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1. The team agrees with you. I think the team (Z) sees Raul as a mistake. Steven Romero started out playing Third Base after the team said they'd give him a permanent position, but after Kyle Seated decided to be awesome and the Outfield started falling apart, Romero started playing Left. As a right handed hitter, he's not a great replacement for a leftie, but there have been a lot of reports about the speed of his bat, and his rock hard work ethic, so I think he could make it work, and unlike Raul, he could cover at First, Second, or Third reasonably well.
2. The Mariners flat don't believe in Eric Thames ability to learn and adjust. Carlos Peguero got the call, and when he did, Eric Wedge talked about him as not just the more powerful hitter, but also the better fielder. Anybody that's considered a worse fielder when the club is running out Raul Ibanez and Carlos Peguero is a DH/PH. I imagine Thames as a filler piece in a future trade, especially considering again that Romero is getting his turn, in the Mariner Minor Leaguer hazing tradition, learning to play the outfield late in his career.
3. Nick Franklin is on his way up any day. His .410/.538/.623 line where he has twice as many walks as strike outs is impossible to ignore. The fact that his last 10 games split shows him improving to a .500/.643/.853 line that includes 13 walks to only 4 strikeouts is beyond impossible to ignore. It's inconceivable. Regardless of what happens with Ibanez, Franklin has to be up to replace Andino this week. The starting job at SS is wide open, and while I'm sure the club is probably tentative to reward Franklin so soon after his unadvised weight gain, they aren't going to leave him in a 3 way competition to play short stop in AAA when they could very much use him in the MLB.