Seattle Sports Insider

M's = 3 ...

Posted by

5/18/11

Never fear, dear reader, we lack only 4.5 games before the world will rue the day they doubted us....

=== Three Runs ===

... but it felt like five or six runs. Probably because every baserunner was a mortal shock.

Actually it was five or six runs, or should have been:

1) In the first inning, the Mariners had 1B and 3B, 1 out. A hundred such innings get you 120 runs. Simply a fly ball was +1 run, and the probability of scoring the runner from 3B by any means is about 70%.

Guti grounded into a double play, probably not doing his stomach acids a lot of good. Dr. Grumpy can correct me if I'm wrong.

2) Aside from the 7 (mostly solid) hits off Weaver in only 6 innings, there were also: a strikeout/PB baserunner ... a walk ... a baserunner on an error ... a Guti trip to second base on a second botched DP ... and a Cust home run to the warning track.

3) Weaver threw 23 pitches in the first, 29 in the third, 26 in the fourth, and his pitch count was at 91 after four (!) innings.

He struck out Ichiro and Figgins to end the fourth and walked off the field with a disgusted, defeated look on his face that I enjoyed thor'o'ly. Two strikeouts. This just ain't my night.

4) The M's left several runners in scoring position, hit into two or three double plays, and rocked Weaver for several rockets into the power alleys.

.........

Weaver didn't leave the game feeling like he had a Quality Start. He managed it. He's become a terrific pitcher. He's the kinda guy who's really going to enjoy the free agency tour.

=== Jack Cust ===

SSI appreciates Cust's May numbers. It really does. If Cust were going to hit .300/.400/.450 from here to the wire, we'd be fine with his sticking around.

We've seen Cust square up ball after ball in May. He is en fuego, no doubts there.

Not wishing to be stubborn about it, Dr. D does not predict that Cust will hit .300/.400/.450 from here to wire, and does not agree that Cust has much chance to help the ballclub in June.

His BABIP in May is what, .393, and will revert
"Old peoples' skills" decline in part because with no power, pitchers stop walking you
His best shots are now DEFINITELY to the warning track: he will certainly finish with single-digit HR's and
His LD % is like 30% this month. That's great, but it's not him. He's just hot.
Walks mean much less if the guys behind you are weak hitters
Walks mean much less if you are turtle-slow

So, sorry, but the .300/.400/.450 May is a desert mirage. We're happy for him. But he's still, like Griffey, an old lefty who now leaves his homers in front of the warning track.

Next step: the pitchers stop throwing balls.

=== Kennedy - LRod Combo ===

Kennedy had two hits, one of them smoked IIRC, and LRod was one for three.

Jewelers show you gold and diamonds on black velvet. They do this for a reason. The black velvet here being:

an OBP of .276 with a SLG of .245 - Ryan
an OBP of .272 with a SLG of .276 - Wilson
Very disappointing defensive numbers - both of them

The first game with these LRod and Kennedy at 2B-SS was two games ago, the cool-and-breezy 5-0* win in front of Pineda. Now here's game two, and we think you could call this one a considerable improvement also.

If I'm Eric Wedge, it's going to take a whale of a lot to displace those two in my lineup. I've got two MI's playing major league caliber baseball and two who aren't.

=== Ackley ===

Come to find out the problemo may be that we're waiting for some other team to pony up on Jack Wilson (and that this may be why the M's throw away games by not playing their two decent MI's).

Salvaging a Grade C prospect, or a million or so of bad money, sounds fine. But somebody's really going to pay serious money for Wilson? At what point are you throwing good money (attendance, the pennant race, etc.) after bad?

Zduriencik salvages a decent chunk of Wilson's salary, he'll need somebody to pound another brass stud into his rifle stock. I'd a thought it was a wild goose chase.

Comments

Say WHAAAT?!!

Ditto on the report yesterday that the M's were holding up on promoting Ackley because of J.Wilson. The M's will get the proverbial bag of balls for Wilson. And most of the balls in the bag will be Rosie O'Donnell autographed, scuffed with part of the lacing coming loose. Who are they kidding?! You significantly harm this season, postpone the development of a key cog for next season, all this for a guy who, if he was a cube of sugar, couldn't draw ants to an ant hill?
My word! These are not tough decisions, just poor ones.

Two possibilities.

Either Zduriencik has actually gotten feelers about Jack Wilson (and will make the deal soon)...unlikely but not impossible given how many teams have crappy shortstops...or this is more BS being fed to the press to distract from the reality that they're delaying Ackley to save a rusted nickel.

In which case the decision is

In which case the decision is just as poor but the actual grounds for it are being obfuscated. I'd like to obfuscate the penny-pinchers!

J. Wilson's value

Jack Wilson not going to be any more valuable tomorrow than it is today. And it isn't going to be too much. His greatest value might be in somebody else picking up the remainder of his salary.
Wave him. Somebody will pick him up that way.
I am really frustrated with the stupidity of this action. We hold onto a guy on little value to see if we can get somebody of no value in return and, in the mean time, hurt the team's chances of winning this year.
If there is any doubt about the terrific starting rotation we bring to the fray, then such doubters have been asleep for the past 2 or 3 weeks. But the current lineup can not win games frequently enough to sniff along the playoff trail for long. Would be cool if Felix and Bedard approachd Z and said, "bring up the young bats!"
Waiting for Cust to start mashing? You're seeing it...he's mashing balls to the warning track.
Waiting for Wilson's value to rise greatly? Not happening.
Waiting for Ackley's glove to develop? An atrocious excuse.
If Z was really gong to field the best team he's got, then Cust, J. Wilson and Figgins would turn, pretty dang quickly, into Carp and Ackley and Kennedy!
Make it so.

Trading Wilson is probably

Trading Wilson is probably less about return and money, and more about class and decency.
Wilson agreed to wave his option and signed with Z for less money per year (although more overall.) He was asked to move to second base this year, not to make the team better, but to make him expendable. He accepted his assignment knowing full well he was stepping into a hangman's noose, and for the most part, he's handled it like a pro. Can you imagine how Figgins would have reacted in a similar situation? Maybe we'll find out next year. :)
From what I can tell, he's a heckuva nice guy and probably liked by his teammates.
Wilson has done everything the team has asked of him (aside from staying healthy and being productive, *ahem*), he's been a good citizen, and as a reward, Jacky Z is trying to give him an exit with a bit of grace.
And from what we learned when Bret Boone was traded, teammates appreciate it when the team goes out of its way to handle a well like teammate with dignity. So maybe it's a smart move for the clubhouse too.
Of course, you don't drag it out to the trade deadline. But if sparing a guy's ego while retaining the respect of your current players (and hopefully catching the eye of future players) only costs you a couple of extra weeks, it's probably an acceptable price to pay.

This

This is what I come down on too. Wilson has been bad in the field at 2B and atrocious at the plate. But if we cut every vet we ever sign who struggles for 6 weeks, we're gonna have a lot of trouble getting those roleplayer types to ever agree to come here.
So this is likely an attempt to find him a soft landing someplace. Maybe that's not possible, but we'll see. Same reason I expect us to go most of the year with Jack Cust. Well, the fact that he's our only other "qualified" MOTO hitter at the moment, scary as that is, also counts.
None of our roleplayers are correctly playing their roles, however. At some point - hopefully soon - we're going to have to start to minimize the damage that can be done to our team by those vets. It's already started with the increased L-Rod and Kennedy playing time, but how long do you run Chone out there every day? I'm hoping his playing time gets curtailed when Ackley gets here, as then Kennedy will need a different spot to play.
But Jack Wilson was supposed to be an 80 OPS+ hitter who could play great D. Same with Ryan. Chone's expectations were somewhat higher. Cust is supposed to hit 20 HRs and drive in 90+, and I dunno if he'll hit 5 or drive in 50.
If we want to be gentlemen toward Jack Wilson because he is hurting that his game has fallen off to this level and he did us a solid with his contract, I can understand that.
But we can't be gentlemen to everyone. We're in the business of winning, not the business of sucking - confusing as that might be to those of us who have watched the post-2003 Ms.
Ackley needs to come up in June, and then Wilson needs to go, soft landing or no.
~G