Game 98, Red Sox at Mariners
Dave · July 24, 2010 at 3:00 pm · Filed Under Mariners
Lester vs Pauley, 6:10 pm.
I think I took Amy whitewater rafting today. I think we had fun. I think the Mariners lost last night. I hope I’m only wrong about the last of those things.
Comments
92 Responses to “Game 98, Red Sox at Mariners”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
The game is at 7:10.
At what time do we score our run tonight?
I think we are assuming a little much, assuming we will score a run tonight. (Laughs to suppress tears about this being true)
No kidding — especially with Lester on the mound.
I’ll be curious to see the line-up… anyone know when Jack Z was meeting w/ Wak and w/ Figgy?
With Lester on the mound, all you can do is think one hit at a time, and hope the ump has small strike zone. But if hitters chase Lester out of the zone, the strike zone won’t matter, and it will be ugly. Lester is hittable if you make him throw the ball over the plate.
Pauley vs Lester is not a very promising matchup.
Ortiz and Drew don’t hit LHP’ers very well, but crush soft tossing RHP’ers. Youkilis and Beltre are hot. I would be surprised if this is ends up a close game, but baseball is a funny game that way.
Lineups for the day
Ichiro – 9
Figgins – 4
Guti – 8
Lopez – 5
Smoak – 3
Bradley – DH
Bard – 2
Ja. Wilson – 6
Saunders – 7
Pauley – 1
I’m surprised figgy is in the line-up
http://twitpic.com/28cmko
Nice job, Kreskin. I can’t imagine how you guessed that in advance, but that’s why we look up to you.
Whitewater rafting sounds like a wonderful way to build team unity and trust! The M’s should look into that as well as other outdoor activities like grizzly bear hunting.
Not at all surprised if Figgins is in the lineup. I sincerely doubt that Figgins was dogging it, even though it sort of looked that way. Wakamatsu and Figgins would have talked it out and Figgins would be back in the lineup tonight.
I would think the situation would be much worse if Figgins was not in the lineup.
Figgins batting 2nd.
Lopez batting 4th.
Saunders batting 9th.
Cue David Byrne and the Talking Heads, “Same as it ever was…”
Josh Lueke could be our closer in 2011? Or Beavan a starting pitcher?
In terms of lineup flexibility, Wakamatsu is making McLaren look like Casey Stengel or Tony LaRussa.
That almost sounds like one of my snarky analogies.
I really would like to see Figgins then Ichrio in the order. What can possibly go wrong? Ichiro isn’t exactly tearing it up like he usually does either. Lets shake things up. That’s what you’re supposed to do with a linup when the linup is worse than 16 teams that have pitchers hitting…
I liked the old trick which Lou tried that one time some years back…during the pre-game interview segment, he had Niehaus pick a random name out of his hat to see who would lead off that night…
It wound up being Russ Davis — and, unfortunately, the losing streak continued unabated.
In tonight’s interview segment, Niehaus mentioned to Wak that “I hope this is a fulcrum in the season…toward something more positive.”
Unfortunately, rather than a fulcrum, I think it might just be a crumb instead.
Jon Lester against Jane Pauley. This should end well!
Dave will likely score more this weekend than the Ms will.
…and I mean Dave Niehaus.
Quote from Wak about last night:
“There’s a lot of guys in this clubhouse and coaches that, we want to win every ballgame we’re in,” Wakamatsu said. “There’s a lot of emotions that fly and, again, we’re right there with the fans on every game. But we’re playing some pretty good baseball.”
Pretty good baseball?? What are you smoking, Wak?! Is he THAT delusional???
Based on that information, I think we can reasonably assess that either: (1) Wak has been buying some funky herbs lately, or (2) he is certifiably insane.
It may not be a fulcrum, but we could at least hope it represents the nadir.
What? Ichiro has a .314 average, which may be a little low for him but is actually higher than the average he finished with in three of his nine previous seasons (.312 in ’03, .303 in ’05, and .310 in ’08). He has 125 hits in 437 PA which puts him on pace for 210 hits, which again is low for him but still higher than his totals in ’02 (208) or ’05 (206). And it’s also still higher than the number of hits recorded by all but a handful of players in any given year. He may be having a down year by his lofty standards, but I hardly think he’s having the kind of season that demands messing around with his spot in the batting order.
Which is not to say it might not hurt to change the batting order for some of the players who definitely are having problems, like Figgins and Lopez.
Lester isn’t so tough. Sure he’s got an ERA of 2.81; but that’s all luck – his xFIP is way up there at 3.39… um…
Okay we’re screwed.
Haha…
Oh, Figgins.
Hey, Adrian.
And thats the ball game…
Hey Dave and Mike – ask Wilson if he thinks RoJo is a good catcher…
(yeah like THAT’S going to happen)
Figgy! Way to back up that play!
Looks like Lester might shut down this offensive juggernaut. Oh wait….. you mean this is a typical Mariner outing? But ….. nevermind.
this is the most depressing game I’ve ever seen…
Give ‘em time, Iaio, give ‘em time.
Anyone think that a Mariner will break 20 hr’s this year?
The only time we’ll be seeing is Lester going 9 tonight…
Remember that scene toward the end of Platoon, in which the soldier who survives that last major battle stabs himself so that he can be sent home and avoid the rest of the war? Were I a Seattle Mariner I’d be thinking of a creative way to injure myself during a game. Nothing too bad, just enough to avoid this abject failure.
How many nights in a row can the Mariners be threatened to be no-hit? This offense is historically bad.
Awright. I predict a perfect game through 8 and M’s win it in the 9th!
M’s have an OPS+ of 77. The last AL team to have a lower OPS+ was the 68 White Sox at 76 (excluding strike shortened season of 1981 where they only played 60 games and TOR had a 74 OPS+).
I had no idea it was this bad, historically speaking that is.
I think its time to change the dimensions of Safeco…
Can you jinx an opposing pitcher?
Let’s try it out.
Hey look, Lester is pitching a perfect game.
Oh, wow.
No way! Hopefully he keeps it up
Never underestimate the Mariners’ ability to underwhelm.
Somehow this is all Jose Vidro’s fault.
holy fuck, no way a perfect game bid ends on that!
It worked! I jinxed him.
Hey, we got a baserunner! Thanks, Patterson.
Condor!!!
Saunders!
Liddi: six home runs in his last six games. Lovin it.
SAUNDERS!!!!!
Condor!!!!!
I love saunders!! I just turned the game on to see Patterson “clank” that play. Then Saunders hits a bomb!
Willmore2000, you are a genius.
SAUND-ers!!!!
Plus, against a good lefty!
The Mariners owe Willmore2000 season tickets…not that anyone would want to watch the Mariners on a consistent basis
The M’s team hitting streak remains alive.
Got a hit in every game since 5-15-1996.
Have never failed to get atleast one base runner.
Actually had a good number of baserunners off of Gooden when he no-hit them.
Hey for free season tickets I will prognosticate daily, unlike that lazy fucking groundhog punxsatawney phil.
Carlos Pena and Michael Saunders the only lefties to homer off Lester this year
From your mouth to Chuck’s ears.
Funny how the same people who downplay Michael Saunders are the same people who never let up harping about the obvious lack of power the Mariners have.
Saunders now has eight jacks which is the same amount that Jack Cust has after he hit two today in about the same amount of At-Bats.
And unlike the broken down aging power hitters who we didn’t sign in the off-season, Saunders has a future.
It’s good to see the young guy coming around, especially given what appeared to be a lack of a belief system regarding him earlier in the year (I realize that may not be fair, and there were other things going on with Griffey and Bradley). I know he wasn’t a Z acquisition, and I realize he’s not tearing it up offensively at the level of, say, Jason Heyward – but I’m glad his bat appears to be adjusting to major league pitching. I hope he has a long, successful Mariners career ahead of him.
Bradley triple. That was awesome.
Actually the real lack of belief system wrt Saunders was among the fans. During the early part of the season I got tired of pointing out that they had no basis to conclude he was “unable to hit major league pitching” (and various other shibboleths) based on 120 PA.
Spectacular job getting that bunt down.
I was a little worried, at the end of the triple where he was laying on top of third base, that he had passed away.
Someone mentioned the 68 White Sox.
They had one quality hitter…Pete Ward…but one young guy no one thought much about, Bill Melton.
He turned into the Sox best power threat until a slipped disc essentially ended his career. But that’s the kind of breakthrough we need next year from Saunders or Smoak–or how about both of them?
You know, if Chone Figgins really cared and wanted to put in some effort, he could have made it to third with Ichiro there.
Here’s a fun one to increase your misery: who currently sports a .338 / .386 / .636 (1.022 OPS, .438 wOBA) line? And is batting .371 vs RHP?
Michael Morse
Ok, the rest of the story: that’s through 83 PA in 38 games, total, so far this year (including a spectacular last 7 days). He’s a sub/pinch hitter for Riggleman in Washington, and those numbers aren’t sustainable as a full-time hitter (not to mention the fielding issues).
But still, that’s a great bench bat.
Sweet its “Leave em Loaded Lopez”
Don’t
Fail
Again
Lopez
I freely admit this is totally subjective (and not original thinking either) – but Smoak and that swing of his sure look like good candidates for that.
Nice RBI Lopez!
Smoak should take two strikes.
GOSH DANGIT! WANTED THAT FOR SMOAK!
There, fixed that for you.
That’ll work
Nothing against Olson, seriously – but I hate the mentality where Aardsma isn’t brought in cuz the extra run means it’s not a save situation. At some point some smart team is going to move past that sort of thinking.
Jack Wilson will not be riding his bicycle home in disgust tonight.
Baseball can humble us all. I never would have thought this game could end up the way it did.
I wish Lopez would get beaned a lot more with the bases loaded. It’s good on two levels because 1. Lopez is in pain and 2.M’s get a run.
Why is Olson even considered a bullpen arm? ’cause he’s not good enough to be a starter?
He’s just not what I want to see right now.
Nice clutch pitching by Olson (despite the Loafie error).
And good call by Wak.
Also good call on the the squeeze bunt.
Nice execution today in general.
Was the Bradley run + Wilson bunt a suicide squeeze? It looked to me like Bradley was probably running with the pitch, but the camera angle wasn’t great.
Yes, it was. Bradley was moving quickly towards home before Jack Wilson laid down the bunt.
Let’s hope Eric Byrnes sees it over and over in his dreams…
Apparently the M’s had a nice game tonight. We went to see the real team in the Northwest, and I have seen the future and it is Dustin Ackley. He had a solid single to left, and made a wonderful play at second ranging deep to his left. He made another good play charging on a slow bouncer where he didn’t get the guy (and neither would Ryne Sandberg), but he looked entirely comfortable in the field, at the plate and on the basepaths.
Sean White, on the other hand, was not a highlight. His line won’t look that bad, but that is no reflection on how badly he pitched. Andy Baldwin got a lot of swinging strikes, the whole team showed some power, Halman got called out stealing on an atrocious call. The sun was shining and then the moon was shining.
And some poor soul offered $525 for Mike Sweeney’s purple Rainiers jersey. I’m thinking it was Mike Sweeney or someone related to him. Sweeney, btw, looked just like Sweeney; he never saw a pitch he couldn’t offer at.
5 runs on 4 hits.
Dave, what’s your call on what to do about figgins? Obviously he is still holding a grudge over the Griffey incident and now reports he is somewhat of a cancer on the club! Will you be addressing this issue as well as the Wak situation? Thanks!
Against Lester, I’ll take it.
The real problem is we don’t seem capable of getting more hits than that even against scrub pitchers.
Dave is on vacation, see the blog posts.
I’m confused by your statement that Figgins reports he is somewhat of a cancer on the club.
I think he meant, there are reports that he is a cancer on the club.
We’ve all seen that Figgy – like many ballplayers – can be rather immature emotionally; but if we’re going to start calling him a “clubhouse cancer”, some actual evidence should be offered.
Searching for the words “Figgins” and “Cancer” doesn’t turn up much except for reader comments on blog posts, which is pretty much worthless. I could type “Gutierrez is a clubhouse cancer” on a few forums and accomplish the same thing.