SECTION 331

So the big news today is that Roy Oswalt is going to be a Ranger, and James Paxton has been placed on a short DL with a bruised knee. As awful as both of those things sound, neither of them seems to affect us in the immediate term, so while I feel like I should be more concerned, I’m just not. Paxton should be fine, and Oswalt won’t be an issue until just after the All Star Break, if then, so we have plenty of time to avoid Rangers hitters. Thankfully. It will be nice to have a break from Texas after this series.

As I am typing these words, Dustin Ackley and Brendan Ryan just pulled a double steal of second and third respectively, with Ichiro at the plate and two outs. Ichiro got walked, and both Ryan and Ackley made it home on a throwing error, so that sort of thing is nice to see. We haven’t gotten much of that sort of thing out of the Ms this year. The Ryan/Ackley duo made an incredible double play then in the bottom of that 5th inning, assisting Justin Smoak in the final out of the inning at first to snag Ian Kinsler. It was almost like our young lads were playing the fine game of baseball!

In the top of the 8th, drama exploded everywhere, as the Mariners loaded the bases against Alexi Ogando and then Mike Adams with no outs. Adams couldn’t contain the Ms batting lineup any better than Ogando could, and after Kyle Seager scored under Ogando’s watch, Adams allowed three more runs with the help of some stunningly terrible fielding errors by Rangers fielders, he was replaced with Mark Lowe. Lowe let one more run in, that being Brendan Ryan scooting past catcher Yorvit Torrealba to redemption from last night’s awful disappointment at the plate after Ryan was waved around by third base coach Jeff Datz. When the top of the 8th inning was over, the score was 10-3 in favor of the Ms, and the order had batted around.

The Rangers tried, but could not come back from the deficit. Tom Wilhelmsen was sent into the 9th in a non-save situation, threw 10 pitches, and that was pretty much it. The Rangers got a man on due to a glove transfer flub on the part of Kyle Seager, but that was pretty much all we allowed them to do. Mike Adams had a bad night, the Ms took advantage of it, and I’m not going to pretend to be anything other than overjoyed about it. I don’t care about the bobbles, the slips, Figgins awkward jump in left field in a botched attempt to get a ball that bounced off the scoreboard; at this point, none of that matters. What matters to me, right now, this very minute, is that the Mariners beat the Rangers, and by a really wide margin at that. If it wasn’t a weekday, I’d maybe raise a toast.

Tomorrow is the final game of the series. Do we take it from them? Do we lose phenomenally? I’ll hope for the former and prepare for the latter, like I always do, every day.

I haven’t been writing but I have been watching and listening. And this weekend has been  a soul crusher. Had I been in less of a hurry to get to sleep on Friday after the game to post, I would have posted the shot of Albert Pujols hitting a home run and left it at that. Ah, here it is:

Sad, right?

It’s been difficult to watch the past few days, as the Mariners have had and wasted opportunities, as lineups with Chone Figgins and Miguel Olivo have been announced, as Brandon League has been allowed to load the bases, allowed to give up runs, and then finally, sadly, has been booed off the field after the top of the 9th inning. I understand that Eric Wedge had some harsh words for anyone who might criticize his lineups, and that’s fair, I get that. It has to be difficult to be the ones losing every day, more difficult than it is to watch the ones losing. But he has to know. He has to; and that bit about knowing “what you have” lineup-wise. Really? We’ve been at this all last year, and for two months already this year, and you can sit there and tell me that Figgins is just going to stay on this team for an as-yet-to-be-determined amount of time, and that it’s OK? I may be wrong, but I don’t know if I am buying the mystery that Wedge is trying to sell. He and his coaching staff have more contact with these guys than anyone else, and they still can’t tell us what they “have”? I don’t have any choice other than to take Wedge at his word, but he’ll have to pardon my “yahoo” skepticism. I can appreciate the fact that he is defending his players, and I respect that – but I can only respect it so far. If you have watched Brandon League all year long so far and are still cool with putting him out there in a one-run game even when you know he’s having location issues, then I as a fan who pays to go see you do that has a problem with your assessment. And as a fan, it kills me to see League – a player I genuinely like – booed off of his home grass: and that might be the part that angers me the most.

But I digress. I think I really just needed to vent. I love the victories that we have had, but the losses have been really difficult to take this year for some reason. I just hate watching the guys play a new team only to become that team’s punching bag. As things are right now, there are only 6 other teams with a worse record than we have. And we’re going back to Texas tonight, so things could get a whole lot worse. As a side note, is it me, or has it seemed like we’ve spent an abnormal amount of time playing the Rangers this year?

I think I’m done griping. It takes a lot out of me to be upset with the team, so I have chosen a light indifference mixed with my normal pro-Mariners enthusiasm. But I’m still watching, so that says something about my tolerance levels, and yeah, my love for the team.

Had it not been for the loss, Friday’s game would have been a lovely game to be at. It was warm – I didn’t need to don my third layer of clothing brought in preparation for bad weather – and we got a sweet Justin Smoak home run out of the deal.

I didn’t get Smoak’s swing or his run around the bases because I was too busy yelling, but here he is, going into the dugout to high fives and butt swats…

Liddi takes a swing.

I can’t place all the blame on League or Wedge for the one-run fiasco. It was only a one run game because of a bad 6th inning for Blake Beavan and that Pujols homer. Tom Wilhelmsen threw a nice solid 8th inning, and I was really hoping that League could get himself a little redemption for his recent performances.

And then League…

And that was all she wrote. Whoever “she” is.*

I would have loved to be at Saturday’s game, regardless of Felix’s struggles. The King’s Court was four sections instead of the usual one, and the atmosphere looked far more electric than the unfortunate FOX Sports broadcast would have had those of us viewing from home believe. It also seemed like everyone I know from Twitter and elsewhere was there, so I truly felt like I missed out. It was a bad game for a Felix, but a great day for a game. It also looks like Franklin Gutierrez will be taking in some rehab with the Rainiers, and if there is any greater reason to take a drive to Tacoma, I can’t think of one. With the Everett Aquasox season nearing its beginning, it looks like there will be many other baseball-viewing opportunities presenting themselves if I find myself at the point where the Mariners become too depressing or downright unwatchable. I am hoping that never happens, and that I will merely be inundated with baseball. Insert smiley face here.

I think I feel a little better now. I have complained, I posted some pictures, and later today after making a sushi lunch and watching a movie with a friend, I will come back home, make some dinner, and watch the Mariners go after the Rangers in Arlington. My hopes are not high, but that’s really for my own protection, more than it is any negative feelings against the team. Kevin Millwood gets the start, and with the way he’s been pitching lately, maybe we have a chance. Maybe. With baseball, hope always springs eternal.

*Not me.

This one I was supposed to take care of ages ago, but Ryan got tickets to a game the day we were going to talk, then I got busy, then everything went completely nuts last week with my schedule, and now even with two games to actually go to this week, things are a little more quiet, and we were finally able to devote some time to a second interview. Ryan and I have been friended on Twitter for about a year maybe, but we have never met, so I literally knew nothing about him going into this, outside of the fact that he’s a Mariners fan, but that alone is a good enough reason for me to conduct this interview. Well, it was really more of a true conversation. I asked some questions, he answered them, and we got stuff done during what turned out to be a really quick losing Mariners contest against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. And away we go!

S331: OK, so obviously I already know your name, so where do you hail from?

RM: I hail from the great town of Bremerton. Born & raised there, went to college in Ellensburg, now back in Bremerton.

RM: Jamie Moyer was my favorite player growing up. I actually modeled my windup after him. Also, 49!!!! Jeepers! David Ortiz is another one of my favorite players from when I was younger and just seems like an honest, great dude that’s easy to root for. Finally, Stephen Strasburg: I mean, have you seen him pitch?! If he can stay healthy, his potential is astronomical. I just want to see him succeed so badly…wait, so you can’t throw Pujols a hanging change in the middle of the plate?? (surprised face)

S331: So they were just showing more of Danny Hultzen’s numbers and talking about the Generals win tonight. It looks like they lost yesterday, but Hultzen still struck out 12 batters. Not knowing a whole lot about Hultzen myself outside of, well, the hype, what do you think are some things we can expect out of him? Do you even think he’ll take the Tacoma detour, or do you think he has what it takes to make it straight to the majors?

S331:  Zduriencik certainly wasn’t messing around when he said he wanted a team built on pitching and defense…I sort of wish he’d just debate the offense part. Just a little.

S331: Haha! No, I meant The Wave…

S331: Speaking of anything to do with CF, how do you feel about how Michael Saunders has been handling Franklin Gutierrez’s fielding spot? We aren’t getting the highlight reel plays, but he looks pretty comfortable out there…

S331:  So I know you’ve mentioned to me previously that you weren’t really familiar with Houston, but what are your thoughts on the future expansion of the AL West?

S331: So we’re almost done here…I have to ask what the least favorite team is?

S331: Amen to that.

I’m writing this on virtually no sleep, and during tonight’s game, so if it sounds incoherent, forgive me. I was very wound up when I got home from last night’s hitfest, and just couldn’t shut my brain down, so I’ve spent all day today paying for it. You haven’t really lived until you’ve done my job after what must have been maybe four hours of downtime. There has been a lot of yawning. But I wanted to get some pictures up, because the Hernandez/Darvish matchup yesterday evening was amazing.

My friend Eric and I met up at Hooverville, and had some cider. We go to Hooverville because Eric doesn’t drink beer, and they have Strongbow cider in cans, and usually some other cider on tap. Also, it’s dog-friendly, and kind of like hanging out in a friend’s living room, and is kind of a pre-game and after work hangout for a lot of other people as well. We sat around and talked baseball, and watched the rain come down, debating our chances of making it to the stadium without getting soaked. It was warm and muggy last night, very unusual for Seattle; but I’ll take that over freezing after the sun goes down. We left the bar around 6PM or so after the rain let up, and went to Safeco, where we went down to the Pen and then jockeyed for position on the bar on the Rangers side, and waited for Yu Darvish to show up. I was surrounded by an older couple wearing their Rangers jerseys, and countless Japanese fans. Nobody was shy about getting their place at the bar, either, or placing themselves in such a manner that I knew I’d never get a decent shot. I didn’t want to ask anyone to move – they deserve to take their pictures just like I do – so Eric got me a chair, and I took pictures over everyone’s heads.

I usually take a ton of pictures whenever I go to games. Sometimes I get what I want, sometimes I get a bunch of pictures that I can share, but I don’t really feel all that great about. They’re good for the blog, but they’re not something I want to pay to have printed out; I have a sort of baseball wall in the house (much to Tom’s chagrin, I sometimes think; ha!), and only my very best pictures have made it there. It may or may not be necessary to point out that there aren’t many hanging there at all, and all of them are Mariners. But this one will probably make it to print:

I knew the minute I got it that it was the one I had been trying for. Since so much of my photography is as much by accident as it is by practice, I’m pretty happy with this.

I got my shot and we bailed for our seats. The weather was holding, so the roof opened up, and before we knew it, we were sitting amid a healthy combination of Mariners and Rangers fans, and baseball was underway.

Jesus Montero checks his swing as Mike Napoli gets onto a throw in the dirt.

Felix kicks up to lean into his pitch.

The Mariners incredibly made Yu Darvish throw nearly 100 pitches in four innings last night, small balling their way to victory in the cold damp air. Felix threw eight full innings, which is totally acceptable, but I found myself really wanting him to get the complete game. Instead, Tom Wilhelmsen got the call, and allowed the Rangers nothing; no hits, no walks, no anything. And then it was over, and I was certainly glad I had been there.

Oh, and Kyle Seager threw a bat:

Those are both terrible pictures, but I was amused that I caught it on “film”.

My obligatory visiting left  fielder picture.

Wilhelmsen, coming in to dominate the 9th. His pants are overexposed. Sorry about that.

And everybody’s hugging…

Not the best photo I’ve taken, but by that time I was winding down something terrible, and ready to go home and try to sleep, which of course didn’t happen until far later than it should have. The general atmosphere at the stadium was really fun, and at one point in the evening I ran into Mariners Director of Marketing Gregg Green, taking some pictures of a gal who was modeling the King’s Court T-shirt for this Saturday’s Turn Back the Clock Night. The shirts are red, and there will be two sections for the King’s Court this weekend, which are both almost sold out. The red shirt thing is strange, given the fact that we will be playing the Angels, but the team will also be wearing the old Rainiers uniforms of red and white, so I guess I can let this one slide. This one time.

Tonight’s game started out pretty decently, with the Mariners tearing a run away from Matt Harrison in the first inning, but between the Rangers hitting Hector Noesi fairly well and Josh Hamilton robbing us of a few runs against the back wall (and tearing a hole in it, as well!), the Mariners progress back up the ladder towards .500 was stymied. Even a little threat build-up in the bottom of the 8th, with Alex Liddi and Ichiro both managing to get on base. But Hamilton was replaced by a fresh Mike Adams, and the next three batters to the plate did nothing to bring them home. In the bottom of the 9th after Steve Delabar took care of his Rangers batters, Joe Nathan came to the mound to do a little closing. We did not put up much of a fight, though Brendan Ryan did make Nathan work a little, before he swung at a pitch low and away to end the game.

I am just exhausted and it’s bed time. Glad there is a day game tomorrow; I have a lot of catchup work to do due to a meeting today that interfered with a project I was working on, so it will be nice to just sit and listen to Rick Rizzs and company, and hopefully we can take the series. I’m not bummed about this 3-1 loss, simply because yesterday’s game so far exceeded my expectations. And I know we’re not winning any prizes this year, but outside of our RISP problem, there were some very neat parts of tonight’s game. If we get slaughtered tomorrow, I may go back to being annoyed with the team, but for now I’ll go to sleep not being too terribly sad about how we’re doing so far. It could be a lot worse.

Well, this doesn’t look good. I approach the Rangers cautiously as far as thinking the Mariners will beat them, but I am still really jacked about this evening’s game.

I will be headed to Hooverville later today to meet my friend Eric, the Red Sox fan. Tonight, though, even with a Boston hat on, Eric will be a Mariners fan, just like he is every time we go to a game together and the Mariners are playing any team other than Boston. He’s flexible like that. I can dig it.

The last time I was at a game, I was wondering to myself if I would ever get the luck of the rotation with my season tickets to see Yu Darvish pitch. If my tickets didn’t already fall on a day when that happened, I thought, I’ll just get a separate ticket to come and see the game. As my apparently-very-good luck would have it, not only does Darvish pitch tonight, but of course he goes up against Felix Hernandez. I am both elated and concerned. Elated for the obvious reasons, and concerned because Felix seems to have had a difficult time lately rallying his offense to do the work they need to do to support him. And the last time the Ms went against Darvish, the news was not great. The last home game I was at, actually, was a Felix Hernandez start. It was a 1-hit shutout of the Minnesota Twins. Since then he has taken losses to both New York and Cleveland. To be fair, Cleveland was Felix’s own fault, one of those rare uncomfortable-to-watch Felix starts. So I only know what to hope for, and have no secure idea or theory on what will actually happen. Baseball is fun that way.

In order to quell any sort of apprehension I might have about tonight, I looked at their numbers on FanGraphs. They’re both fairly evenly matched, but there are some numbers where Felix fares better – like walk rates, home run rates, and FIP. I tend to gravitate to the good rather than the bad with stats, and maybe I shouldn’t be comfortable with this, but for some reason (probably lack of knowledge) it makes me happy, particularly the home run rates, because hey, Texas. I would imagine we’ll still see a home run from Texas tonight. Maybe we’ll see two. But up until today I thought that Felix had been getting more unfair shakes than he actually has been, and that makes me happy. I am definitely looking forward to tonight’s game, regardless. I’ll be jockeying for position on the bar on the Rangers side before the game, trying to get some good shots of him warming up. O, happy day!

As for the weekend series against the Rockies, I have to remain guarded about how proud I get of the team, but it was a nice group of games to see/listen to. I am hoping that it gave the boys a morale boost, to be hitting that well. The back-to-back dingers out of Jesus Montero and Justin Smoak, and then a nice shot off the bat of Mike Carp later in the game were nice to see, thin air or no. Park advantages go both ways, and the Rockies could have done something, but they didn’t; and the Mariners place in the overall standings reaped the benefit of that inaction. It’s just great to see the kids hitting a bit more. I was unable to have GameDay up during these games, so I don’t know how to explain the Mariners as we know them so far this year, vs. park factors, vs. pitching. But we got a sweep on the road. The Mariners get a slow clap and a “Bravo!” from me.

I wanted to write a post yesterday about Brandon League, but I just don’t have the energy to be negative lately; at least not in any more than 140 letters. I consider Twitter to be an outlet for heat-of-the-moment outbursts; what I say there is not necessarily completely indicative of how I really feel about things in the big picture. League’s “saves” have been horrifying to me this year to say the least. He did what he needed to do yesterday, and we won, but not before he scared the pants off over half the fanbase. I wish I would have had GameDay up yesterday, because it looked to me on the broadcast like every single pitch League threw was right down in the zone; and the Rockies batters were hitting them like they were. And you’ve got to think that the opposition, desperate to not be swept, was going to swing at anything someone tossed at them. There were a few Todd Helton swings that would have resulted in the death of an infielder if Helton had let go of the bat. The final strikeout was about as dramatic a swing as anything I’ve seen; Helton wanted a piece of that fastball, and he wanted it bad. But fortunately, he missed and the game was over before he could make League throw any more, or make him walk Helton to load the bases for Michael Cuddyer. So I’m thankful, but still a little scared.

I will be Tweeting my adventures as usual this evening, and will hopefully have some photos up before tomorrow’s game; which reminds me I need to charge my camera battery. Everyone smile, it’s Felix Day!

The Mariners had a good game last night against Colorado, and it was a pleasant surprise. And much-needed.  I am having a get-together at the house tonight, so I was not able to watch the entire game due to cleaning and getting things ready in general, but I did get to see most of it. Watching Kevin Millwood take responsibility for all 9 innings was enough to make me look forward to today’s game, which I will be listening to at work. I don’t have any feelings about Millwood one way or the other. I know he was an Oriole once, and he seems like an amiable enough guy, even if I occasionally feel I need a translator during his interviews (his drawl is so thick you can stand a fork up in it, and I’m pretty sure he speaks at a frequency only elephants can hear under normal circumstances), and last night he did a really good job pitching against a Rockies club that is faring far better than we are currently. We don’t get a lot of complete game shut-outs coming from the Mariners, and it’s nice to see one out of, frankly, an unexpected source. We’re still 8.5 games out of first place, but we could have been 9 had it not been for Millwood and the thin Colorado air.  And Kyle Seager, because Kyle Seager. Jeff’s article does far more justice (like usual) to the situation than I can.

I received an email yesterday regarding the Mariners draft on Monday, June 4th. Apparently if I want to sign up a space for myself (and guests!) I can go hang out at Safeco that day in the Terrace Club with Jack Zduriencik, Mike Salk from 710 ESPN, and Dave Valle; and a bunch of other Mariners fans. I’m not much of a draft person; I don’t follow prospects very closely, and no matter how hard I try, I cannot remember names of anyone until they do something in the upper ranks or the very lowest ranks up north in Everett. And even then it’s kind of a gamble. Even so, I think I’m going to go. I don’t do a whole lot on Mondays, and this is a two and a half hour deal, so there really isn’t any reason I shouldn’t go. If I change my mind, I guess anyone who reads this will hear about it, but as things look right now, I’ll be sending in my RSVP later this evening. I’ll probably live-Tweet it, because that’s how I roll.

My 30-minute lunch is nearly over, and my work firewall for whatever reason isn’t allowing me to access any sites I wanted to access to talk about things I wanted to talk about, so I think I’m just going to clock back in for work, finish up the next three hours, and start my weekend with a Mariners game and a summer barbecue. Enjoy your day, because baseball is nigh!

This is what Ken Levine said, on air, during the 7th inning of today’s Mariners game in Cleveland.

One of my co-workers telecommutes from Texas, and is a Rangers fan, so we have occasion to talk about more than just work, depending on the day. Today was one of those days, as Lucas Luetge loaded the bases in the 7th, because I was sure that that would be the moment when we would blow our four-run lead. And the Indians got a run in that inning, but not more than one. I relaxed a little, and my coworker let me know that he was headed to lunch, and I was prepared for the hollow victory of a 3-run game, a little push in the right direction before the team heads to Colorado for tomorrow night’s early contest. Instead, the Mariners waited until the bottom of the 8th inning to blow our lead, with a Jose Lopez 3-run shot over the left field wall. Steve Delabar only sent Lopez three fastballs until Lopi got one he liked well enough to beat it out of the park.

And that was when it hit me; rather than be sad about these losses or even indifferent, I need to take the same position I did back in 2010, when even Cliff Lee couldn’t save us. I just have to wear this. I have to buck up and wear these losses, and keep going to games and do what I’ve done in past years that haven’t been very good. There’s just no alternative. I love baseball, I love the Mariners, and it’s time to put on my big girl boots again, and just see this through. We’re not the Cubs, our fans have not been waiting nearly that long.

I think the reason these games have started to annoy more fans is the advent and spread of social media. Prior to things like Twitter and FaceBook, we could complain, but that complaining only went as far as your friends or family, and perhaps the people sitting around you in the stands at the games. I was a happier fan even in 2008, because I had no way yet of connecting with other fans and hearing, talking about, or being bombarded with their opinions on the team. But that has all changed now, and I have found myself getting a lot more irritated with things that might not have necessarily really broken my heart before. It’s much easier to get angry with the way things are going, because you have a whole troop of people who see your reaction and can also instantly react themselves, and before you know it, you’re in the middle of a massive Mariners-hating tornado that is pulling up your houes by the foundations and messing up your yard.

So while the Mariners labor through the bottom of the 9th, and I have to clock back in from lunch, I’m just going to sit here and listen to a baseball game. Because I have a strong heart, and I can take it.

Per an early-game Tweet from Shannon Drayer, the Mariners did not get in any sort of pre-game field warmup due to rain in Boston. So I can sort of forgive the two runs in the bottom of the first, which came at the hands of the Green Monster and Casper Wells’ miscalculation of the bounce. I can’t even get mad at the wall (not like I used to, anyway). It is what it is, it’s always going to be there, and it’s always going to give fielders problems. I could be critical of Wells and say he shouldn’t have run in so close to the warning track, but based on what I’ve seen in Fenway over the years, it’s a mistake that anyone can make there. It’s one that players probably shouldn’t make, but it doesn’t seem to stop them. I can maybe chalk up the lack of pre-game warmups to the rough first inning, but you would think that a major league ball club would know what they were doing by now. OK, I am trying to be more positive here. Settle down. Breathe…

Vargas had an easy bottom of the second, thankfully, and got a little help from Jesus Montero, who gunned down Marlon Byrd during an attempted steal of second. By the looks of how fast Byrd was running there, it was a pickoff that could have easily gone wrong; but Montero and Kyle Seager executed it perfectly for the second out of the inning. Vargas’s third inning was not smooth, but also not damaging run-wise. He had already thrown 57 pitches, however, so I was thinking that there was a distinct possibility that it would be an early night for Vargas, and more bullpen fun for the team.

It was the bottom of the 4th where the real fun started. I had to grab some dinner, and just sat here, eating and watching the home runs roll in. First from Daniel Nava with Cody Ross on base, then a Kelly Shoppach solo shot. Hisashi Iwakuma was rumored to be warming up in the bullpen, but when the bottom of the fifth inning rolled around, Vargas was still on the hill, back to being successful again with a 1-2-3 inning. Vargas in fact lasted until the end of the 6th inning, with 103 pitches thrown, 7 hits, 5 runs, and 3 walks. Disappointing numbers from one who has been doing so well this year. Shawn Kelley turned out to be Vargas’s one and only replacement tonight, pitching both the 7th and 8th innings, and allowing the Red Sox’s final run of the game.

The Mariners managed to get to Lester a little bit in the 7th, but with two men on and two out, Michael Saunders just couldn’t do what needed to be done, and popped out easily to short. I think that this game tonight displayed perfectly what I was talking about earlier today. It’s difficult to sit here and watch a game where the opposing team does things with their hits, gets runs in, moves batters forward, makes their fans cheer, and your team grounds into double plays, pops or flys out, grounds out, does anything but get runs in. And that seems to happen this season more frequently than not. The part that is the most difficult to deal with, I think, is that it isn’t like we got no-hit. We had 8 hits to Boston’s 9. But take away the two dingers, and this is still a 2-1 game in Boston’s favor. It’s difficult to watch, and it leaves me glad that this week is a week full of day games, so I have something to listen to at work, but I can still have a nice evening out in the sun if I so choose, without feeling like I’m missing something. It’s easier to hear it on the radio than it is to see it on the players’ faces. Watching the broadcast show expressions in the dugout, the look of exhausted agony on players faces, can sometimes be a little too much to take. At least Rick Rizzs has a cheery disposition just about all the time, and that makes things a little easier to come to terms with the way things are right now. I am looking forward to my week of mostly-radio.

Tonight’s game ended with John Lester going the full 9 innings. We got a run in on a Kyle Seager sacrifice groundout. Lester struggled a little with Alex Liddi, taking things to a full count before getting Liddi to strike out swinging on a 94MPH fastball, game over, 5-1 Boston. 119 pitches, nine innings, no victory for the Mariners. Again.

There’s always tomorrow right?

I haven’t been writing a lot lately. Even if that wasn’t blatantly obvious by the fact that I know that the last time I posted here was five days ago, I just had to log myself back into this site, something that only happens after lengthy periods of inactivity. There have been several contributing factors to my absence, but the first and foremost of them all is that the Mariners have simply not been that inspiring to write about. Actually probably the first and foremost of all is that, unlike others in the blogosphere, I don’t get paid to write about the Mariners. I’m sure I could find something useful to say if I was on the clock, but I’m not. And the lure of the weather we have been having here lately is terribly strong.

So instead of making sitting indoors in front of a TV from pre-game start to post-game end on these lovely days a priority, I have sometimes watched, sometimes listened, and sometimes (like yesterday, while I was out on the Sound fishing for cod) Twitter’d my way through Mariners games. I’ve started to become a casual fan with season tickets. And that sort of bothers me. OK, no, it really bothers me. This isn’t how summer is supposed to go. Summer is supposed to be all about baseball, all about the Mariners, and all about writing, for me. The really alarming this is that this team is not even remotely as bad as the 2008 and 2010 Mariners, and I surely managed to figure a way to eek out posts then…

So it has to be the weather. Or writer’s block. Or the uncertainty of going up against an opponent we haven’t faced yet this year, because I truly can’t say what the Ms will do against any given team. Things feel very unpredictable right now. I don’t really feel like I can say that the team is good, but I can’t say that they are bad, either. At least there was some certainty in the past few years – or if not certainty, then a way for what was “good” and what was “bad” to become crystal-clear obvious pretty quickly. All this year I’ve sort of felt like the water is really murky, and clarity is not coming easily for me. What do you do with that? What do you do when you find the subject you’re writing about uninspiring and difficult to wrap your head around? Mostly, you go fishing, watch bad movies on Netflix, and clean the house. There are Mariners games in there somewhere, but not like there used to be.

I need to whip things back into shape again around here, so bear with me. It will start tonight as the Mariners go up against the Boston Red Sox, who have been notoriously awful this season so far. Matthew gives the advantage to the Mariners in his series preview, and I’m currently operating under the assumption that two negatives make a positive, so we’ll see what happens. Boston is lower in the standings than we are, but they also have to play tougher teams in that tiny little park. May the better team prevail, and may it be us.

As the Tigers and Mariners game started this evening and Justin Verlander and Kevin Millwood embarked upon what would start to feel like a tremendously long game, I fired up Gmail chat and pinged Moira Koskey down in Portland, OR. As Austin Jackson took a Millwood fastball for a 2B ride to center field, Moira’s youngest son, Graham, decided that it was as good a time as any to attempt to wash his hair with an entire bottle of dish soap. After that particular fire was put out a few minutes later, we sat down to chat about the Mariners in general, the game in progress, and a few other things. Please excuse any formatting issues, it turns out that copying and pasting directly from the chat program presents a little awkwardness with WordPress’s templates. We got through it.

S331: Well, this is starting out…uh…like a Mariners game.

MK: UGH yeah, basically. I was thinking it might be rough to come up with some happy thoughts during a Verlander/Millwood matchup. (break for Graham emergency) Ok, that was unpleasant, let’s proceed. How many runs did the Tigers score while I was away?

S331: Only the one.

S331: I’m with you there, too. I liked him coming back because it gave me my best year of baseball to date, 2009. I loved that Ichiro was so happy during that time, and I loved the whole atmosphere with the team and the bullpen and Mike Sweeney hugging everyone. But you’re right, the end was not pretty, and I think the team and Griffey both deserved better.

MK: Yeah, I really enjoyed him in 2009! He was a nice surprise as a player, and I think he was a great influence for Ichiro. It seemed like the team was really enjoying itself, which is definitely not always the case. So I don’t hate the guy. But he is definitely somebody I’ve ended up having some sour feelings for.

S331: Soccer is often referred to as “the beautiful game”, but I think you’re right, baseball is just perfect. Anything else you’d like to add? I know you’ve got some kidlets to put to bed…

MK: I think I covered almost all of it… except that I still have that “Ichiro! Do Your Best!” sign and now I want to take it to a game with me again.

As I’m posting this, tonight’s game is ending and we just lost on a Jesus Montero pop up with the bases loaded. Don Kelly made a diving catch into the lower bowl over multiple Mariners fans who were all trying to catch what they thought was going to be a neatly-hit foul ball, but it was our last out to end the game with a final score of 6-4 Tigers. Brandon League was once again brought out in the top of the 9th inning. It is here that I bail to go to sleep, since I have to be up in seven hours, and I am not getting any younger no matter how hard I try.  Major thanks to Moira for putting up with my first go at this. You can find her on Twitter here, and in Portland watching baseball on TV and stocking up on dish soap for Graham.

So the interview thing with Ryan did not pan out yesterday – he wound up getting tickets to yesterday’s game, and I can’t blame a guy for wanting to see free baseball, not on a day like yesterday. I listened to the game on the radio while running errands around town, and am glad to see the Mariners headed back towards .500, and still above the Angels, even if only by half a game. I’ll take it. I will also take the Baltimore Orioles having the best record in baseball right now because this would be the first time in my baseball fandom that some time elapsed in the season and a team I really liked had a record like that. Not too shabby, Birds. Keep it up!

I went to the Friday night Smoakamotive promotional, obtaining my train car for year 6 of being a Mariners fan. I think that means I have all six. The cats like to knock things off my shelves in the guest room, and it’s not a room I spend a lot of time in, so I am not sure. Some of them may be under the futon. In any event, even though we lost to Tom Wilhelmsen, I had a fun time, and managed to stay dry-ish and warm-ish in the rain that fell over the left field bleachers later in the game. Here are a few pictures from Friday…

Munenori Kawasaki taking some warmup before the game. You can always tell Kawasaki from a distance because he wiggles his hands a lot to loosen up his wrists. If the high socks don’t give it away, the hand-flinging will.

More warming up.

Mike McCready of Pearl Jam rocking out the National Anthem. It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was very solid and the crowd loved it. It was cool to hear.

Jason Vargas, prior to first pitch. Friday was not the most stellar performance from Vargas, but everyone has their bad days. Over 6.1 innings he threw 103 (!!!) pitches and gave up four hits, two walks, and a run. Wait, I guess that’s not so awful. This really was Wilhelmsen’s fault. Yikes!

Brendan Ryan, mid-shoulder lick.

Dustin Ackley steps up to the plate.

Tom Wilhelmsen, pre-brain fart.

The outfield waits for Wilhelmsen to warm up.

Having replaced Wilhelmsen with Charlie Furbush, Eric Wedge makes his way back to the dugout while the infield mills around.

Jesus Montero helps Furbush get warmed up.

Furbush leaves the hill after pitching to one batter, Joe Mauer. Mauer’s single allowed Trevor Plouffe to score, and advanced Jamey Carroll to second. Jamey Carroll’s Game Day photo is terrifying.

And that was pretty much it. Steve Delabar replaced Furbush, and managed to keep any more runs from coming in, but the Twins had already knocked us around, and that was pretty much it, the game was over in the 7th. Brandon League was brought in, stadium lights and awful math-metal song and all, but the game was gone. I didn’t understand the use of League other than to get him throwing some- and maybe that was all it was. The song and lights and all didn’t make much sense; why the hype for a non-save situation? Also, I don’t mean to spend the last bit of this post complaining, but League’s song is not something that gets the crowd riled. It’s just not. David Aardsma’s song was something I could deal with and eventually came to love, but with closer songs, it just has to be something that is easy for people to clap with or rock out to, and whatever League is using is neither of those things (my knowledge of the nu-metal genre is limited on purpose). I haven’t seen Mariners fans truly embrace the save since JJ Putz, and frankly that’s just sad.

Enough for now, I have to go mow the lawn. I have pictures from Saturday which I may post later today, but if I don’t cut that grass, I may get a visit from some neighborhood association I am unaware of. So until I have the chance to sit down and post again, enjoy your day.

Taking a break from my extremely busy work day to down some coffee in preparation for another long night. I used to be able to go to ball games, run home, upload my photos, go through them, crank out a blog post, go to sleep and feel fine the next morning. I think those days might be over; as Danny Glover might say, “I’m gettin’ too old for this shit.” I do have a lot of photos to share, though, and they’ll find their way here soon enough.

Yesterday’s news of Miguel Olivo’s downgraded groin strain and Chone Figgins being put on pause were both things I didn’t find out until way after the fact. We’ve got a project deadline at work currently, so I haven’t been taking as many quick breaks as I usually do to check Twitter or whatever other online sources I click on for news and to give my brain a break while I’m sitting 21 floors above the streets of Seattle. I’m glad for Olivo the same way I’m glad for anyone with a physical ailment who has been told it’s not as bad as was initially feared. I have mixed feelings on the Figgins thing; seems like an awful lot of money has been thrown out the window to just sit him while he seems to be playing better, but I totally get why it’s being done. Now I get to hope that the ploy works, and the kids that are being placed in the lineup start to realize their potential. I would prefer this happens sooner rather than later; I am really exhausted with one-run losses. That song has been overplayed and it’s time to retire it.

I was at last night’s game and achieved my goal of trying out the new pulled pork sandwiches. It looks like anywhere that there used to be a Dixie’s barbecue, these sandwiches are being sold in Safeco now. Su and I shared an order of sweet potato fries, and the whole meal was excellent. Definitely a repeater, which is more than I can say for Dixie’s. This may seem trivial in light of the loss at the hands of Tom Wilhelmsen, but I have to take my enjoyment where I can get it.

Speaking of Mr Wilhelmsen, I very much like the fact that he shouldered the responsibility of last night’s loss. There is something about singular accountability that I find immensely comforting when dealing with a team sport. Oftentimes, the post-game interviews are a mishmash of “we couldn’t get it done”, or other diverting statements where nobody is singled out and the team as a whole is blamed (usually by the manager), when the loss was truly and genuinely created by one player. That one player last night was Wilhelmsen, and he took his lumps to the media, and I respect that. It seems like he’s kind of a quiet guy who just buckles down and plays ball, and that is something I like. Also appreciated: use of the word “fart” in an interview. I am 12.

So tonight is Felix Day, and the King’s Court will be in session. I will be sitting up above them in my regular seats, unless I can convince Justin to pay some extra for a ticket exchange. Right now the weather looks like it might be a nice night for a game, but I don’t care about the weather. I care about the offense getting Felix a win, and none of this no-decision nonsense. The Twins are not good this year, and we need to take advantage of that fact (one might argue that neither are the Mariners, but I’m looking past that right now). Tomorrow, unless something explodes or goes horribly wrong, I will be conducting my first interview with fellow fan and Washington penninsula resident Ryan McQueen, so stay tuned for that as well.

I have very little to say about the sweep. I listened to the post-game show today hosted by our very own Matt Pitman, and my biggest conflict right now is Brendan Ryan. My personal issue is simple; I don’t feel like we can risk having him out of the lineup, because we can’t afford having any sort of gap at shortstop. But the batting issue is getting a little out of control. That was pretty much what Matt said on-air, and it totally reflects my present dilemma. As long as Ryan maintains his defensive abilities, I am never going to want him to go away. But he’s got to hit. He just has to. I feel like maybe if he could hit one, just a single (nothing fancy, let’s not get crazy), things might go back tomorrow. I am hoping perhaps he will do this tomorrow. Justin Smoak should probably do this as well. After all, it’s his Smoakamotive Train Night! I will keep my fingers crossed, and hope the boys do some damage on their home grass against the Minnesota Twins, who are not doing much better than we are in the standings lately. Since I’m going to be at both tomorrow night’s and Saturday’s games, I am wanting to see some winning. Let’s do it.

So in my search for a new feature, I think I’m going to try to do something I am going to call Fan Focus, because I’m too tired lately to come up with a more original name, and that’s basically what this would be anywy. I’d like to interview Mariners fans from near and far, and see what folks from around the globe have to say about our team. I have some basic questions outlined, but the final interviews will be more of a conversational style. If you want to be interviewed, here is what you’ll need:

• A computer
• Gmail or FaceBook for the chat feature. The interviews will be conducted via chat, then edited for spelling and/or syntax if necessary, and a final draft will be submitted to you via email for approval once I get everything written up. If you don’t use either of these sites, let me know and we’ll figure something out.
• At least an hour of free time. During a game is preferable, Sundays or Mondays are perfect, as those days comprise my weekend, and during games I’m pretty much stationary. Some might not take an hour to actually conduct, but I figure that is a good starting point.
• The willingness to share your personal experiences with and ideas about the team from any angle that happens to crop up during discussion. These interviews will be as much about your love of the team as this blog is about mine.

If you would like to be interviewed, you can either respond to me on Twitter, or here in the comments. To edge myself back into the interview process (I haven’t conducted any sort of interviews since I worked on my high school paper over 20 years ago), I am going to start off with people I know, then branch out to some folks I might not know as well. I will get everyone as I can, and if I don’t please remind me at will. I want everyone who wants to be interviewed to get interviewed. Ideally, this should be by a fans for the fans. So reply here, or at Twitter, or even email me if you like, and I will get to you as I can. A weekly schedule would be ideal, but we can work that out individually. Go Mariners!

Well now I feel like a complete jackass.

Hopefully anyone who is a regular here knows that I would never ever wish injury on anyone, not even my most hated player, not even my most hated player on my most hated team. I have joked about such things before, but find me a sports fan who hasn’t, and I will find you some beachfront property in South Bend, Indiana. It’s just in passing, it’s all in complete jest in the heat of the game, and if anything ever happened to that player I would feel just awful, even though injuries are obviously the luck of the draw, and my control over them has no grounds in reality. So after taking time out of my day of doing laundry and cleaning the house to sit and write about how Miguel Olivo should ride some pine, I was not too very happy to see him pull a groin muscle and pull it hard in the bottom of the bottom of the 9th inning during tonight’s game. And Olivo was doing his job. He was attempting to throw BJ Upton out at first. Slow motion replay showed Olivo grabbing his groin mid-air, so I’d have to assume it happened when he jumped upwards, as opposed to coming down on his leg poorly. Whatever the case, he had to be aided off the field, and no, I don’t feel happy about it. Ideally, benching should drive home a point and give the player time to work on what is ailing them – accountability, right? But this does nothing, and I know  that there are people out there snickering about this or glad that Olivo won’t be seeing any game time for a while due to this situation, and that is wrong.

The game went into extras this evening, and if you were watching you know that Olivo also hit a solo homer. His post-injury replacement, Jesus Montero, did the same thing; they were our only two runs of the game. One might feel that there is some sort of leveling out of the universe here, but all I feel is awful. Olivo is squeaking up there, is at .195 now (or .210, if you’re looking at FanGraphs’ new live settings, which I sort of am), and any progress that might be made offensively is going to be delayed due to what is now being announced as a right groin strain. I don’t have any hope for his defense, but there was a point in time last season – before the 17-game slide into oblivion – that Olivo was not doing all that poorly with a bat. Again, that might be in the context of the 2011 Mariners, but I do distinctly remember Olivo hitting his fair share of doubles and home runs.

And Felix Hernandez deserved better than this game. Felix deserving better may become the rally cry of the Mariners fan. I hope it doesn’t, but for the month of April things aren’t looking all that great. Felix pitched 8 full innings of 5-hit, 1-run ball, with a cool 9 strikeouts. Felix did his job, and his batters failed him. Such a shame.

I don’t have a whole lot more to say. I just watched Olivo’s post-game interview, and he looked like he was trying not to break down. I’m going to go bury my head in the sand for the next 24 hours.

I listened to the game at work the other day, but didn’t really get the opportunity to hear or see much of yesterday’s game. Looks like I didn’t miss much, either day.

So what do we have here so far? A 4-2 road trip, which isn’t so bad, right? Chone Figgins is hitting and fielding acceptably compared to Chone Figgins as Mariners fans usually know him; and that’s great, we’ve been waiting for the past two years to see things like this from Figgins, and I’m happy he is coming around and seems to be a different Figgins in general than he has been here so far. I have long wanted that big grin to mean something, and it finally seems like he’s having fun here.  Jesus Montero is getting a little more playing time, even if it is only at DH (which I still disapprove of). Michael Saunders is taking care of business, and Alex Liddi is showing a bit of flare too. And all of this is great. I’m trying to avoid thinking about how our sweep of Detroit might have been due to facing the lesser pitchers in their rotation – down that road lies madness, quite frankly – and just enjoy the fact that the road trip is what it is; four games won out of six games played.

So I hate to be the person pinning frustration on just one player. I know that some of the problems the Mariners have been having as of late are due to multiple issues, some of which are easily solvable problems (plate patience, for example, is a big one I’ve been grappling with lately, and RISP, anyone?), but for the love of all that is holy, can we bench Miguel Olivo, even for a little while? Brendan Ryan makes a throwing error a few weeks ago and sits for a game, Eric Wedge said, to learn accountability. Miguel Olivo constantly makes throwing errors, passes balls, and has a sub -.200 batting average for the past month, but is still run out onto the field because he is viewed as an everyday starter. What the hell, Wedge?! I know a lot of people are upset about this, and I’m not trying to pile on in that sort of blind anger sort of way; generally speaking, I don’t feel one way or the other about Olivo. But this has to stop. The fact that he keeps getting put on the field day after day while one player makes one defensive mishap gets sat out for a game seems like a terrible strategy. And it’s not engendering confidence in the fan base, either. My feelings on Olivo are literally nothing compared to what I’ve seen around the internet and in talking to people about this team. Fans are not happy about the fact that he is getting game time; and even the recent home runs are not going to change that.

I also find myself interested in the way that Wedge has been using the bullpen. April is just coming to a close, and already it’s easy to tell who will be sent out to throw when the game is going badly for Seattle. Do we really have that little confidence in Hisashi Iwakuma, Erasmo Ramirez, and Lucas Luetge? Steve Delabar and Tom Wilhelmsen have already earned their yearly paychecks. Because I am not a baseball manager, I usually tend to believe that regardless of how I personally feel about what’s being done with the lineup, surely there has to be a reason for the calls made and the lineups set out. Baseball people know what they’re doing, right? I should just keep my opinions to myself and let the baseball team be the baseball team. But I am disappointed in the lack of Iwakuma; he’s been playing major league baseball for a month and has thrown five innings. Five. That’s it. Keeping him in the pen and not using him is not going to improve his numbers.

If I saw Olivo being held accountable for the things he’s done (or not done) so far this season, I might feel like all players on this team were being held equally as accountable for their actions. And I know that Brendan Ryan is one of the team’s darlings, and fans love him, so it seems like more of a slight when a popular player is benched and a less popular one is not. But the fact that Olivo has not yet been held accountable for any of his errors doesn’t not demonstrate that all players are equal here, and it certainly feels like Eric Wedge either doesn’t see or doesn’t care what Olivo does behind the plate. And I don’t know which is more offputting from a fan standpoint. All I know is that I’m a huge advocate for justice in all forms, and it doesn’t feel like justice is being served here. It feels like Eric Wedge is ignoring badness where it’s convenient for him to do so, and the rest of us get to watch the results of that call in glorious HD.

This isn’t the criticism it might seem like. I want to be proven wrong. I will still hope that Miguel Olivo hits well, throws well, and doesn’t allow his pitchers to throw “wild” (and that is in quotes because of the dubious nature of a wild pitch during yesterday’s game), and calls a good game. I will do this because Eric Wedge isn’t giving me a choice. I will also do it because I am a Mariners fan and ultimately the team’s success as a whole is what matters. But just once, once, I would like to see things handled a little differently. One home run does not eliminate the throwing error on a pickoff attempt that allowed a runner to score yesterday. It just doesn’t. So I am going to hope that Wedge levels the playing field a little by sending the same message to Olivo that the rest of us want sent; give him a rest for a game. Surely he could use it.

EDIT: I got all drunk on power there for a minute and forgot to mention how sad I am at the passing of George Sherrill’s elbow. Not really sure how one obtains the need for Tommy John surgery when one spends so much time not actually using his arm, but it has happened, and there is little the rest of us can do about it. I was really looking forward to having a healthy number 52 back in our midst, but baseball does not care what I want. Here is hoping Sherrill’s surgery goes smoothly, his recovery quickly.