Mariners dismiss Servais as manager, name Dan Wilson as replacement

SEATTLE -- On the heels of a brutal road trip that punctuated their summer-long spiral, the Mariners made a leadership change on Thursday’s off-day by parting ways with manager Scott Servais.

Dan Wilson, the former catcher and member of the Mariners Hall of Fame, who is currently a special assignment coordinator on the Minor League side, will take over as the 21st manager in team history. There is no interim tag, either -- he will hold the title through the remainder of this season and beyond.

Thursday’s news suggests that anything could be on the table for the long-term scope of the franchise’s leadership, opening the possibility there could be more personnel changes, spanning the rest of the coaching staff and potentially the front office. Indeed, the Mariners included the dismissal of hitting coach Jarret DeHart in the announcement of Servais' firing.

“It was a very difficult decision to make, but I thought one that our team was in need of,” Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto said. “We need a different voice and a different direction.”

Servais departs at a time where Seattle still remains in the postseason race but with fleeting chances -- a far cry from where the club stood entering play on June 19, with a 10-game lead atop the American League West. Since then, the Mariners have gone 20-33 for a .377 winning percentage that is MLB’s lowest other than the White Sox, who are on pace for one of the worst seasons in history.

Seattle’s downturn has been steady over the past two months, but it took a steeper nosedive after a 1-8 road trip that featured among the club’s most stinging losses of the season.

With it, the Mariners have fallen to five games behind the Astros in the division race, which is likely their only realistic path to the playoffs, as they are 7 1/2 games back of the final AL Wild Card spot, with the Red Sox and Rays in between.

News of Servais’ dismissal broke Thursday morning via a report from The Athletic and wasn’t confirmed by MLB.com until hours later. Dipoto revealed that Servais had learned of his dismissal via a news alert, before their scheduled meeting where Dipoto informed Servais directly.

“It was always going to be very difficult, but that made it even more difficult,” said Dipoto, who hired Servais shortly after he was brought on, in October 2015.

Their relationship dates back to 2000, when they were teammates in the Rockies organization. Servais was then Dipoto’s assistant general manager in Anaheim from the 2012-15 seasons, before they reunited in Seattle.

“Scott has been my friend for many, many years,” Dipoto said. “And I can't stress enough how tough this day was for me and tougher for him, frankly. And that it’s hard for me to put into words.”

Seattle's fall of such significance in 2024 -- and in the final stretch of a season with expectations -- casts a cloud of uncertainty on where the organization goes from here.

The players repeatedly have suggested that they’ve underachieved. The coaching staff, especially on the hitting side, has been burdened with significant blame, leading to DeHart's dismissal. The front office, under Dipoto and general manager Justin Hollander, faces the reality that the roster’s shortcomings fall within their scouting and construction.

The Mariners have an all-world rotation that features three All-Stars (Luis Castillo, Logan Gilbert and George Kirby) and two blossoming youngsters (Bryce Miller and Bryan Woo). But that group has been handcuffed by an offense that’s been so inconsistent -- a drastic disparity that was repeatedly exposed on the recent road trip.

“The last two months have been very difficult for a lot of people,” Dipoto said. “And as I said, I think the way our team has played recently, it's gone beyond just struggling to play offense. And I think we just need to get back to believing in who we are as players and who we are as an organization.”

Mathematics and their tumbling trends don’t play in the Mariners’ favor, but they do still have 34 games remaining. And now, the organization's brain trust will instead rely on a new voice to pull them out of this slide -- because if they ultimately don’t reach October, Servais could be just the first casualty ahead of what will be a long and defining offseason.

This will be Wilson’s first stint on a Major League coaching staff, though given his extensive background on the Minor League side, he does have relationships with many homegrown players, most notably Cal Raleigh. Wilson has spent most of his time on the big league side during Spring Training, but he’ll occasionally drop in during the regular season. He’s also served as a part-time analyst on ROOT Sports.

One of just 11 members among the Mariners’ Hall of Fame, Wilson is in his 11th season in the organization on the front office and coaching side. His roving role has mostly been on the Minors side, where he visits each affiliate throughout the year.

Wilson managed for one week at Triple-A Tacoma in 2022, when Rainiers manager Tim Federowicz entered COVID-19 protocol.

Wilson spent 12 of his 14 seasons (1994-2005) during his playing career with the Mariners. He has caught more games (1,281) than any other player in Mariners history and was the starting catcher on every Mariners team to reach the postseason, until Raleigh in 2022.

Wilson has also been involved in some of the club’s philanthropic efforts in the community.

As for Servais, in his ninth season with Seattle, he was MLB’s second-longest-tenured manager with the same team, along with the Dodgers’ Dave Roberts and behind only the Rays’ Kevin Cash, who began with Tampa Bay one year earlier.

Servais’ time here ends after compiling a 680-642 record, making him the second-longest-tenured and second-winningest manager in team history, behind only Lou Piniella in each category. Servais’ greatest achievement in Seattle is leading the club to the 2022 postseason, which ended an agonizing drought that spanned more than two decades.