Mariners pitching prospects Ryan Sloan and Kade Anderson forming special bond
The Mariners knew they had two special young pitchers. In pairing Kade Anderson and Ryan Sloan together, the goal was to manufacture one special relationship.
On all fronts, the experience has been a resounding success for the Mariners' top pitching prospects at Double-A Arkansas.
"We hang out just about every second of the day," Anderson, 21, said this week. "We're like brothers at this point."
It's not a stretch to suggest that the two emerging talents, and their budding friendship, could arrive together in Seattle by the end of the summer to help the Mariners, in some capacity, in their chase for a second straight AL West title.
Two months into their first season together, the excitement around both arms is already reaching a fever pitch, and the drumbeat to call up both to the big leagues figures to only grow louder every time they step on the mound.
In its updated prospects list released Wednesday, Baseball America ranked three Mariners prospects in its Top 10: Colt Emerson is ranked No. 3, Sloan is No. 7 and Anderson is No. 9.
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The 20-year-old Sloan is the publication's top-ranked right-handed pitching prospect in baseball, and the 21-year-old Anderson is the top-ranked left-hander in the sport.
"They've struck up a great friendship," Justin Toole, the Mariners director of player development, said this week. "They're roommates living together down there, and they're definitely feeding off each other, challenging each other. They're both so competitive that it makes a healthy situation for both of them."
During spring training, one major-league talent evaluator who followed the team closely described Sloan as the most talented pitcher on the entire Mariners roster. He might be the most talented pitching prospect the Mariners have had since Félix Hernández two decades ago.
The 6-foot-5 right-hander showed that talent last weekend when he threw six perfect innings, allowing no hits, no walks and no runs, with 11 strikeouts on 61 pitches for the Arkansas Travelers.
"It was cool," Sloan said. "I went into the game with the mentality that I'm just going to attack like every pitch is 0-2 and just try to get a whiff on every single pitch, and it worked out pretty well. So I'm going to carry that and build on that for the rest of the year."
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Meanwhile, Anderson, the No. 3 overall pick in last summer's draft out of LSU, is as polished as a young pitcher the Mariners have ever had. He's consistently been the most dominant pitcher in the minor leagues this season.
Toole happened to have a visit to Arkansas scheduled last weekend to check in on the Travelers. He got to see Anderson throw 5.1 scoreless innings Friday night - allowing just two hits with no walks and nine strikeouts - and then stood next to Anderson in the home dugout the next night as Sloan put together his masterful performance.
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"It was so cool to have a front-row seat for all that," Toole said. "When we were watching Ryan pitch, I was asking Kade, ‘What do you think?' And he was like, ‘Man, this is incredible.' And I was like, ‘Now you know what it's like watching you throw every week.'"
During their first big-league spring training, the Mariners purposefully had Anderson and Sloan do just about everything together. Their lockers were situated right next to each other, and they were often paired up during early drills.
They were forced to grow close. They're both "food guys," Anderson said, and off the field they're usually on the hunt for top-rated restaurants around the Texas League.
"We're constantly eating," Anderson said.
Anderson said he admires Sloan's stringent dedication to his work between starts.
"The way he goes about his routine and the way he sticks with it, it's really impressive," Anderson said. "There's no one like him."
From Anderson, Sloan has learned how to trust himself, and his stuff, on the mound.
So dominant during spring training, Sloan took a step back during his first four starts in Double-A, posting a 5.65 ERA with eight walks and 17 strikeouts in his first 14.1 innings.
"I had a tough first month, which was kind of unfortunate - like, not even unfortunate, because, you know, you learn from it," Sloan said. "But kind of taking a kicking in the butt, especially (after) a really good spring training, you come in and it's like, ‘Whoa.'
"But honestly, it was good. I was able to learn a lot from it and move past it."
Sloan, as the regular Saturday starter, acknowledged he got caught up trying to match Anderson's results from the night before.
"For me, just adjusting to having another guy who's super talented on the team was something I had to learn, just not to compare myself, you know," Sloan said. "Obviously, at the big-league level, you're gonna have to be with a bunch of guys who are the same talent or skill level as you, so to be able to adjust to that, and stop playing the comparison game, I think was big for me. I just want the best for this guy, and now everything's been going really well."
Conversations with Anderson helped Sloan push past those initial struggles. Watching how Anderson went about his work each Friday left an impression, too.
"He's just a straight competitor out there, and that's something I like to bring into my game," Sloan said. "I get analytical sometimes versus, like, when you get into the game, what you have is what you have and you have to go compete with that. Nothing else really matters. He does that really well and I think I needed to take that from him."
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This story was originally published June 4, 2026 at 4:49 PM.