Panic Room Lockdown
Holland tonight? ... brrrrr ....

.

DaddyO:  DiPoto constructed this roster according to his offseason plans. He can't jettison them less than two weeks into the season. But (chuckles) he can in May.

Dr. D:  If you want to /rant how bad the M's are, in the comments below, 'ave at it.  :- )  No hard feelings whatsoever.  But there are probably a few amigos here who wouldn't mind reading an optimistic take on the season.  For those few:

...

The M's were 0-for-16 with runners in scoring position against Oakland, 0-for-20 in their four losses before Monday.  I don't know what they were Tuesday, but it wasn't good.  Average with Runners In Scoring Position is a luck stat, period.

The M's have lost three one-run games; give us three, maybe four balls that fell in -- even the way Beltre's "double" did last night -- and the M's are 4-3.  And, per Pythagoras, they are .500 right now, 28 runs and 28 losses.

...

If this were football?, then 2-and-5 would be it for the season.  But consider the differences between football and baseball; the differences aren't limited to just the 162 vs 16 games factor.  Luck is much, MUCH more important in baseball.

.

Guest:  Time to emotionally check out and enjoy the game of baseball...my way of dealing anyway.

Dr. D:  Yeah, that's the great thing about just watching sports, instead of being on a team.  You just change the channel and erase the previous universe from existence for 20 hours.  I like 'net chess when I'm in that mood :- )

Moe Dawg put up a list of M's hitters against LHP's ... Seager 2-13, Cruz 2-13, Cano 3-17, etc etc etc.  The entire point is that Kyle Seager has a career's worth of work against LHP's, and it's not 2-for-13.

  • Seager vs LHP:  .250/.300/.410
  • Cano vs LHP:  .290/.340/.440
  • Cruz vs LHP:  .280/.370/.550

Yes, I'll grant you.  If we're done in September and Adam Lind has slugged .061 with 0 RBI in 500 at-bats, we're going to be bad in 2016.

.

MtGrizzly:  When do you sit Marte for a game (or two) and get Sardinas some time at SS?

Dr. D:  My personal opinion is that Marte looks just fine.  He's got an out-of-zone swing rate of only 12% and a swing-miss rate of only 8%.  It's one week in and he's a young player you're hot on.  Wayyyyyy too early to put pressure on him.

But if we're talking from a positive standpoint, that Sardinas could help the club, sure.  Would be intriguing to get him some AB's at SS, LF, certainly CF when we have a groundballer on the mound.

.

etowncoug:  This mariner team is pretty bad. Not a surprise given an offseason where the roster got worse on almost every move the GM made.

Dr. D:  My personal opinion -- reviewing the first week -- is that (1) the pitching looks playoff-caliber.  Up and down the staff.  And their team ERA is 115, with 71 K's against only 20 walks and 6 homers.

Lemme read that again:  their pitching STAFF has 10.4 K, 2.9 BB and 0.9 HR.  Against good-hitting teams.

...

(2) as to the offense

They have a team full of Latin players who look like their timing is slightly off in the cold Seattle air.  For example, Nelson Cruz is stiff and mechanical, jumping too early,  and yet he's still .296/.387/.630 through sheer technique.

I think their lineup has not yet hit on 8 cylinders, and that's baseball.  For sure the combination of "meh" hitting and terrible luck makes the whole experience maddening.

...

(3) as to the bad luck, including RISP

For all their problemos, including tough opponents that is! ... , a hit here and a hit there, and they'd be sitting on 3 or 4 or 5 wins.  The next week may bring another 2-5 record, or maybe a 5-2 record.  You really do have to play 50-60 games before things find their level.

...

LIFE PRESERVER OVER THE BOW:  the Rangers started last season 7 wins, 15 losses.  They were -9.5 back after one month's play.  As late as May 19, they were -7 under .500.  They won 88 and the division.

See you tomorrow morning for another Panic article,

Dr D

Comments

1

as last year.  And the year before.  And the year before that.

Nobody has continual bad lack like this.  Nobody.  Yeah, I know Felix is the unluckiest pitcher in history.  That most offensive players face-plant the moment they arrive in Seattle. 

All due respect Jeff (and you know there is that - we go back almost 20 years now), but I can't buy the luck thing anymore.  Close the roof - lock it shut, whatever, but this offense or lack thereof early in the season (seems to) kill us every year. 

The explanation can't be randomness.

Because it simply hasn't been random.

I hope their play will allow me to keep an interest in them longer than the time of the NFL draft this season as I had planned this year - but I'm not the optimist you are.  Please keep being that though because it is appreciated.

2

But the nation, not us, picked the M's to win it all last year.  I think the talent is undeniable.

....

You could say "Top-Down Malaise" but ... the administration is different this year, right?

....

By the logic "we're doomed" - which maybe we are :- ) - the 1999-2002 M's didn't win.  And the next 40 years' worth of losses are assured?  And the Royals before two years ago, could you have forgiven their fans thinking they would NEVER win?

I understand people thinking "I'll believe it when I see it."  The franchise has earned that attitude 10 times over.

3

Install heaters! Hand out handwarmers! 

Totally anecdotal (looking at the game results bars on Bref), but the M's haven't had a hot start since 2009.
Before that, it was 2003.

It appears to me that, aside from 2000~2003, the M's almost NEVER start hot at Safeco Field.

Heaters!

4

Here are the winning percentages with the roof open and closed.  As of the time of that press release, the W/L records were the same either way.  The Mariners undoubtedly released it in response to people asking them to close the roof, since as a franchise they HATE to close the roof.  (Other studies have confirmed that Safeco is the least-closed roof in baseball.)

The press release doesn't say anything about whether closing the roof would help you break out of an April hitting slump.  My own observation is that it is clearly easier to score runs with it closed in early season.

5

Of the dates of when the roof was closed. At least then, you can cross reference it with weather info and the like.

Matt? :)

Would also like to know if you could eke out numbers for, say, early season closed roof game with full house vs. early season closed roof game with empty house.

In terms of things like audio and WiFi, those factors would affect performance.
Would be interesting to see if that factors into baseballs (though minimal it should be, I imagine).

6

I've thought that Marte looks fine, too.   I shouted that Sardinas was likely to get the vL start tonight, and he is.  But to tell you the truth, I'm surprised it's at SS.  I would have bet it was in CF or LF (with Aoki moving to CF) 

7

Why would the roof impact the M's in a negative manner but not 15 years of other teams?

8

But my feeling is that the M's have had very incoherent offenses or low consistency/OBP teams.

As a result, the M's "break out" when things go well or they play in friendlier parks.

The teams were hardly built for Safeco for the most part.

Other teams seem to be more coherent, especially in the division recently, and those teams can 'travel'.

9

Since the club basically cannot fire this hitting coach, who takes the fall if the offense continues to falter? 

10

There comes a time for a Mariner’s fan

To accept the fact that the Mariner’s can

Make the life of that Mariner’s fan

A kind of a roll-er-coaster.

 

The offseason is up to the top of the ride

And soonafter begins that inevitable slide

Down to the earth the hot steel wheels glide

It’s kind of a roll-er-coaster

 

Now a quick turn we make and upward we go

Careening careering to where we don’t know

Knowing tomorrow we’ll soon start to slow

It’s kind of a roll-er-coaster

 

But we who are tempered to high-and-then-lows

By frequent travail as we travel these slows

Know something that practically nobody knows

It’s kind of a roll-er-coaster

 

So if you’re the sort of a bandwagon fan

You won’t want to ride on this haphazard van

Cause bandwagons don’t travel too well on this plan

It’s kind of a roll-er-coaster

 

Wheeeee!!!

 

11

Out-STAND-ing, Tuner!

The trouble with this roller coaster is that the downs last longer than the ups, and the ups don't go as high as the downs go down. This roller coaster never reaches the peaks.

Add comment

Filtered HTML

  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd><p><br>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

shout_filter

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.