Franklin Gutierrez is the answer for Mariners in center field

Robinson Cano's towering fly ball kept moving away as Franklin Gutierrez chased it into Yankee Stadium's national park-sized left-center field.

It looked as if Gutierrez had met his match, found the fly ball he couldn't run down.

Then he found another gear — a gear only the best center fielders like Willie Mays, Garry Maddox, Mickey Mantle have — and as Ken Griffey Jr. watched in left field, Gutierrez stretched out and made a remarkable, triple-saving catch.

"I became a fan when he caught that ball that Cano hit," Griffey said. "I was in left field and I was just watching him run, and when he caught the ball I applauded. It was one of those plays where he was probably looking at me and asking, 'Where were you at?' And I'm looking at him saying, 'I was watching you run.' "

We've watched a lot of good center field in Seattle in the last 20 years, from Griffey to Mike Cameron. Gutierrez is the latest, and maybe the best of them all. Certainly he is playing the best Seattle center field since Cameron left town in 2004.

"It makes me feel good when the people compare you with these guys," the soft-spoken Gutierrez said. "It's something I have to appreciate."

Don't be distracted by this playoff race the Mariners never expected to run this season. Despite the fact they trail division-leading Texas by only 3 ½ games, this still is very much a team in transition.

It still is a team looking for answers.

And Franklin Gutierrez, 26, has become the center-field solution.

"Anybody who's been in this game long enough knows how important the middle of your diamond is," Mariners general manager Jack Zduriencik said. "The fact that this kid plays center field the way he does is just fun to watch."

Gutierrez has become the gem of Zduriencik's three-team trade last December that sent closer J.J. Putz and others to the Mets for Cleveland's Gutierrez and others.

"He's just a very talented kid, just a talented athlete," Zduriencik said. "When we brought him in here we thought he would be a very good center fielder, and he's lived up to all of our expectations."

His glove and his legs have taken the pain away from last year's Adam Jones-to-Baltimore trade. And his bat has been a bonus.

His bat produced Thursday's game-winning, three-run, eighth-inning home run, a 418-foot launch over the left-field Nikon sign that gave the Mariners a 3-1 win over the Rangers.

Gutierrez, who hit .258 with 22 home runs in his first two big-league seasons, is batting .297 with 10 home runs and 35 RBI. He extended his career-high hitting streak to 12 games with a second-inning single.

"It's been very nice to see him come together with his bat," Zduriencik said. "This is his third year, he's been in the league for a while now, and he's starting to figure it out."

Before this season, Griffey, as a member of the Cincinnati Reds, watched Gutierrez during interleague games against Cleveland. Even the Reds players talked about the brilliance of Gutierrez's potential.

"We always felt he was a center fielder who was playing either left field or right field, depending on what they needed at the time, because they had [Grady] Sizemore," Griffey said. "But he comes over here, he gets the opportunity to play every day and shows what he can do. He makes great reads. He has a good arm. He does everything above average as a center fielder."

Gutierrez has already put together an impressive half-season highlight reel:

• Fourth game of the season in Minnesota, he sprints from right-center field to left-center, going gap-to-gap and launches his body into the air to catch Alexi Casilla's should-have-been double.

• His Cano catch, where he simply outran the baseball before hitting the wall.

• And Wednesday's larceny, another would-be hit off Aubrey Huff's bat. Gutierrez, running into the left-center gap, launched himself parallel to the grass and made a spectacular grab.

"He can run it down and he'll lay out to make a catch. He'll take chances, educated chances," Mariners closer David Aardsma said. "As a pitcher that's great to see, because you know he's putting everything out there, just like you are. "

Gutierrez is a quiet, serious kid who is obviously uncomfortable talking about himself. Before a recent game he sat in front of his locker, listening to his iPod.

"This is the chance that I was waiting for," he said, "and I'm trying to do my best. Trying to catch every fly ball I can."

He's studious and smart, somebody who understands the Wak way of playing the game, a solid building block for the future.

"I love him," Zduriencik said. "He's a great, great young man."

Franklin Gutierrez is a part of the Mariners' future that already has arrived.