=== Sizzlers:  Eric Wedge ===

For those who missed the memo - which is plenty of amigos - Eric Wedge walks into the 2011 clubhouse wearing fangs down to his chin.

As Geoffy pointed out before spring camp ever started, if Wedge and an unnnamed ballplayer -- let's just call him Shawn Foulups to avoid any similarities to persons real or fictional - come to blows, then Jack Zduriencik's cut man is in Wedge's corner.   Either Eric goes or I go?  This year, it's you, Shawn.

.........

Ericcc's ability to dismantle a bullpen engine and forget how it goes back together --- > is well documented.  Meaning, of course, documented by me.  

If we haven't measured this dude's ability to compound-fracture a bullpen, then it can't be measured.  (Which is likely, but you know.)

It's not like SSI is blind to possible problemos in the managerial corner.

..........

But!  That big asterisk conceded -- SSI loves what it sees so far.  If it looks like a good manager, walks like a good manager and quacks like a good manager, it probably is a good manager.  And SSI has seen them all, literally them all, going back to Darrell Johnson locally and back, non-locally, to the guys like Harry Walker, Ralph Houk and Walter Alston.

Wedge is a guy who can get his guys in the fight, and keep them there, for a year or two anyway.  

He looks like a real good fit for what Jack Zduriencik is trying to do.  ... other fans look at Ericcc as wimping out to Capt Jack.  SSI looks at it like this:  if the offensive line and wideouts aren't doing as the QB expects, you got a problem.

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=== Fizzlers:  Team Vibe ===

In 2009, the Mariners won 85 games and then they added --- > Cliff Lee to that club.  (It only seems like it was 1909.)

Most people had the M's as ready to contend.  About the only two people who waged war on that idea, who I can remember, were Bill James and Geoff Baker.  (Well, James wasn't waging war; he wasn't interested enough to swat Zduriencik with a rolled-up 1979 Sporting News, but Baker waged war.)

The same Geoffy is now advising us, from the same March 20th in-clubhouse view, that this team is ready to implode again.

...............

This doesn't hit me as gospel, but it does hit me as alarming.

Once you get past the brainiest reactions to Baker's on-site assessment, such as "Baker is not me!  How could he know anything?" ... you're left wondering why the first three weeks left him with that impression.

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=== Dr's Diagnosis ===

It is hard enough to predict what Milton Bradley will do.  

There isn't any way to predict, reliably, what a volatile 25-man roster will do.  There are too many moving parts.  

Trying to predict which MLB team will go from 97 wins to a losing record -- as the Angels did last year -- is like trying to predict at which exit will occur the next car crash on I-5.

After the 2000 seasons, most people had the Mariners strongly down...

............

I don't know whether the M's will win 90 or lose 100.  I don't think anybody else does, either.

It's March.  That's one of my favorite times in the baseball season.  I choose to hope, not because it will earn me scowls from the sportswriters, though that's a fringe benefit.

I don't have to bet money on the season, and don't have to predict an UP or DWN year.  I can simply root for Bedard, Pineda, Smoak, Lueke, and Cust to come through.

At least until April 10, that's what I'll do.  Sleeves up, leanin' back in the bleachers, big smile on, I'm watching to see if our new Big Three and MOTO are going to kick some tail.  They might.

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Enjoy,

Jeff

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