The biggest one so far is that, at the first sign of complacency, Wedge kicked their tails and said he wouldn't accept it. Runners-up:
Pineda is an all-star and top-10 in Cy voting unless something goes terribly wrong;
Smoak is real;
Fister and Vargas not just filler (Cole, Paxton, Taijuan and Campos can just be a great bullpen, then, right?);
Bedard's stuff is there, if he can just figure it out;
MB with earplugs: 7-for-25, 2 HR -- plug away!
Ackley (.313/.405/.531 since 4/12) and Franklin (.419/.500/.677 and 3 SB since 4/12) heeeeeeating up in the minors;
The three teams we've stunk against are a combined 34-17;
He's willing to mix-and-match Kennedy, Wilson and L-Rod (and now Gimenez, I guess);
Law of averages finally catching up to Olivo and Figgins;
Ackley@2b, part II -- Choi getting intensive catching lessons.

Or at least one of the very few whose confidence has grown in the Mariners as the season has gone on.  I actually do feel confident in the lineup (with the exception of Jack Cust who has been an all too literal anchor for the lineup so far).  I feel confident in the starting rotation.  I'm a bit scared of at least 1/3 of the bullpen, but hopefully that will change once Aardsma comes back and perhaps Denny Bautista or someone else replaces the other of Lueke or Ray.
Honestly, if before the season I had told you that Justin Smoak will look like he's hit his stride, Michael Saunders will look like he's on the verge, Brendan Ryan and Jack Wilson will still not hit for much power - but - won't offer up at junk pitches half as often as before, Luis Rodriguez will look more than capable off the bench, Milton Bradley will look like 2008 Milton Bradley, Jason Vargas and Doug Fister will not only consolidate their gains from last year, but actually look like they're improving over that, Erik Bedard will survive his first few starts without reports of pain and have the same strikeout stuff as 2007, you might give the 2011 team a chance.  Honestly that's most of the questions answered coming into the season.
Of course there are downsides, Jack Cust looks not much different from Griffey last year, the bullpen has been all sorts of fun (with the weird exception of Jamey Wright and Aaron Laffey), Felix has been shaky in his first few starts while Bedard has been weirdly blasted, and Figgins has started slow again.  But I don't know, I feel like we all have faith that Felix will be fine, and Bedard will likely be too (how many guys have run 8+ ERAs while striking out better than a batter an inning?  1.  Charlie Haegar last year had 9K/9IP and an 8.4 ERA over 30 innings, only 16 guys have ever had an ERA over 5 while striking out a guy per inning), the bullpen is a bullpen and will eventually have the right guys plugged in, Jack Cust...either he'll show that he's capable or we start looking for a new DH again, that's really the big one, we do definately need something there, so the season may at this point hinge on whether Jack Cust can starting hitting for a bit of power, even a .150 ISO might be enough, just so long as he isn't a statue that shows up at 1st base occasionally.
I'm still not at the point where I'm ready to give up on the season, perhaps because I'm one of the few who didn't give up on this season before it started.  Virtually every team has bad streaks, ours has come to start the season, and that makes it tough, 6-12 is a hole to climb out of sure, but it's not impossible even for a flawed team like the Mariners, last year, the Phillies winningest team in the majors, lost 16 of 23 at one point during the season.  It happens to all teams and the trick lies in not letting it become the identity of the team I suspect, so far, it looks like Eric Wedge isn't allowing that to happen

No, we don't have it now and won't for 2 years or so, but if we draft Rendon, and our 2-3-4 goes Ackley-Rendon-Smoak...
Ackley - 115 OPS+
Rendon - 125
Smoak - 135
That's not asking for the moon from THOSE guys.  Since I think Rendon can post a 140 and Ackley a 130 within a reasonable time frame you're looking at a lot more wood than the Ms are swinging right now.
Wishcasting gets you into trouble, but if we can get some AVERAGE contributions from the rest of the lineup we should be able to shock some people, especially if our rotation continues to impress.
The Twins have been running a twin-bill with Mauer and Morneau for years, with a few decent spikes from others like Kubel and a bunch of grinders.
2008 Twins:
Mauer and Morneau - 134 OPS+ each
Span - 122
Kubel - 114
Everybody else - around 95-100
They has a 102 OPS+ and won a bunch of games.  They won 96 games in 2006 with the same approach, and have had an OPS+ within a few points of that for 4 of the last 5 years. 
Our problem is our "everybody else" is like 40.

I'm curious - given the youth that we will have (plus the second pick in this year's draft and likely a protected pick in next year's draft), would you blow every available $$ and make a play for Fielder in the off season? He's the only truly elite bat left standing and he's going to want AGone money but...
 
 

Throwing down .300/.400/.500 (approximately) in his first month of A+ at 20?  He could easily beat Rendon to the majors (Franklin is 9 mos. younger).
And Poythress sure looks like he could provide everything they're hoping Cust will do.
That'll leave them with a lot of cash to buy up average players with (or even above-average, as Grizz says), assuming they can find the right ones.

Pitching-first teams play faster, too. Unless your guy on the mound has Bedard's pacing! I always thought that if Selig really wanted to shorten game, he should expand the strike zone or raise the mound a few inches. There aren't any walk-walk-three-homerun teams that can play a two hour game.

Doc, the Nirvana references are one of the things that turn a great blog into the best on the interweb. More please! ;)

He's not gonna beat Rendon to the majors.  IMO, anyway.  I love Franklin.  I backed that pick the day we picked him just because of how much of a baseball-lovin freak he is, and how his power numbers skyrocketed the second he picked up a weight and moved it around a bit.
But Nick still has to try to stay at SS (not a sure thing, though I think he will), conquer AA with its better breaking pitches, learn either to hit right-handed in a sustainable way or ditch switch-hitting, and improve both his Ks and his batting eye a bit, as he's borderline in both.
Nick is great, and I think he will BE great in the bigs, but he's not gonna be fast-tracked.  The Ms proved that this year by leaving him in the Cal League for probably half a year.  And I would expect him to start next year in AA even if he does get a mid-season promotion.
He needs at-bats, a lot of em, to iron out a couple of things that could stall his big-league effectiveness.  Barring strangeness or him going postal on a couple more leagues, Nick Franklin won't be our SS til 2014 or so.
Rendon has the batting eye that Franklin doesn't have.  He has the glove that Franklin is striving for.  Franklin is trying to get the most out of two swings (from each side of the plate) while Rendon can just focus on one, and has done so.
Rendon won't sign til August.  I expect him to be competing for a roster spot in March 2012 and to get it around the middle of the year once we move Figgins.
Ryan Zimmerman spent 300 plate appearances in the minors, all in his draft year, and was in the bigs by September then with a full-time job the next year.  Evan Longoria had about the same 300 appearances his draft year, then spent one year in the minors before his full-time big-league job was there for him.
I expect Rendon to split the difference...and Franklin won't be ready then.
That's okay with me, honestly - staggering the service time on some of these guys will hopefully help us adjust payroll to keep most of em if they work out.
First, of course, I'm looking forward to having hitters that DO work out.  Smoak is looking like everything I wanted him to be.  Ackley's up next, and then we'll see what happens in June.  Franklin's looking to me like one of the last bullets in the arsenal for whatever current run we make, not one of the first.  We get our ducks in a row and then a plus SS makes his arrival as all the other hitters are in stride. He's the A-Rod arrival position on the Randy/Gar/Griffey/Bone teams.
There are worse things. :)  And if he beats that arrival projection?  So much the better.  I'm just not planning on it.
~G

But if he's in AA at the end of '11 (which we agree on), you think he'll need 1.5 years of AA (end of '11 and all of '12), and then an entire year of AAA ('13) before he comes up?
I mean, his adjustment to advanced-A took like four days and then he's creaming the ball at .300/.400/.500. (Yes, granted, almost all the damage vs. RH pitching. But, boy, is he destroying RH pitching.)
I certainly agree that a lot depends on his glove.  If they think he can handle short in the majors, he'll be a huge offensive upgrade over anyone we have at that spot, even if he's still got some serious things to work on.  I'd think they'd bring him up once they think he won't be a defensive liability.
Anyway, I wasn't trying to get into a debate about who would get there first, only that I think he could have as much impact at short (in terms of delta over alternatives) as the other three at their positions, and that he ought to get to the bigs in roughly the same time frame as Rendon (approx. '13, give-or-take).
So if Smoak is your Mauer and Rendon is your Morneau, you've got a couple of shots to be your Kubel/Cuddyer.  The fact that Ackley and Franklin ought to be at "glove" positions also obviously increases your chances of getting impact free agents/trades to fill out the rest of the lineup.  The Cliff Lee deal says to me that Z is not going to just try to play the "Twins" game.  More like "Twins-plus."

A Rendon selection would lead to us having one of the best infields in the game if everybody pans out.  Franklin at short?  This is not the late 90s with A-Rod, Jeter, Nomah, Tejada et al crushing the ball from the SS position.
Shortstop has become a small-ball position again for the most part, manned by waterbugs.  In 2010 the guys over .750 OPS are Tulo, who is huge AND aided by Coors, Hanley Ramirez, and Stephen Drew.  We'll see if Starlin Castro can join em.
2009 was a better offensive year for shortstops, but Jeter and Tejada are not comin back, Bartlett was a one year slugging wonder...
A SS who can post a .800 OPS will be upper echelon offensively for a while.
Can't judge Franklin on the pop in his bat in High Desert, but he showed last year there's far more there than people gave him credit for, and a .280/.350/.450 kind of bat is what I see him as.
If they work out, you're absolutely right - we're set up to home-grow several plus bats, especially positionally, and can spend our FA bucks trying to get "gritty" players who won't embarrass themselves at the plate.
I have Franklin's arrival slotted in my head for Summer 2013 if all goes well.  I hope he arrives in fine form - and that we've already got the offense humming by the time he gets here. :)
~G