Game Fifty-Two Recap
Yay, 21-31.
Let’s just be honest – the M’s got a gift. Replays show that Josh Wilson was probably out, so if the ump gets the call right, we’re still playing, and the Twins have the top of their order coming up. On a night that Jim Joyce changed history with a bad call in Detroit, we just saw another reason why this game badly needs instant replay – the umpires are not good enough to do this without help.
Cliff Lee is just so, so good. I don’t know how much longer we’ll get to watch him pitch, so savor his starts.
Another bad night for the offense. Jack can talk about being “reasonably optimistic” about this roster all he wants, but the M’s now have an open roster spot, and they should use it on someone who can hit.
Lots of potential goats spared from withering criticism tonight. Rob Johnson with another backbreaking passed ball in the 9th inning, putting the go-ahead run in scoring position. Wak going with Eliezar Alfonzo as his pinch-hitter in the 10th, and not having RRS or Olson warming up to go after the LHBs due up in the top of the 11th, if it got there. The M’s nearly lost a game they should have won, but in the end, they’ll take the gift win.
I like that Ichiro fellow!
And a sad, warm goodbye to Ke Griffey Jr. – a great, great player till (near) the end.
Thanks for many, many memories Kenny!
After all the close losses all year, I’ll take the gift of a win. However, I just checked out Baker’s log of the game, and saw this gem of a quote:
I guess stuff like that is why his blog is no longer linked here?
Anyways, great win on an emotional night. Bradley said he always looked up to Griffey, I hope they remain in contact.
This team has seemingly been under a nasty voodoo curse all year. So Junior retires, everyone starts to feel good about him again, the sun comes out, angels sing, the curse is lifted, the Mariners finally get a break and win one.
Maybe it will all be better now.
That was Bob Condotta.
I’m not a big bunt guy, but not bunting with Kotchman up, no outs and runners at 1st and 2nd in the bottom of the 7th seemed really strange to me, too. I feel like the chances of a double-play are soooo high in that situation.
I’m just going to enjoy the win.
Unfortunately, Jack said during his stint in the booth during the game that they’d be bringing in another reliever.
Hopefully he has a change of heart, but we should know soon. He aid they’d announce something tonight if I recall.
Wow….League is now 5-5…..that is very telling
Great Win! Go M’s!
P.S. Ok, Jack, get us a bat!
Well, that was fun. Let’s make a good day into a great day and cut Johnson. The baseball gods will not let us win anything meaningful with him behind the plate – same problem we had with Jeremy Reed in CF a few years back.
Also need to find a replacement for Kotchman. A belief system is great, but at some point you have to produce. Kotchman is going on 7 years of very average to below average production at plate. That just doesn’t cut it for someone who plays 1B – we have to get above average hitting from that spot.
Z stated during the broadcast that they are looking at bringing up and arm to fill out the 25th spot in on the roster.
Its funny.. I didnt even notice that Geoff’s blog wasnt listed on this site anymore until someone mentioned it earlier in this thread.
Go M’s!
How much longer must we endure Casey Kotchman and Rob Johnson? Both are known commodities of suck by now, right?
It’d be positive to bring in a hitter, but the question is… who? Who in the org would be ready to contribute and would have a regular role on this team, i.e. wouldn’t end up sitting on the bench unused most of the week like Ryan Langerhans has?
Yeah, the win was a gift on a night of terrible hitting, but given some of the bad variance the team’s taken in the shorts, it’s a mulligan I can live with.
The M’s may have gotten a gift on the win by the call at second base but Cuddyer got a gift strike 4 to swing at when he hit his home run. Pitch right before that was strike 3 on the lower outside corner.
I still think Prince Fielder is the guy to go and get. The Brewers are no where near contention, and they wont be at any time during the season. Fielder is a FA at the end of the year… I believe. And while he’s off to a little slow start this year, he’s averaged 38 home runs, .280ish BA, 180ish hits per year, and around 10 or so errors, during the seasons he has played throughout and been given over 500 at bats. Massive upgrade for offense, decrease at first base defense, but I’ll take the offense. Try and get him NOW, and if it doesn’t end up working out, sell him and Lee and whoever near the deadline and rebuild the farm with some serious studs… because you should get them for both players. Just my opinion.
Joyce’s blown call in Detroit put an exclamation point on what has been the worst season of MLB officiating I’ve ever seen. Tonight’s gift to the Ms doesn’t begin to balance out the crappy calls they’ve been on the receiving end of for the past two months. Crappy balls-and-strikes calls on both sides of the plate, an absurd runner interference call against the Ms in regulation during Lee’s April debut – I’m not keen on instant replay, but I’m all for replacing them with robots.
Interesting point Darth,
I umpired for several years while I was in junior high and high school. I cant imagine replacing umpires with robots or an automated officiating system. I think there are better ways of managing umpires. I think replay will change the game but for the better. I’ve heard many people mention that it takes away a human part of the game, but I’d rather not get screwed out of a win than have a more human element to the game.
I read an interesting article on ESPN about Joyce by Curt Schilling, but how he spoke about the arrogant nature of some of the umpires. I think that is what needs to go in baseball. If you want to keep the human element, start remembering you are human and drop the “I’m perfect” jackass attitude we’ve been seeing all season.
The bigger problem than the ‘I’m perfect’ attitude that permeates so many of these umpires are these guys who want to be part of the story, part of the game. The guy who tossed Oswalt the other night is a perfect example. I’ve long said the best umpires are the ones you never even notice are there, and some of these egomaniacs just can’t deal with that.
I’m all in favor of the current home run system and then adding in the one call per side per game idea being floated around. Make the use of the replay a strategy as well as get these umps out of their ‘I’m perfect’ mindset knowing they can and will be overturned.
Did anybody else stay up to watch as FSN played last year’s season ending Mariners game? They’re in the middle of the ultimate hugfest as I type this…
Such an odd feeling to watch that team…and feel the positive vibes, the optimism, the expectation that THIS year, 2010, was going to be even better…
…and know that most of that team makes up most of THIS YEAR’S nightmarish mess of a team that is struggling to keep its dignity in the face of unmet expectations and repeated disappointment.
Weird to revisit our mindset at the time, where we were begging Junior for one more year…where the thought that we’d add Cliff Lee was improbable…and the idea that we’d add Cliff Lee and somehow perform much worse would have been unthinkable.
so who should the Ms ideally target to fill the open roster spot?
don’t overlook the outstanding hustle of Wilson on the play. Whether he was safe or not his effort forced the ump to make a close call and get us the win.
Rob Johnson drives me nuts. It’s like his mitt has ball repellent on it.
The common denominator for both umpire calls is that the receiver’s back was to us and we don’t seem to have video of the opposite side so we can see the ball hit the glove. In Joyce’s case there doesn’t appear to be a defense any way you can slice it, but on the Wilson play it could be possible Tolbert’s lob was a little slow into the glove and possibly looked a lot closer to the ump than it may have seemed to viewers watching the play from behind.
The ego debate is great, but I’d much rather be the guy who called the 27th out of a perfect game, than the guy who screwed a pitcher out of the rarest of rare feats in MLB (although it would have been the 3rd thrown this year).
I think part of the problem is age– pure and simple. We’ve had the same umpires through generations of players that have come and gone. Most of these guys earned their stay by the way they umped in the ’90s, not recently.
And in the same way Griffey had trouble letting go– I think some of the short tempers and quick triggers, and BAD calls, is more likely tied to an inability to deal with their dwindling competence as umps.
I say let’s try some younger umps before we get robots with instant replay capabilities.
And Gomez–
I agree. He looked out, but no camera angle offered a clear view of whether that scoop off the ground was clean, or if the ball was trapped and then picked up with the glove? If they used the “conclusive evidence” rule like the NFL, I don’t think there was a good enough angle that they could have changed that call (although it’s never clear cut, because there’s also a human angle to replay, as has been noted in the NFL system).
2.5. That’s Cliff Lee’s WAR. Oh man are we going to be getting something good in return.