball, he’s one of them, sitting on the doorstep. … Help will be required at some point, and he’s putting himself in the conversation to get the opportunity when that happens.”
Ford, the Mariners' 2021 first-round round pick, played a handful of games in left field in Class AA last season, but he wasn't particularly comfortable there.
“I tried it out last year and haven’t talked about it since,” Ford said in an interview earlier this month. “So, yeah, I guess catching is the plan. That’s my plan. I’m always gonna fight to catch. I can play outfield if, like, someone needs me to get out there, but I’m a catcher at heart.”
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