The long stretch of road
At 19-21, the Mariners at least have Felix back. But this schedule is just crazy.
May 22-24, 3 games at Tampa Bay. Tampa Bay’s 18-25.
May 25-27, 3 games in Kansas City. KC is 17-28
So there’s some time against weaker teams, hopefully the M’s at least keep pace with the Angels ahead of
May 28-30, 3 games in Anaheim.
May 31-June 3, 4 at home v Texas.
June 4-6, 3 more at home v Baltimore
And then June 7th they get off before another road trip featuring another stuffed-in Cleveland makeup game.
That’s pretty brutal, and when it’s done, over a third of the season will be complete. If the team’s still five games behind the Angels and we haven’t seen improvement from – well, you know the list – slogging through those remaining games will seem almost as unappealing as these long stretches without any off days.
No, you bundle Vidro and Sexon and some AAA pitcher for a mid to high level young pitcher such as Zambrano. You bring Jones in and put him in left, put Ibañez at DH, and start a platoon of Broussard and Ibañez at first. You can bring in Wlad to DH on nights that you have Ibañez at first.
Personally, I think we should have dealt him in the offseason, when his value would have been higher, but I think you HAVE to trade him.
Where exactly were we going to come up with an HOF-caliber center fielder last offseason? (Yup, I said it: Ichiro’s in the middle of a HOF-caliber career.)
I suppose if your argument is we’d be better in 2007 and ESPECIALLY going forward with, say, Gary Matthews pulling down 55 million for the next 5 plus what we got for Ichiro…I’m not sure I’d agree. My guess is if you dump Ichiro in the 2006-2007 offseason, given that Bavasi ain’t Pat Gillick when it comes to making astute FA signings, you might as well blow up the team for 2007.
I don’t see why the M’s improve minus Ichiro. Griffey and RJ were different- they ASKED to leave. Unless Ichiro wants to, he stays. I’m fine with just the draft choice and $11 million in cash, especially since you can reasonably trade Guillen and use HIS cash in 2008 while playing one of Jones or Wlad, likely.
Vidro and Sexson’s contract make them almost impossible to trade.
atait, the agent is doing his job. He’d lose negotiating leverage if he didn’t make it clear that Ichiro could leave. As for Ichiro’s quote, I don’t see how you read that as leaning in any direction at all. “I’m not even sure myself what my feelings are” translates to a “very real possibility” that Ichiro will leave? (I assume you mean “strong possibility”; I think everyone agrees it’s a real possibility, it’s just the likelihood of it that we speculate about.)
101. My god, why would any team on earth give us anything of remote value for Vidro AND Sexson’s contracts?
No, you bundle Vidro and Sexon and some AAA pitcher for a mid to high level young pitcher such as Zambrano.
Funniest. Rosterbation. EVAR.
But hey, I hear the Twins need a DH and a LF. Maybe they would trade that Santana kid for Sexson and Vidro, and sinceSexson used to play the OF, it makes sense for them, right? 😀
Well, some common sense here…
If we win 95 games and make the playoffs (improbable as that seems now), I don’t think there’s any doubt that he’d stay. There won’t be a home town discount, but the Mariners would pony up and he’d stay.
If we lose 90-100 games, I don’t think there’s any doubt he’d leave. Even if the team came up with an ungodly amount of money, he’d test the free agent waters and find a good team at a good price (for him).
It’s the gray space in between that’s making things unclear; at some point Ichiro WILL draw a line and say that if the team’s below that level, I won’t stay. I just happen to think that bar is fairly high—a division championship or 90 wins.
Let’s trade Mike Hargrove to SF for Randy Winn.
No, you bundle Vidro and Sexon and some AAA pitcher for a mid to high level young pitcher such as Zambrano.
I just had to see this again.
I’d be OK with Randy Winn as manager. He couldn’t be worse.
The people who think 5-10% odds aren’t terrible are the people who make HARD bets at the craps table.
Those people are called suckers.
No, you bundle Vidro and Sexon and some AAA pitcher for a mid to high level young pitcher such as Zambrano.
Carlos or Victor? (ducks)
and then the whole nickname thing could start one more.
Insurance for what[?]
The team may decide that it would rather deal with filling only one opening in the outfield rather than two (it went so well when the team filled three openings in the rotation this last offseason). The return on Guillen is not going to be great (he’s certainly not going to bring back a major league ready RF prospect with left-handed sock). The team may ultimately decide that giving the GM (whoever it is) at least the option of bringing back Guillen on a reasonable, one-year deal is worth more than adding another Yorman Bazardo. I’m not saying that I would not trade Guillen for the right prospect, only that it is not a given that he will get traded.
The righthanded balance is a separate issue, and I think everyone here can recall Dave’s post on the subject from two days ago.
Carlos or Victor? (ducks)
Actually I think he was talking about Nancy
Where exactly were we going to come up with an HOF-caliber center fielder last offseason? (Yup, I said it: Ichiro’s in the middle of a HOF-caliber career.)
I suppose if your argument is we’d be better in 2007 and ESPECIALLY going forward with, say, Gary Matthews pulling down 55 million for the next 5 plus what we got for Ichiro…I’m not sure I’d agree. My guess is if you dump Ichiro in the 2006-2007 offseason, given that Bavasi ain’t Pat Gillick when it comes to making astute FA signings, you might as well blow up the team for 2007.
I don’t see why the M’s improve minus Ichiro. Griffey and RJ were different- they ASKED to leave. Unless Ichiro wants to, he stays. I’m fine with just the draft choice and $11 million in cash, especially since you can reasonably trade Guillen and use HIS cash in 2008 while playing one of Jones or Wlad, likely.
I didn’t say trading Ichiro would have made us better in 2007. It’s my belief that the risk of letting Ichiro walk for a draft choice and $11 million is too great to ignore. Ergo, the franchise will be better in 2008 and beyond with one or two very good young players (under team control for 4-5 years) AND the $11 million rather than just with the money and the draft pick. Would Ichiro be better than both options? Yes, probably, but I’m also taking into account the chance that he doesn’t come back.
And yes, I would have “blown up” the 2007 squad in the event that we dealt Ichiro – if you call trying to deal Sexson, keeping Soriano, Snelling, and Fruto, and letting Meche and Pineiro walk “blowing up” the team.
I don’t know how others feel, but if things go bad, I, and I speak as an M’s supporter, want them to go horrifically bad. If I have to support a bad team, I want to listen to radio postgame shows where the manager gets testy and says ridiculous things to defend his players. I want to see bizarre lineups and listen to equally bizarre rationalizations. Dan Bernstein, a Chicago radio guy, referred to this as “fun-bad.” If my team is going to be bad, please let them be “fun-bad.” The last month or two of the Melvin regime in ’04 was pretty close to “fun-bad.”
101: Thanks. I needed a good laugh.
117 – I just want Hargrove and Bavasi gone, and I want Ichiro dealt to the highest bidder.
If getting that means the M’s have to suck – so be it. Mediocrity may not be our friend.
Why would you have a platoon of Broussard and Ibanez at 1B?
Besides from the fact that that would be a horribly poor defensive platoon – they both hit from the left side!
Kazmir today?
Ah, nothing like watching a discussion of the Mariners contention hopes devolve into rosterbation and ‘Trade Ichiro?’ wank.
The Mariners aren’t trading Ichiro and there isn’t much that can be done to improve the roster as it stands.
Meanwhile, to get back on topic, let’s not forget that we didn’t think much of the M’s chances going into this season. A sensible fan would have known, even during the winning tear that got the team 2 games over .500, that the chances still weren’t too good, given that it’s a long season and the team constitution had some deep flaws, and that’s without injuries to key players or the slumps.
The Mariners aren’t trading Ichiro and there isn’t much that can be done to improve the roster as it stands.
Yup, though in a perfect world, we could use Broussard and Jones for some of the worse hitters and maybe get SOME pickup on the offense.
Pity that so much of the suck in our offense is under contract through 2008.
118 – Not as funny as what our current GM did this offseason, that’s for sure. And it would win more games. It would give us more range, more pop, and better starting staff. It’s a huge improvement.
124-
And it’s also impossible. Just because Bavasi gets taken to the woodshed by other GMs doesn’t mean he can do the same to them. No way in hell does Bavasi get Hendry to make that deal.
124: Sure. But trading WFB for the entire Yankees lineup would be a huge improvement, too.
#54, just how much worse than a 5.73 ERA from our starters will it take for you to admit this is in fact a BAD rotation? The AL average for SPs is 4.39, our guys are more than a run higher.
Its awful. Felix coming back helps, Washburn regressing evens it out..
124 –
I am trying not to believe it, but it sounds like you think people are laughing at your crazy trade proposal because they feel M’s would be giving up too much. That can’t be what you are thinking, is it?
The fact the M’s have been over .500 since the second day of the season, and remain within spitting distance of it, means they’re already outperforming my expectations going into the spring. So it’s all gravy at this point. If they can beat up on TB and KC — two of a very small handful of teams they should dominate — we can extend our delusions of competitiveness well into June. That’s so much better than the past two years of Hargrove/Bavasi that it may just get us more years of them; but here’s more optimisitc possibility: it will be just enough to stop Bavasi from doing anything drastic and stupid at the trade deadline, yet the team will still crater spectacularly enough in the second half to ensure a thorough housecleaning in the offseason. And the timing for that would be perfect, since there may be more good managers and GMs available than in past years.
Jones should be playing on the big club. Another 3 run HR today, with Pelekoudas there to see it (though I’m sure he was there to watch someone else; I kept hoping it was James Loney and that they’d figured a way to unload Sexson on somebody).
I concur this is a make or break kind of roadstand, but worse, 23 straight games in a row with no days off, well, you can screw over your pitching staff in a hurry with that. When you’re already scuffling, you’re either gonna step up or you’re gonna fall apart when you add the day after day after day stress on top of it.
23 straight games shouldn’t overstress the staff with a 12 man staff and Tacoma just down the road.
You haven’t been watching the Tacoma pitching lately. Maybe stress isn’t as much the word as, well, failure.
Tell you what: I’ll package my old, oil-leaking truck and my old, oil-leaking Honda and I’ll throw in a dirt bike, all for your clean, late-model, low-milage Porsche. It will give me more range, more pop, and make me more of chick magnet. It’s a huge improvement. You’ll do that deal, right? (Don’t forget, you get a dirt bike!)
With a name like joser, you’re already quite a chick magnet I see.