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June 28
Brad Miller parachutes into Seattle. He doesn't hit in this game, but he looks like he gets a couple of hits. Come to think of it, he did draw a walk, and steal a base, and drive in a run. One of your all time great debut 0-fers, man.
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July 19
The Mariners drop 3 homers, 2 doubles, 11 hits, and 10 runs on the Astros. In the 16 games since Miller arrived, they have:
- Scored 3+ runs in every game
- Homered in every game
- Been held to 3 runs only the twice
- Scored 95 runs, an average of 5.94 runs per game
- This coming against CIN, TEX, LAA, BOS and CHC
I think they're on a streak of 23, 24 games in a row with a home run, so I'm guessing they haven't been shut out in at least that long. Seems I read that the next-longest HR streak in baseball this year was 16 or 17 games. In other words, for a team to homer in 23-24 games straight, that's pretty unusual even if you're NOT the team that scores 513 runs per season.
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July 31
Possibly the Mariners don't need to trade the farm for a straw that stirs.
Justin Smoak and Dustin Ackley have needed approximately 1-2 election cycles to figure out baseball. Even Kyle Seager bounced. Michael Saunders is going to be over-the-hill before he has his prime, as Yogi would say.
But funny thing about Nick Franklin and Brad Miller and Mike Zunino. They belonged on the field during their first games. I mean, they stuck the landings like tournament darts in a quill board. The way they took over the #1 and #2 hitting slots? I'm still geekin' out about it.
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Smoak and Ackley, it made sense to speak in terms of a Straw That Stirs. But watching our DP combo, those guys, they don't give a Buffalo nickel who else is hitting in the lineup that day. They are interested in the pitcher's release point and that's all.
You get seven or eight guys like that, hitting up and down the lineup, hitting from the SS-2B positions, a full rack o' ribs out there, and you start to see where some teams don't need a Straw.
This one may not. Man. How many games with a homer? They going to get another couple on Saturday?
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Jemanji's Original Roto Law. Draft for position scarcity. Get you some bats at SS and 2B, and the entire game is as easy as a baby's smile. Which is what Eric Wedge's looks like these days. He's got the skin of a 5-year-old. So lucky.
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July 20
Kyle Seager enters the game with 24 doubles, 16 homers, and a .492 slugging percentage. (You remember that his swing percentage, and miss percentage, have gone way down and stayed down. His improvement is anchored in his strike zone gains.)
He racked up 3.6 WAR last season ... this year he's got 3.8 WAR, so far. I hadn't realized that he is #8 in WAR in the American League, had you? The next two players below him: Robison Cano and Dustin Pedroia, both of whom would score $150-200M contracts on the open market.
The kid is going to score MVP votes this season.
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