Do the M's need to go get a bat?
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"In theory, theory and practice are the same. In practice, they are not." - Dr. D's Epic File Folder of Thunderous Paradoxes, mostly plagiarized from obscure chess books
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GLS sez, "Two hitters are better than one ...
"... And three great hitters are better than two.
"In the latter half of the 90's, we had Griffey, A-Rod, and Edgar in the same lineup and yes, there were some good teams, but not what you would call great. Not great like the Tigers are this year. But we had a legit murderer's row, and not-great pitching.
"And for these Tigers, it isn't just about those two hitters. Note that they have Ian Kinsler batting leadoff and having a pretty darn good year, and Rajai Davis batting ninth as a second leadoff man. Davis would be leading off on most other teams instead of batting ninth. Then there's that starting rotation, which is just flat-out solid. My point is that, as a team, the Tigers are doing well because they're strong in multiple dimensions of the game.
"The Mariners are basically the opposite of the Tigers. I don't see the problem as the lack of that second big bat behind Cano. The problem is that they're young and as team, they don't have any areas of strength like the Tigers do. As a team, they aren't really awesome at anything.
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"There was the hope that Paxton and Walker would do that for the starting rotation and maybe that's what we'll see in the second half of the season that we can point to going into 2015.
"Now, if the Mariners did go out and get that second really good hitter, you could point to that as an area of strength. Nothing wrong with that. But there are a lot of areas where they can improve which will help them win games. And they are doing that I think. This team is better than last year's team, and in Miller, Franklin, Romero, and Zunino, we have three rookies or near-rookies that probably aren't the players now that they will be two years from now, or so we hope. But then, that's where talent evaluation comes in, especially with your own players.
Okay, I think I said what I needed to say."
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From a sabermetric standpoint, I couldn't agree more amigo.
Theoretically you can certainly build a pennant-winner off of one Straw That Stirs. That is our model in Tampa Bay, where they put Evan Longoria into the middle of the lineup and don't spend much $$$dinero except for him.
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Are the Tigers about two hitters? Hm ... let's save that debate. Certainly with the Cabrera-Prince-Verlander tripod -- evolving into the 2014 edition, with three #1 starting pitchers -- they are massively Stars & Scrubs oriented. That means, the Detroit Tigers believe that great players decide big games.
Bob Dutton had the right take this morning: Friday night's 10-pitch HR by Victor Martinez was just a great, great AB.
But the question stands: Which Mariner gives you that at-bat? Maybe Seager does, when he's at the top of his game.
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The opposite of "theoretically" is "in practice; in the real world." Business looks one way in the college classroom, and another way on the street.
It looked to me like the Mariners did not have enough "chest" for that staredown between Verlander and Iwakuma. It looked like the Tigers had a slight smile on their lips the whole time. Victor Martinez' at-bat looked like one of Edgar's, and you just had a feeling after the game that we didn't belong on the field with them.
It is to that issue, that ---> the import of a "Cano playing partner" would speak. The M's lineup lacks real swagger The M's lineup lacks any swagger whatsoever.
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Very true that the 2014 Mariners have had several "sucking chest wounds" to fix -- #5 SP, SS, etc. And it supposed to be easy to get better when you're just trying to upgrade from a 50 OPS+ to a 90 OPS+. Great point :- )
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Love your idea GLS that if you want to win, there needs to be Something You Do Good. If the Mariners want to make that "the starting rotation," great - you can still win like the 1970's Dodgers did, as Billy Beane is proving.
Problem is, the Detroit Tigers HAVE the rotation we seek -- they have three Cy Young aces, plus Rick Porcello and Drew Smyly (!), AND they have Miguel Cabrera (!), Victor Martinez, with Ian Kinsler making $16M this year, etc.
But the Mariners could not care less about Detroit's excellence. Their corporate philosophy is --- > very definitely that --- > it is NOT their job to compare themselves to Detroit in any way. It's just their job to win more than they lose.