Seattle Mariners 2010 Rant

[SeaTownJosh]

Its that time of year again, the all star break is coming up and after a great season in 2009 (Like in 2007) the mariners come up empty at the all star break. The team is just amazed. They dont know how this could have happend. 100 million dollar payroll, a farm system with tons of talent. But some where along the line blame has to be placed somewhere.

Who do we blame jack z, wak, or the players? To add to that why did this all fail.

Since 2001 its been nothing but disapointment after disapointment. If it wasnt 2002-2003 where they won 93 games and failed to make the playoffs, or 2004-2006 where it was nothing but bad baseball. 2008 where after a great rise in hope, the team failed once again investing in one hit wonder players.

This all the fault of Jack-z. He should have known better from the start that Milton bradley wasnt ever going to be good again and at 31 he is over his prime. Rob johnson is a terrible major leauger who in triple a may make a bit of noise but isnt good enough to play with the big boys.

Casey kotchman by far was the worse move. A guy who was hiting 240-250 in boston at the best ballpark to hit in the majors. He did account that when players goes from a good hitters ballpark like fenway to safeco your numbers are going to drop. Russell proved himself and jack totaly gave a big fuck you to the fans when he didnt give russell a multi year contract. If boston didnt want him then why would we want him?

What it comes down to is what i coined as the "Diamond In The Rough Strategy". Where a GM wants to find these players for cheap who he banks on will have a comback season. Bill Bavasi did this and fucked up the team for years. He went for casey because he thought he would hit 260-270 and hit 10 homers and drive in 70-80 runs. That was total dumbass move kotchman isnt a good hiter and will suck even more at safeco.

Before i go to far and make this longer then it has to be im sad to once again the stupidass gm sit up and make more excuses for why we are failures.

First were going to have a fire sale while we sell off half our team. Cliff lee will be the first to go and maybe a few other will follow him. Then the mariner GM will pretty much tell us were going back into rebuilding mode. This means we get prospects we will have to wait 1-3 years before we see them up here producing. Then in the media the blame game will go around while they pretend like they care.

This just more proof we need to get rid of the unions in baseball. No more paying players millions if they dont produce. It makes me sick to know rob johnson will make a million dollars this year when he does nothing to produce for the team. You notice in other sports where there are no unions that you dont have teams that go 10-20 years without making it to the playoffs. The yankees only dominate because the players have no incentive to work hard. Rather then paying them millions pay them 50k a year and fill there contract with incetives to produce.

Anyways tell me what you think.

[clarknova]

YES! A fellow ranter. Man, I love a good rant. Nicely done.
My take:
I put far less blame on Jack. I think he's going to be held responsible to how the team performs, but I'd be surprised if this is how far they let the team go under him before they do anything about it. The problem truly lies in the fact that they can not make whatever move they want, don't have unlimited payroll, and really can't see into the future to tell when players are going to regress. Nobody in baseball or who follows baseball with any base knowledge would have predicted Chone Figgins to play like he has. Most people applauded the signing as a bargain and a coup to take away Anaheim's valuable lead off hitter. Jack's "Diamond In The Rough" strategy has, to me, been pretty brilliant. Aardsma, Branyan, Guti, Vargas, and Fister were all brought in by Jack, and are completely blowing away the expectations of their performance before they signed with the M's. The focus shifts completely to the misses (Kotchman, Figgins) when the team is losing- and, since we need someone to blame, who else can we point the finger at?
So, the FO plucks out these "diamonds" and when they are winning (relatively in 2009) everyone applauds the hits and puts him on a pedestal, when they lose, Jack's an idiot who can't evaluate talent and all the misses (Kotchman, Figgins, Jack Wison) get dragged out.

The main issue to me is that the team is in the common sports vicious cycle of "the team loses, we lose money, we cut payroll to keep out of the red, consequently we don't have enough to buy talent, the team loses... Etc." The ONLY way this front office can produce a perennial winner given it's payroll is to build from within. Great teams do both. The M's had one of the worst systems in baseball talent wise after the 2008 season. They were ranked near the bottom of every evaluation I read. Now they're in the middle of the pack. In a year and a half. That is HUGE. HUGE. Bavasi and his regime absolutely destroyed what was left of our system after Gillick (bless his heart), didn't do a whole lot for us. Look at the Blue Jays after he left, or the Mariners, or the Orioles, or the Phillies farm system now. He has a proven formula- build a world series contender and leave the teams farm system obliterated. Bavasi took over and as I have coined "took a dump on the corpse" It takes more than a year and a half to go from being the first team in baseball to spend $100 million dollars and lose 100 games to being a playoff contender.

I think one of the biggest mistakes this year was the media blitz and the teams "Believe Big" campaign. That's all or nothing. You look super foolish if you don't win and "Believe Big" is your team slogan. Total fail. I mean, when it was "You Gotta Love These Guys!", that was perfect. If they win, of course we love them, and if they lose, at least they're adorable!

Basically my take is this- We don't have enough money and this isn't MLB2K, we can't just force players to sign here, and we can't force teams to trade with us. Building from within is the only way we're going to win a world series. One thing that struck me that I've heard the M's FO say is that they want to be like the Braves of the early 1990's. They want to contend every year, and that's sort of the blueprint they're using- talented, team controlled youth built around a dominating pitching staff. That's the goal.

Bradley? It was a contract swap. We couldn't afford the bats we wanted, and Branyan? Even if we had him from the beginning of the season, he missed the first 3 weeks due to the back problem that probably led to the M's not offering him a multiple year contract, but come on- Jack is the guy who let him play every day. He'd still be riding the bench somewhere if it wasn't for Jack, and not wanting to lock him in at first base for multiple years when you're cash strapped is hardly a fuck you in my opinion.

There isn't a GM in baseball that could have come in and turned that festering pile of shit the 2008 M's were, into a contender in less than two years. Nobody. I'm not trying to be an apologist per se, I mean, I'll hold him accountable if this doesn't work out, but I think we have to give him a chance to implement this "plan" of his.

Wakamatsu is another story. Those line ups, bunting like a mad man, refusing to pinch hit, refusing to bench shitty players... Not good. And the team wide underperformance? How can you possibly account for Figgins, Kotchman, Bradley, Wilson, Lopez, AND RRS to all play SO far below their potential, and not just hitting- frickin' base running? Defense? Seriously? I'm sorry, I know these guys are professionals and grown men, but that's some bad coaching. When you have to flip your 1st and 3rd base coaches because we keep running the bases like a damn Benny Hill sketch day in and day out- That just sucks. Fire the hitting coach? Please. Wakamatsu has not done well this year.

So basically, blame? I blame the players, I blame the coaching staff, and I blame the PR department, but I'm not far enough into this to blame Jack. I mean, looking back, when Bavasi signed Beltre and Sexson I literally ran around the office at my work yelling and fist pumping. Again... Hindsight.

[SeaTownJosh]

I say this if jack wants me back on his side.

Trade Kotchman & Get rid of johnson.

[TellItToTheDA]

I say this if jack wants me back on his side.

Trade Kotchman & Get rid of johnson.

But I don't think we could get much of anything for Kotchman in a trade, and we won't get rid of Johnson until Adam Moore and anyone we may get in a Cliff Lee trade (Wilson Ramos or Francisco Cervelli possibly?) are established.

[clarknova]

I say this if jack wants me back on his side.

Trade Kotchman & Get rid of johnson.

I hear ya. And for the record, I don't blame you for blaming Z- I'm pissed and blaming too, just in a different direction, but that doesn't make you wrong. Earlier this season I declared that I would not watch or listen to any more games until Tui and/or Snell were not on the major league team. It actually took longer than I thought, but eventually it happened. I agree with TellItToTheDA regarding Kotchman and Johnson- Kotchman gets released before he gets traded. Unless we can somehow convince the Royals to trade us Butler for him so they can continue their quest to construct a team completely comprised of our garbage.