RealGM

the Mariners on Monday night reached an agreement with first-round Draft choice Dustin Ackley on a guaranteed five-year $7.5 million Major League contract.

By putting Ackley on the 40-man roster, his time of service in the Major Leagues begins immediately, and he also will be invited to Spring Training with the big league team next spring.

The next step is "get him to Arizona as soon as possible," the Mariners' GM said. "We need go gauge where he's at. I imagine he will play in the Arizona Instructional League and have him participate in the Arizona Instructional League."

There are no definitive plans to have Ackley come to Seattle and work out with the team, but that could be discussed as early as Tuesday.

"He had a pretty long season and him coming off an injury [Tommy John elbow reconstruction surgery] probably wasn't a bad thing to take the summer to himself," Zduriencik said. "We'll speed his process up. We'll get him to Arizona and the Arizona Fall League and go from there."

Exactly how long it takes for the sweet-swinging outfielder to reach the Major Leagues depends entirely on how quickly he moves through the farm system.

Bulltalk wrote:What position do you think Ackley will eventually settle down in? There's a part of me that wishes he could be a solid fielding career second baseman. I guess center field will probably be it, though.