Flexen, who pitched in the Korea Baseball Organization in 2020, impressed manager Scott Servais with his two-inning Cactus League debut against the White Sox on Friday, Daniel Kramer of MLB.com reports. "I really like what I saw," Servais said. "I think he does it a little bit differently. He's got the higher arm slot, and we saw all four pitches today. Maybe not as good as command as he would've liked to have with the secondary pitches, but I really liked how he threw the ball."

EDGE Analysis

The Mariners took a two-year, $4.75 million flyer on Flexen after he looked like a drastically improved pitcher with the Doosan Bears last season, and the right-hander seemingly carried over a lot of the positives into his first time facing MLB hitters since 2019. Flexen impressively got through the potent trio of Tim Anderson, Luis Robert and Jose Abreu in the first inning, and after allowing the first three hitters in the second to reach safely, he retired Adam Eaton, Danny Mendrick and Seby Zavala. on strikeouts to finish off his outing. Flexen flashed an impressive pitch repertoire as well, complementing a sweeping curveball with a low-90s fastball and a cutter-changeup combination.