I'm with OBF and I think Moe is onboard as well. I think it IS possible to "ruin" a ballplayer by rushing him. But my guess is that it is harder than we think to do so, and I don't think we're ruining Mike. Call me a Zunino Denier (sorry, Bat). I don't think we "ruined" Ackley. The Rangers didn't "ruin" Smoak, and nobody ruined Montero. Players get exposed, and so long as you're playing regularly and giving the team plus performance at a glove position, you are probably better off with major league coaching, major league attention, major league resources and major league learning, you can probably learn to deal with the exposure up here as well as down there. Gonna be tougher, for sure. Of course, watching the Mariners run the bases this year, I may have to re-assess that suggestion about superior coaching.
So long as Mike's WAR is above half a win and no one better is on the horizon and so long as the pitchers love pitching to him, I say leave him in there. Of course, Steve Baron has a million or so minor league at bats, got exposed at every single stop in the minor league system, but eventually overcame every challenge, more or less, to reach Tacoma, and supposedly has a good glove and is hitting (SSS alert). Maybe he can give us half a win. Nobody's gonna worry about ruining Steve Baron....NAH. Let's try to figure out who ruined Cano instead, since that's our real problem.