After spending last summer playing for the Everett Aquasox, Mountlake Terrace’s Aaron Brooks has climbed a rung on the Seattle Mariners’ minor league ladder and is pitching for the Clinton LumberKings, the M’s Class A affiliate of the Midwest League.

Brooks, a 2010 graduate of Mountlake Terrace High School, is off to a sizzling start this season, posting a 0.59 ERA after making nine appearances from the bullpen for the LumberKings. The big right-hander has a record of 2-0 with one save; in his 15.1 innings on the mound Brooks has given up just one earned run, struck out 11, and given up just one walk.

As of May 27, Clinton stands in third place in the Midwest League’s Western Division with a record of 27-24.

While the eastern Iowa city of Clinton is more than 1,900 miles away from Mountlake Terrace, Brooks’ parents made the trek earlier this month to see their son in a LumberKings’ uniform. “It’s quite the trip,” Steve Brooks said while in Clinton. “We are having fun checking out the area.”

The Brooks’ were able to attend many of their son’s games last summer at Everett Memorial Stadium. Aaron made 21 mound appearances for the Aquasox last year, striking out 31 in 28 innings pitched. While his 4.50 ERA last season wasn’t stellar, he got the call to report to Clinton this spring, with hopes of continuing to move up in the Mariners’ organization, something dad Steve is hoping for also.

“If he is able to move up to High Desert in California we might head there,” Steve said. “But I think we are done with Iowa.”

The High Desert Mavericks are the Seattle Mariners’ Class A — Advanced affiliated team of the California League.

Brooks signed with the Mariners in June 2012 and played a season with the organization’s Arizona Fall League squad that year. Brooks spent all but a couple games last summer in Everett with the Aquasox.

Clinton, a city of almost 27,000, sits on the eastern banks of the Mississippi River about 140 miles southwest of Chicago. Between the 1850 and 1900, Clinton and neighboring towns along the Mississippi River became known as the “Lumber Capital of the World,” as huge log rafts were floated down the river from Wisconsin and Minnesota to local mills where the timber was cut into lumber. Local owners of the timber mills, including the Friedrich Weyerhauser family, made millions; in the 1880’s and 1890’s Clinton boasted 13 residential millionaires, more millionaires per capita than any town or city in the United States.

— By Doug Petrowski