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:fiddles:
:doodles:
:noodles, trying to figure out what to say about these first three games:
:decides there's nothing worthwhile to say except...:
Again
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TOP TEN THINGS ABOUT YOUR MARINERS MORNING
10. Five words: less Dr. D this morning. At least YOU don't have to write this up, pokey
9. Sure, Houston won, but we were missing Tyler O'Neill check this shtick out
8. Jarrod Dyson performed 2 miracles in 3 games ... and like we sez, defense and baserunning is always more aesthetically pleasing than 5 homers. Speed Never Slumps
7. News pages on M's site filled with phrases like "tough-luck start," "Pazos uninjured" and "Season expected to continue as planned"
6. Robinson Cano second on ballclub with .167 average
5. Wait till we get our best out there (no at-bats for Motter, Ruiz or Heredia)
4. Seager with a 5:1 EYE ratio. Take your wins where you can get 'em
3. We're wishing Felix' groin well
2. M's sporting 6 of 13 pitchers with 0.00 ERA's
1. M's learn valuable lesson: don't "giftwrap" a promotion to any Chase De Jongs. Poor keed
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The 2016 Rangers started 1-3 but quickly climbed back to 3-3, to 6-5 and 14-10 en route to 95 wins.
The 2015 Rangers started 7-15 and 15-22 but won the division with 88 W's. The very same season, the Royals started 7-0 and won their division. Well, not the VERY best example of what we're talking about.
The 2015 Astros started the year 7-17 but since then, have been apparently impossible to beat.
The 2014 Royals started 0-2, with a soul-crushing walkoff to lose the second 1-2, but won the pennant.
The 2013 Indians started 5-10 but won 92 and made the playoffs. you could look up your own other examples.
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If you want to taste some real pain, go through the 300 in-game comments under the next thread right.
...
Zeus threw 100 pitches. He got 18 swings and misses, as opposed to 2 hits yielded. He threw 18 of 27 knuckle curves for strikes, got 5 whiffs, gave up one single on it. His fastball was 41-for-59 with a 95.9 MPH average and his third pitch, his foshball, had a -0.82 run value on 13 of them. If he throws like that ...
Three starting pitchers, three playoff pitchers. Told you this was a bat-first team.
Game tonight,
Dr D
Comments
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It's all my fault, guys.
My son-in-law is VPN-ing the ROOT Sports broadcasts. Not ME, God forbid. I'm just watching.
But apparently that is enough for the good Lord to punish me, inflicting numbing pain on my baseball viewing by making the Mariners' offense unwatchable.
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P: Forgive us, Lord for sending $25/month directly to MLB headquarters and expecting to actually watch our team's games.
C: His Mercy is great.
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I don't think God frowns on demanding that you get a service you paid for, even when the provider has its collective head so far up its own butt that it can see its neck from the inside.
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And I'm acquarinted with VPN's, proxies, and other systems of bypassing IP detection (having lived in the Philippines, it's absolutely essential to know one's way around this stuff if one wants to, oh, access a PayPal account or login to a native USA version of a site (like Ebay) rather than the Philippines version (which is barely even a quarter as useful as the Real Thing), so when I say I've thought about this, I hope you will agree. /DanielPlainview
The problem with convincing one's self that VPN's are 'ethical' is that, in order to use just about any service whatsoever, one has to (at least TACITLY) agree to the Terms of Service provided by the service provider. Included in there is DEFINITELY something about how it's not allowed to use VPN's or the like to misdirect ROOT (or ESPN, or Ebay, or whatever) from gathering location data on you, the user. So from an 'ethical' standpoint, I have tremendous difficulty convincing myself that I'm in the right using a VPN or other such mechanism. But from a *moral* standpoint, that's actually easier. I paid them my money for a service they provide to literally millions of other people, and all I'm asking is that I receive the same service those other people are provided. I'm asking for the blind dispensation of service, which seems to be a subset under the larger umbrella 'Justice' or, possible, 'Fairness.'
YMMV, of course. Still, it's an interesting question that deserves plenty of consideration as far as I'm concerned.
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0-3 or 3-0, either way we'll be something like 24-17 sometime in May.
Still...ouch! That Was the best sum up from the thread last night.
Omit needless words.
Ouch
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Man, that article has me pumped. A five tool guy, eh? I'm tired of the 'Stros getting them all. O'Neill is ours and you can't have him.
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1. Segura is pretty good. Well, make it really good.
2. Paxton might be the best starting pitcher in baseball with a last name not starting with K. Although such a name would be very appropriate for him.
3. My goodness, how much do I want Vogelbach, Gamel and O'Neill to wreck havoc on AAA pitchers for about 10 days before we can call them up and let loose the dogs of war.
4. #3 is silly, I know....and only partially tongue-in-cheek.
5. If the Seahawks lose their first game of '17, then they've stumbled through the first 1/16 of the regular season. It is worth remembering that the M's have stumbled through the first 1/54 of the regular season.
6. It feels more painful and ominous than that.
7. Our bullpen is pretty good. I said that before, didn't I?
8. Diaz is nearly unfair.
9. If both Martin and Dyson are in the lineup tonight, I will shed a tear. Or two. Really. Not tongue-in-cheek,
10. And as always, I would glady trade one of the two of them, speedy stealth weapons as they are, for a battle Tank. And here I'm really not tongue-in-cheek. Were O'Neill an Astro, they would have him up quicker than you can say "Bob's your uncle," telling him to not fret the K's (as improvement will come) and to just hit 30 balls over the fence.
11. My favorite Cuban is on the mound tonight. Time for me to put up or shut up. C'mon kid!
12. But two or three homers would be nice, wouldn't it?
C'mon Mariner bats. Move 'yer bloomin' arse!
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40 runs on the Angels this next series. Then watch a bunch of Houston popouts to LF in Safeco. "So sorry you're not at home now"...
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were line drives that went about 360 feet to the opposite field and squeaked over the walls in the extremely shallow power alleys (doubles or nice-catch outs in Safeco) or high pop flies that just squeaked over the short walls (as in the Springer homer last night) that would be cans of corn in Seattle.
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"Move 'yer bloomin' arse!"
A My Fair Lady reference! Folks, you can count on Keith to come up with 'em.
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Our pitching may be better than expected, as a whole.
Some of our pitching is not perhaps good, though SSS beware. If it's just a matter of a hot-swap or two, though...
Our starting pitching in particular is responding WELL on this first run.
Our bats will be fine.
0-3 sucks. But better than a lucky 3-0... I can see where the next 30 wins are coming from here; where in the lucky scenario I'd be more nervous, now I'm mostly impatient.
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I enjoyed last night's game. Baseball is back.
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...if a "lucky" 3-0 is worse than a well-played 0-3. :)
Gimme the wins.
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I'd just rather have the team in which I was more confident in for 159 (along with the 0-3 record) rather than 3-0 and more internal questions for the rest of the season. I'm not worried about our bats.
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not suggesting the Astros' wins were lucky. Contrasting our 2017 with previous years' hot starts which amounted to jack squat.
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Not trying to make too much out of this 0-3 thang, but the fact that it's Houston making
an initial statement all over our bony butts, feels slightly worse. I had so much hope for
this lineup and it's clunking and wheezing like an old steam shovel. Back in 2001, every
time you watched a game, you just knew they were gonna win. Since then, seems like the
opposite. Maybe old Lou really did sell his soul. ;-)
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I know...we're a very good team and we will start winning...but I want to start that tonight. Getting tired of losing everything! :D
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The team seems to understand the RSVP should result in some RISP.
Not all he pieces seem to be on the table, or at least not in focus, since the WBC.
But, it'll get better, we're still in the wild card!
zoom
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Over the offense. Staying calm.
I am ready to see O'Neill earn his next promotion but at the same time I'm having trouble seeing the roster fit. Send Heredia down? How about seeing if he can hit MLB pitching this year first? Dyson as a 4th OF could make some sense with O'Neill taking over LF. I can't see trading Martin or Dyson now but really that's what it seems it would take to make room for Tank to start. He's just not a 4th OF. If you also think Heredia or Gamel should start how does it all fit?
I'd probably trade Martin when O'Neill is ready. But Dyson is a FA at the end of the year and Martin is controlled through 18 I think.
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If' he's ready you send Heredia down right? He still has options. Let Dyson play part time like he has for years. Spell Martin when needed. Let the good times roll.
It would be nice to see Heredia get some playing time so we can see what he really has available.
Tonight is only game 4 though...... :D
Let’s Go M's
This team can't hit a collective .150 for long. It will change. Then the big blue and teal machine will show the AL no mercy
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We are in a CF/LF bind...in that we've committed and we have to decommit (hard to do) to move in another direction. Or we're in need of an injury.
So we're not decommiting right now. But I have always been concerned about the small ball nature of Dyson + Martin. I know the '15 Royals are sort of the template, but that team had Gordon at 119 OPS+ and Cain at 125. They had two OF with thump. In '14, when they had 89 wins, KC had Gordon at 118 and Cain at 109.
Haniger will get north of 100, but neither Martin or Dyson has ever been there. Dyson has 83 XB's in 1552 plate appearances. He would average 28 a full season. In 3 healthy and everyday seasons, Martin has 35, 27 and 35.
I'm the odd duck here at SSI, as I like Martin more than Dyson. But I cringe at the two of them together. I hope they prove me wrong.
A Gamel/Heredia platoon has much more bat upside than either one of them. And both those guys pick it some.
Indeed, as you said, O'Neill will have to slug his way out of Tacoma. Eventually he will. It wouldn't hurt my feelings if he did it pretty darn early AND Dipoto had the huevos to change direction early and make the call.
I know I've raised my (silly?) concern too often. Will try to let it go and enjoy the show.
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No reason to stop sharing your concerns. My biggest concern is becoming the lack of bench use.
My thought of moving on from Martin is a Heredia/Dyson platoon in CF being that Dyson still may not have the legs everyday. Besides he may be more valuable offensively to be on the bench when you need a base stolen than starting. All that stuff still needs time to sort itself out but that's what I'm watching for. Many expected a Martin trade as soon as Dyson and Haniger had been added. I just want to see Heredia play already. Hopefully he's not cold by then.
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like the 513-run M's ...
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Oops...doubled up. Deleted
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...how much I'm learning to dislike all things Houston. Irrational, I know... but it's all I have to work with at present.
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What happened out there in the thirteenth? I watched on Gameday and counted four walks that turned into one run. The inability to gain a single base by Valencia Zunino and Tyson has me a little bit upset. The fact that Valencia was thrown only balls and still got out has me much more upset. After Valencia got out, Peacock seemed to calm down and start to throw strikes. Valencia made an opposing pitcher feel and pitch better! Is there an MLB at bat archive for Gameday data? I'd love to show the offending at bat.
Valencia already has three Mojo strikes against him. 1. He's an Orc. 2. He operates the short side of a 1B platoon, 3. He's not Mike Napoli, who was on unemployment and job searching for most of last winter.
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The sequence went:
Valenica makes his bat explode in 4 separate pieces swinging at a pitch a foot inside, gets a new bat, and swings at another pitch a foot inside to pop out to very shallow CF. Zunino strikez out on six pitches, Dyson one bounces it to short for the easy force out. Cue sad trombone.
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But Servais could have used the bench in that inning. PR for Cano who then didn't break for home on a shallow fly that Heredia might have scored on. Or PH for Dyson there with Motter or Heredia. Only 9 hitters have a PA through 3 games.
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of having speed and positional flexibility on the bench when you refuse to PR or PH?
Might as well carry another extra pitcher so the bottom of the 13th is better covered.
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expected a dirge and instead get this. Yall are some gentlemen I could crack peanuts with.
Sniff,
Dr D
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Well color me WAY wrong. Same lineup tonight, except for Ruiz at catcher.
Atta boy, Skip! Double down! :)
I suppose I get it. I can't say I like it. BTW, Heredia had a .419 OBP (SSS) in the bigs vs. RHP last season. Overall (AA-AAA-MLB), he was .302-.408-.392 vs. RHP. Oh well.........
Overton activated and De Jong down I-5 to Tacoma, btw.
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in the Shout Box associated with this post