Sportsline: Put a Hit on Boom-Boom
Larry Dobrow has an article up at Sportsline taking stock of the Mariners.
There’s a lot of advice to the M’s here, some good, some asinine, but it’s a well-written piece that gets off a few hilarious lines. Take suggestion five, for example:
5. Purchase a subscription to Soldier of Fortune and see if there’s a heavily armed go-getter willing to take care of Bloomquist once and for all. There’s no greater indictment of Bavasi, Mike Hargrove and the Seattle brainiacs than that they remain willing (as evidenced by the recently extended contract) to sacrifice 200 outs at the altar of Bloomquist and his ghastly bat. Short of the entire active roster oversleeping and missing the bus to the stadium, he shouldn’t be on the field. Ever.
If that isn’t enough to justify a leisurely Sunday read, well, it’s a good thing it’ll be Monday here in Japan in four short hours.
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Something tells me that hopeful fans going to games in 2007 will be Getting Lit for Littleâ„¢ to ease their pain more than they did the last few years…
I’m terrified of the upcoming commercial campaign. And I’ll have to watch the games on mute. I can’t deal with the blind positivity of the broadcast team anymore…
I dunno….WFB kinda looks like Jason Borne’s distant cousin… I’d be careful
Slightly OT but [deleted, ot]
In these bleak days of December, even status-quo Mariner baseball looks good from here. I wonder if I’ll be able to hold on to that Seasonal Affective Disorder December feeling at the end of April, when the M’s are staking their claim as cellar dwellers.
That’s a great commentary on Bloomquist. What struck me most was his closing thought
And this kills me because I feel that way as I watched them last year. I’d like to see the Mariners win of course. But if winning convinces ownership that Bavasi and Hargrove should keep their jobs or that Ramirez, Bloomquist and other are useful pieces of a winning team, than winning in 2007 is a HUGE long-term negative.
FWIW, Opening Day used to sell out early but I think last year there were tickets available until the day before. If you get on-line the day Mariners tickets go on sale, you’ll score tickets for sure. Fenway is tougher; it depends what you want to pay for them.
I liked the article and it did make me laugh.
I go to Safeco pretty regularly and I am often bored stiff during the games.
I don’t think there is any doubt that we are fans of one of the worst teams in mlb and certainly one of the most boring.
At least our section will be empty this year, at least until the Red Sox fans fly in from Boston. Worst fans in baseball.
Why couldn’t Bavasi throw Bloomquist in with Soriano? Then, the animus in the “regular” fanbase would have been aimed at dumping Willie Boom Boom, and it would have balanced out the trade pretty nicely.
Thankfully he didn’t because as soon as Atlanta DFA’d him (within minutes of the trade being completed), Bavasi would be trading our prospects to get him back before he was released to free agency
I’m busily juggling the letters in “Larry Dobrow” to see if I can spell “Derek Zumsteg” or “David Cameron”, for surelu it is but a pen name for one of our dynamic duo. Sorry, guys, the Bloomquist hate paragraph gave it away.
speaking of fine sports writing, anyone have ESPN Insider status? I’d love to know just how “Sure, the Royals overspent for Gil Meche. But it was worth the investment, Buster Olney explains.”
ohmigod! Ken Rosenthal weighs in too, over at Fox! “At first glance, it would seem almost impossible to defend the Royals’ decision to hand $55 million to Gil Meche. But Ken Rosenthal says there may actually be more of a method to the madness than you’d think. Full Story … “
I know that that article was supposed to be funny…
But now, I’m just more depressed.
msb, my first thought when I read the Rosenthal article was that his premise was sound, but to compare the Mets overspending to get Pedro to the current plight of the Royals with Meche was pretty hard to digest.
If you read Dobrow’s article and get to the asinine parts (MUST SIGN ZITO!!!!!), you quickly realize this writer doesn’t read USSM after all.
Still, good stuff. Especially from a national pundit.
Given that we already have a banner endorsing a GM change for 2008 before the current GM has finished building his roster for 2007, I’m guessing there is no shortage of people here cheering for failure.
Who is Larry Dobrow? He hits the mark while be smart and funny . . . on a national site. Very rare and nice to see.
The most frustrating thing about this is it seems inevitable that there’s going to be a major housecleaning – the problem is that it could have/should have been done two months ago. Instead we’re left to enter this season once again torn between rooting for our team to win and hoping that things get bad enough, quickly enough so there’s still time to right the ship.
Feels like Groundhog Day – Mariners style. Maybe that’s what the new ad campaign should be. Shot of an alarm clock going off playing Sonny & Cher “I Got You Babe.” Then cut to Willie Bloomquist weakly grounding out to second, but hustling up to first base as he’s thrown out by a mile. He then jogs back to the dugout, as the crowd cheers his grit and hustle, Hargrove gives him a pat on the but and he goes and sits down next to Snelling who’s been a permanent fixture on the bench.
#16– Dobrow; he seems to do a lot of media & magazine critiqueing…
#17 – RE: Dobrow – gets to write about baseball and TV for Maxim and Stuff. I want to be him.
Now I’m gonna beat a dead horse but since the article talked about the dead horse….
Instead of trading Soriano for ehhhhhh…..
Why didn’t Bavasi call up Gillick and offer Soriano for say, some guy, like, um, whats his name, hmmmmmm, I know, don’t tell me, oh ya… Lieber?
You might be mistaking an assessment of Bavasi’s tenure for feelings as a fan. I’ll be thrilled if we raise a pennant in 2008,regardless of who is GM. And then there’s this: everyone raise your hands who predicted the 2002, 2003 and 2005 champions based on offseason moves.
#10: The crux of the Onley insider article is that the Royals are at least giving it a shot, and the Meche contract is as much about showing the other FA’s (and their own talent)out there that KC can be competetive when it comes to offering market contracts to players.
“…But they can’t win if they don’t try, and mostly over the last two decades, they haven’t tried, haven’t spent the kind of money they needed to spend to give themselves a chance. They’ve got the money now, in this lucrative era for baseball, and the Royals’ options are to spend it or keep it. Kansas City has chosen to spend its money. The Royals have chosen to try.
Gil Meche, $55 million? A little crazy. OK, maybe more than a little crazy.
But at least they’re not consigning themselves to a future of failure. They’re taking a shot, and it’s hard to fault them for doing that.”
The Royals have tried… by giving a large percentage of their budget to Meche in each of the next 5 years.
Come June, the Royals will be looking to unload Meche’s contract on somebody else, and they’ll have to trade away a very good prospect to do it.
Kinda stretches the limits of the meaning of the word try. I thought the logic of recklessly throwing money at a problem went out with the Herk Robinson regime.
Maybe this will be the season when:
(1) the Mariners way outperform their expected wins as Guillen hits 47 home runs and Reed hits 50 as that odd-looking uppercut swing finally starts to work,
(2) Hargrove is hailed as the next Joe Torre,
(3) Steinbrenner sees the articles, fires Joe Torre, and hires Hargrove,
(4) Hargrove perceives the need for a scrappy backup infielder and convinces the Yankee front office to trade for Bloomquist “at whatever cost”, and
(5) Rick Rizzs gets the Assistant GM with the Athletics because Beane is impressed by Rizzs’s profound understanding of the game.
Well written piece. I agree wholeheartedly.
Derek and I talked briefly last night when he was in for dinner (and Anchor Steam) and I’m of the opinion now that they shouldn’t sign ANY pitchers to any kind of long-term, big money deal. Unless the sky opens up and drops Barry Zito on us, I say go with young guys, stop throwing money at deadbeats just because you have it, and be patient.
Sound crazy? Here’s what I’m thinking:
If we don’t upgrade the rotation significantly, we won’t win enough to save Grover and Bavasi’s jobs. They’ll both be gone by midseason, and perhaps some of our bloated contracts will be moved as well. We hire a GM/Manager team commited to building around the young, valuable pieces we already have in place, and we SIGN Matsuzaka next season when he’s a free agent because right now it looks like he is not going to get a deal done with the Red Sox before the deadline. Then we take a shot at a pitcher or two in next year’s FA class, which looks like it might be fairly significant.
Am I dreaming?
Maybe I’m just pissed because Deion Branch couldn’t reach out for ONE MORE FOOT!!!!!!!!!!!
Matsuzaka won’t be a free agent next year. He has to be posted again if that’s what he wants after the 2007 season. He is a free agent after the 2008 season. At least that’s what the CW repeated ad nauseum on Red Sox and Yankee message boards says…
…and obviously the reason Yankee fans are interested is because they also think the deal with the Red Sox will fall through and Matsuzaka will try again, hoping the Yankees are the bid winners… 🙂
Is the deal with Matsuzaka really going to fall through? Yankees fans must be rubbing their hands in glee at the thought.
Will we take Meche back from the Royals if he comes with Alex Gordon?
I’m just pondering what will make me sicker, today’s Seahawks game or if we flush 8 mill down the toliet for Batista?
So they fire Bald Bill and Grover before June of ’07. We all run around our cubicles and do the hokey pokey. Then we sit down in abject horror as their replacements are named.
After Pat Gillick, Bill Bavasi, Bob Melvin and Mike Hargrove, which is four backward Ks, its true madness to suspect an improvement would occur. It could get worse.
#30: Excellent point. While I would hope for the best, it is wise to remember that those responsible for hiring and installing Bill Bavasi and Mike Hargrove are apparently not in danger of losing their jobs. Which means that should things fall correctly and both Bavasi and Hargrove get what’s coming to them, their successors will be chosen by people who once thought that these two were the best candidates for the jobs. Yeesh.
30 – Totally agree. The problem is Howard and Chuck.
I’m gonna throw this out there: What’s up with Joe Girardi? From Manager of the Year to Yankee broadcaster??? I know he got into it with the Marlins owner during the year, was fired in the off season… Lost out to Sweet Lou on the Cubs job… And then withdrew his name from the Nationals list…
Is he just waiting for Torre’s job?
I don’t know… At this point I like the sound of: New Seattle Mariner Manager Joe Girardi.
Speaking of Sweet Lou, if anyone is looking to get a tatoo, I recommend this picture of him on Wikipedia: LINK.
I guess you could Photoshop in an M’s hat… But that look is priceless. 😀
New Seattle Mariner Manager Joe Girardi.
Yeah, that has crossed my mind too — here’s a guy who seems to enjoy working with young players and gets the most out of them; what could he do with a real payroll? I suggested this back at the end of the season when it was already obvious that he was losing his job and we all still thought Hargrove was as well. I was immediately shot down with “he’s going to Chicago” and there was no further discussion (and then, of course, Hargrove inexplicably kept his job). It’s possible Giardi is angling / being positioned to be in the post-Torre sweepstakes (broadcasting for the Yankees is a heck of a way to introduce yourself to the fans), but I also wonder if he’s hoping for a White Sox meltdown (or for Guillen to just piss off the wrong people once too often) to get back to Chicago.
Still, he should be available and the M’s spot damn well better be open.