Fun article at Lookout Landing, which captures the difference between a boring-and-bad team (Mariners 2010, and Mariners 1976-1992) and a boring-and-fun team (Mariners 2011).
Taking the cross from Sully's post and heading it towards the net despite my Andrey Arshavin stature ...
If you're looking for "No Cheering In The Press Box," skip to the next post. :- ) For this one, anyway, we'll scour for hopeful signs.
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Adam Moore. He was wayyyyy overmatched in 2010, as his 8:63 EYE painfully demonstrates.
Moore has a gorgeous catcher's swing, the ability to hit the ball out to RF, and the willingness to wait on the ball.
Powerful guy, short to the ball, lots of torque delivered to the hitting area. He just wasn't seeing the ball.
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It wouldn't be fair, or smart, to fall into Post-Hype doldrums and bail on a guy due to only 205 ugly at-bats. If you believed in Moore last year (and I did) then these first 200 AB's are viewed simply as growing pains. 200 AB's? c'mon.
In a Pollyanna world that has the 2011 M's dancing the Cinderella ball, Adam Moore consolidates his experiences this winter and comes back with a Dan Wilson bat or better.
Will be great to watch in ST, anyway.
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Justin Smoak. Fascinating that Dr. D seems the only guy left who still views Smoak as a very possible future MVP candidate. Check me on that if there are still others around.
I see his swing as being 40 homers a year in Safeco, no problem, if he is going to jell. I know Champ disagrees. This one, my coefficient of confidence is as high as it can get. :- )
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In 14 games after his callup (57 PA's) he hit .340/.420/.580 with an excellent EYE -- a .400 OBP guy with two weeks' worth of 35 doubles and 35 homers. He may do that every fortnight from here on.
Continues to mystify why M's cyberfans aren't thrilled with this guy. As much or more than with Ackley.
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Ackley is named in the article, natch. "Should be starting by June, if not by April" ...
The odds have got to be about 100.00%, give or take a couple of zeroes, that he's starting by June. What's interesting is that Ackley is lobbying the Mariners hard, with his bat and with his words, to give him a shot in spring training.
I don't have a good feel for what happens, back channel, when an agent signals "You better not hold us back for the 7th year or we'll never sign with you." Strasburg might have done this -- and Washington might have figured, hey pal. You're gone after 7 anyway.
The Mariners may want Ackley for the 15-year scan. If so, they might relent on the 7th-year holdback.
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Michael Saunders, it says here, will have about 3,000 at-bats in the majors, probably none of them as an impact player.
I'm sure he's ready to put up 2.0 wins as a center fielder, if Guti can bring back a Colby Rasmus. But I'm not really wavering as to his ability to be the best left fielder the M's can ever find...
As a left fielder, I'm hoping that the M's' ambitions go higher than this. However, if the M's go with an Earl Weaver 5-to-make-3 outfield, that is a completely different Michael Saunders conversation...
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I really like him. And I really like that we have our right side of the infield for the next 10 years set.
I see Smoak as a very nice #5 guy right now...about to be a very nice #3 or #4 guy.
The brilliance in the Lee signing is that we fell into Smoak.
I'm in on this one.
moe
Don't know if Smoak ends up as an MVP or not but I do know that I am thrilled that he is going to be in the middle of the lineup for the M's for quite some time.
Love the Bedard signing. The M's know better than anyone how he is doing and for them to do this signing this early in the offseason is a huge sign of health.
I am actually very optimistic for this team (why else be a fan). They have two positions, in my mind, to mend. The first and most important is DH. Jack Cust would look good. OBP and power from the left side is perfect. The other spot is left field. I like Saunders but as a 4th outfielder until he can hit the outside pitch.
Still need a good RH hitter who can play the field (probably LF) and share duties as DH.
Is supposed to be pretty good luck, until the shell arrives ...
is your good RH hitter who can play LF and share DH duties.
That would be pretty cool.
As y'know he's much better against LHP -- always has been, still is. With 250-350 AB's against the right pitchers, we could scrounge a useful season out of his 11 mills.
As I watched Adam Moore struggle last year I never lost faith in the kid. I've been pulling for him for four years and I'll be darned if I'll quit now.
Something that I picked up on late last season has me thinking that things could be better in 2011, maybe a lot better. Was I the only one who noticed how many times Moore struckout looking at a pitch thrown down the middle on him? There are, really, just two reasons for this happening. One is getting fooled, which to me says that he was over thinking the situation way too much. If his problem was getting fooled then he needs to go up to the plate with a simpler approach.
The second reason could have been that he was given the wrong strategic approach from his coaches. There was just waaaaay tooooo much emphasis on working the count and OBP last year, and stuff like that hurts a kid like Moore. Moore needs to be more aggressive at the plate and load up for those fastballs that he saw on the first pitch nearly every at bat. He was sitting back, allowing the pitcher to have two or three pitches. The hell with that approach. Adam needs to attack, attack, ATTACK the ball! With success from this approach he can then start working on his patience.
Patience has never been one of his strongest skills. Seeing the ball and putting that punch to the solar plexis swing on it is what he excells at.
Lonnie
And he'll like it, by order of Eric Wedge.
I don't think Parker Brothers is in any position to get snooty about PT...he's got to prove he can still outhit Saunders to win at bats IMHO.
I'm encouraged that Z is looking at DH candidates like Hideki Matsui and Jack Cust...if he can land a nice lefty bat for DH (Matsui? Cust?), a righty platoon partner for Saunders (Diaz would be nice), a lefty platoon partner for Moore (Zaun would be nice) and work Parker Brothers into the line-up as his bat dictates from the DH spot...I'll be much happier about the line-up's ability to protect Smoak and Ackley from overexposure.
Ichiro (RF)
Figgins (3B)
Matsui (DH) / Bradley (DH/LF)
Smoak (1B)
Saunders/Diaz (LF)
Ackley (2B)
Gutierrez (CF)
Zaun/Moore (C)
Los Dos Wilson (SS)
The other Los Dos Wilson (UT)
The other LF (OF4)
Parker Brothers (PH)
The other catcher (BC)