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Is actually a really interesting question.
Obviously Edgar was, and Griffey.  A-Rod gave it up with the way he left, so he doesn’t count.  Buhner was, to me, even though he came over from the Yankees.  Olerud was – even though he won a WS with Toronto.  Randy was, but so was Jamie.  Fassero wasn’t.
To me, Boone wasn’t.  He felt far more like a mercenary even though he DID come up with the Ms and then got traded, only to come back at the end.
Cameron was.  Winn wasn’t.  Cammy was here for 4 years, Winn for 3 (well, 2 and a half).  Why the difference?
One-year rentals aren’t gonna be Mariners, they’ll be mercenaries.  I absolutely agree there.
Fielder would be here for longer than he was with the Brewers (as a major leaguer).  Is that long enough to forego his prior uniform and “really” be a Mariner?
IMO, yeah.  And since about 20 of the other slots are gonna be home-grown or traded for with little pro experience, I don’t think fielding a free-agent mercenary team that doesn’t “feel” like the Mariners is gonna be a problem.
Guys with significant MLB history elsewhere: Olivo (though he was here early in his career), Ryan, League…can’t really say Vargas since he’s pitched twice as much here as he did somewhere else.  Sherrill started here as well, then did some trips around, but we can count him.  Figgins isn’t playing.
20ish of the 25 roster slots are currently manned by players with no significant time outside of this org at the Major League level.  This idea that the Ms are not home-growing a team (or would not if they looked outside the org for a couple of improvements) is, how can I say this…poppycock?  Mularkey?
League and Vargas are not likely to be here past this year, and Olivo might not be either. Figgins could be dumped to save a couple million in salary, and Sherrill is on a short-term deal.  We’re trying to replace Ryan with Franklin ASAP.
THERE ARE NO LONG-TERM OUTSIDERS ON THIS TEAM.
None.  Zero.  It’s a “Mariners” team through and through.  Adding Fielder wouldn’t make it a mercenary team.  If it took you 8 years to cheer for Maddux as an “actual” Brave, then I can see that you’ll probably never view Fielder as an “actual” Mariner.  But the bar to entry for me is about 4 years, in hindsight, so he’ll be well past that.  We’re not building the Marlins’ first WS team here, we’re looking for one or two adds to a massive majority of home-grown or pre-arb traded-for talent.
And as for requiring that to have a team worth rooting for?  The Pirates are 90% home-grown every year, and they 90% suck every year too.  The Royals can’t pay fans to come to the ball park to watch all their home-grown talent.
Ya gotta win too.  Having a pure soul means nothing if you’re terrible. 
For the record, I don’t think we’ll be terrible without Fielder.  He’s not taking us from 68 wins to 90 by himself.    We have a lot of good young talent on this team, which is another reason I don’t want to block it off with 3-year mercenaries who are barely-average.  Add long-term, “real” Mariners with immense talent to the core of home-grown Mariners and build a contender instead of an also-ran.
But mileage does vary on that plan.  Some people believe we’re not allowed to contend until 2018, others that we can only contend with farm system adds, and some that we’ll never contend now that the Angels and Rangers are outspending us.
I guess I don’t think we’re that far off the pace, so I can’t figure out why we wouldn’t add a monster and let the farm improvements carry us the rest of the way.  Different strokes and different assessments.
~G