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=== Game 1, Jason Vargas ===

Vargas started the year "ranked" 76th among 160 starting pitchers.  After he smashed the A's lineup in Japan, his ranking heliumed to 67th.  

Last August or so, Vargas was languishing a good bit below 80th, we're sure, but his rip-roaring Sept. 2011 and his start to this season have him nicely past the 50th percentile in MLB and threatening to encroach the top 50.  This, by definition, would mean that he's performing as a #2 starting pitcher for a drone MLB team.

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In Japan, Vargas used a somewhat heavier fastball mix than he'd used in 2011:  fastballs 55%, changes 25%, cutters 15%.  In theory, he should be able to go back to his 45% fastball mix for Game Two and keep the A's off-balance and confused.

As before, M's fans would like to see Vargas (1) ahead in the count while (2) inducing arm swings from the A's.

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=== Game 1, Brandon McCarthy ===

McCarthy didn't even pitch in the majors in 2010, so his #86 preseason ranking is to be construed as "an UNRATED player screaming up the charts with grandmaster performances.  The single game against the Mariners moved his ranking from #86 to #78 in the world.

Ackley and Ichiro had little trouble with McCarthy's groundball game; they had 6 of the M's 9 hits.  Few of the M's have any track record against him.

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=== Game 2, Felix ===

Felix enters game two as a "supergrandmaster" starting pitcher.  His performance in Japan moved him from #9 to #8, switching places with Tim Lincecum.

I think that we Seattle fans see Felix as, in some sense or another, the greatest pitching commodity in baseball.  But you know what: he "only" got 5.5 WAR last year, and has averaged "only" 5 per season for his career.  Halladay gets a reliable 7 WAR per year.  

There is a sense in which Felix has underperformed a bit.  And that is accurately reflected in the fact that he's one of the top 11, but "only" at #8.  I like it.  That's what I mean by a chessplayer's confidence in the rankings:  he would see Felix as having a champion's talent, but a chessplayer also would see that GM Felix' actual results have been a bit spottier than some of the other super-GMs' have been.  He would consider Felix' rating of #8 to be about right, and he would see #8 as an awe-inspiring ranking.

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In Felix' last 18 starts against the A's, the Mariners have won 14.  Reminds you of Randy Johnson's 44-6 run with the Mariners.

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=== Game 2, Colon ===

Bartolo Colon was #113 of 160 going into the Japan game.  That performance leapfrogged him up to 102.

Colon's first half of 2011 might have you wondering whether Colon is a top-25 pitcher, but here's where we benefit from the fact that the rankings span a period of years.  Colon is an aging veteran who made a real nice push from --- > Nowhere, Baby to --- > the middle of the pack, and in a very short time.

But he also faded badly at the end of 2011, and his ranking tells you that this ex-champion may have a lot of trouble sustaining any sort of elite status for any length of time.

Colon is a fastball-only* starter who moves the ball around the zone ... he and the home plate umpire had a blast, punching out the M's lineup in Japan.  We'll see whether Colon's game holds up to (1) a normal strike zone and (2) a rematch situation.  Maybe Colon will die of overexposure.  Check it out.

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NEXT

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