For the Mariners, it's finally possible to see the road map out of their long, messy and depressing stretch of substandard baseball.

Of course, as many of us know, it's possible to have the GPS loaded and still get lost, so it's not quite time to plan the World Series parade. Many potential pitfalls await them, and it will take wisdom and commitment that has been glaringly elusive on Edgar Martinez Drive to get them to their final destination.

But I think even the most jaded Mariners basher would concede that promising things are happening in the farm system and infiltrating into the major leagues.

General manager Jack Zduriencik has talked ceaselessly of his plan to "build from the ground up" by infusing the organization with young talent. It's his strength; you can see Zduriencik's finger prints all over the Milwaukee Brewers, the hottest team in baseball with a recent stretch of 19 wins in 21 games that vaulted them into a commanding lead in the NL Central.

And now, it seems, the seeds of renewed respectability are being sown with the Mariners. Again, let's not go too over the top here — this is a team that is likely headed for 90-plus losses for the fifth time in eight years, and will again have some of the worst offensive numbers in modern times.

But out of the morass, two gems have emerged in the lineup — second baseman Dustin Ackley and outfielder/first baseman/DH Mike Carp.

You don't have to be a lifetime baseball man to realize that Ackley is something special, but Ted Simmons, senior adviser to Zduriencik, is just that. And Simmons thinks that Ackley is, well, something special.

"He's just a really calm and confident hitter," Simmons said Friday in a phone interview. "Even more interesting to me is how well he's adapted to second base. If you were a brand-new scout who had never seen Ackley play, after three weeks you'd say he's always been a second baseman.

"What's interesting is he's never been one. It's a tribute to how special the kid is. He's over the top. I think of (Chase) Utley and those kind of people. Others do, too."

It's a prime piece to build a lineup around, and there's growing hope that Carp, seemingly relegated to "4-A" status heading into this season, will be one, too.

After a winter of intensive conditioning and dieting, a more fit Carp tore up AAA this season (.343, 1.060 OPS, 21 homers, 64 runs batted in in 66 games). And since coming back to the Mariners for a second time in July, he's torn up the majors, too. Heading into Saturday's game against Tampa Bay, Carp had an 18-game hitting streak, and a .370 average/.409 on-base percentage/.611 slugging percentage in 27 games since becoming a regular.

Again, Simmons: "Carp has had to earn it; no one has given him anything. You see what he's doing against the pitching he's doing it against, and the teams he's doing it against, there's no reason to think that's going to go away. I do see him sustaining that."

The pitching staff, already top-loaded with Felix Hernandez and Michael Pineda, may be on the verge of adding another impact arm in left-hander James Paxton, with this year's No. 2 overall pick Danny Hultzen — another lefty — on the not-too-distant horizon.

Paxton, a fourth-round pick by the Mariners in 2010 after he failed to sign with Toronto as a supplemental first-rounder in 2009, has been a revelation this year, working his way into the upper echelon of MLB top-prospect lists.

In 17 combined starts between Class A and AA, Paxton was 6-3 with a 2.37 earned-run average and 131 strikeouts in 95 innings. More impressively, at Class AA, he was 3-0 with a 1.85 ERA and 51 strikeouts in 39 innings before being shut down for the season this week because of innings count and back soreness.

Zduriencik revealed Friday that Paxton will get an invitation to major-league spring training in February. And like Pineda this spring, he may prove too dominant to leave behind.

"You have to be careful with young guys, and James missed some time (between the 2009 draft and his late signing in March of this year)," Zduriencik said. "But he's a guy certainly that I think is going to make some noise when we get into spring training next year."

With Blake Beavan, Charlie Furbush and Jason Vargas already in the major-league rotation, Erasmo Ramirez in Tacoma knocking on the door, and last year's first-rounder, Taijuan Walker, storming up the ranks at age 19 (as of Aug. 13), the Mariners have some depth for possible trades. That goes for the outfield, as well, where the stockpile keeps growing with the recent additions of Trayvon Robinson, Casper Wells and Chih-Hsien Chiang to join the likes of Greg Halman, Carlos Peguero and Michael Saunders.

It all will make for some interesting maneuvering this winter. For all the young talent, the Mariners could obviously stand to bring in some proven major-league bats to accelerate the process. Will ownership authorize a payroll bump to facilitate that? We'll have to wait and see.

The Mariners haven't yet made an announcement on the future of Zduriencik, whose contract is up at the end of this season. It's an issue he's reluctant to address, saying only, "I haven't asked, brought it up or talked to anyone. I'm operating business as usual as far as I'm concerned."

For the Mariners, business as usual hasn't been pleasant. It's possible, if you squint real hard, to see better times ahead.

Larry Stone: 206-464-3146 or lstone@seattletimes.com. More columns at www.seattletimes.com/columnists