Game 26, Mariners at Rays
Dave · May 2, 2012 at 2:50 pm · Filed Under Mariners
Beavan vs Shields, 7:10 pm.
For the first time this season, Jesus Montero is catching back to back games. Eric Wedge said in his pregame talk that John Jaso will be behind the plate tomorrow. Also, Alex Liddi is getting the line-up spot vacated by Olivo tonight, and Mike Carp is getting another day on the bench. Like Jaso, he’ll probably be in the line-up tomorrow. Also notable is Justin Smoak moving down to seventh in the order. Not sure that’s going to teach him how to hit an off-speed pitch, but he’s earned a demotion, so might as well try it.
Figgins, LF
Ackley, 2B
Ichiro, RF
Montero, C
Seager, 3B
Liddi, 1B
Smoak, DH
Saunders, CF
Ryan, SS
I think Ryan has earned a demotion too….bat boy maybe? Good thing his defense is still there….
“Big Game Shields” (as Dave Henderson likes to say) is probably going to mow through this lineup like hot butter through a knife.
Yes, you heard me correctly.
I will watch it, regardless.
Why is Saunders STILL batting 8th? He should be batting where Seager currently is.
@Ichiroll
I think Wedge is big on the mental aspect that comes with each lineup spot. Much like avoiding moving Smoak into the cleanup spot last year, he doesn’t want to move Saunders into a spot that will cause him to press or try to hard to hit home runs. If he keeps it up I’m almost certain we’ll see him move up soon, but I think for now, he wants him to relax and keep doing what he’s been doing.
“Why is Saunders still batting 8th”
Wedge may have resorted to drawing names out of a hat to fill out the lineup card?
No real reason for your highest OPS and highest wOBA guy to hit 8th, although it is still too early to reliably count on those stats to mean much; but yeah … what you said.
Marcus, at some point you have to look at the last couple of series, and notice that the majority of this offense has been coming from Saunders. Something has to change, and right now the middle of the lineup has been pretty dreadful.. Having him within arms reach of Ichiro, and Montero should be obvious at this point. I think we’re beyond the point of worrying about some of these young guys pressing too much.
Oh I completely agree! I’m not saying it’s the right move by any means. I just think that’s why it’s happening. I would love for Saunders to move up and Smoak to stay right about seventh or so, I’m just speculating on the reason our manager is putting this lineup out there.
Dave,
Are you aware of the recent USSMariner twitter account’s recent activity?
USSMariner twitter recent awesomeness
Ahh, understood, Marcus! Wedge blows my mind with his inability to move beyond his on standards. I hate him so hard.
What would you guys say to giving Seager a week or so run at short? I’ve been one of the biggest Ryan defenders but we’re not scoring enough runs to keep a .130 hitter in the lineup every single day and I’d like to see Seager get a shot. I know he probably doesn’t project there long term and perhaps it’s a horrible experiment, but I’d like to at least give it a quick shot and see what happens.
Despite Ryan’s awful offense, he’s still a 0.4WAR, compared to Kyle Seagers 0.6 — Surely Seager would drop off quite a bit with that move.
Dave, I am sorry to have engaged whomever was running the twitter account @ussmariner last night –but really though, I do think you or another contributor should explain what is going on. I do not see how you can defend the content of the last couple days.
Jack, I would assume by the tone of the posts that the account has been compromised.
I can’t stand to have a leadoff hitter that strikes out 1/4 of his plate appearances. This is ridiculous. They rave about how he sees a lot of pitches and works the pitchers, he still gets the outs that are the most harmful to a team. No good comes from Ks and he just keeps racking them up.
Time for Wedge to put his money where his mouth is and start really docking his playing time.
I think Derick is just blowing off steam with the USSMariner Twitter account. I believe Dave’s always used his own account, not the USSM one.
In any case, I doubt it’s been compromised.
I know two things: I am a grown man and I will never “tweet”. Whatever in the hell it is, I care not. I do like advanced stats, though. Twitter appears to mostly be a loaded gun for those who gravitate toward narrating their entire life. A lot of people like it, so se la vi .., but the tweeting world is somehow going to have to find a way to survive without me. Of this fact, I am mostly proud and yes – agreeably archaic by choice.
Seager – yes!
Seager!!!
Seager can stay, haha.
This is a great inning. Forcing Shields to throw a bunch of pitches, three runs plus a walk from Liddi.. Really liking what I’m seeing.
Wide strike Zone today. Take note, Blake/Jesus
Love the shot of Millwood shaking Kyle’s hand as he passes him on the career HR chart.
I don’t know if it’s just a coincidence or if it’s a sign of things to come, but it sure would be nice if Beavan could take the steps in striking batters out that he seems to be starting. He needs to be able to get more than 4 k/9 to be anything more than an OK 4th or 5th starter.
Montero is hit and miss in regard to how he protects his off hand. Sometimes tucked behind, sometimes not. I hope it does not result in tipping pitches, eventually.
Yet another K for our leadoff guy. He needs to sit down.
Does Figgins have a home near Tampa, by any chance?
Oh, and from the credit where credit is due dept: seager was obviously placed in the right slot – in hindsight. Credit wedge.
Hot butter with 7k’s through three innings.
Timber!
This team has cornered the market on striking out.
We are going to need at least three more runs, dont you think?
I don’t know about three more runs, I think Beavan does a pretty good job of getting about the baseline for quality starts (6 IP 3 ER) so another run or two might be enough.
Okay, four more runs.
I was just thinking it would be a good time to start complaining about Figgins again.
It seems to me that when Liddi swings and misses, too often it’s that he’s trying to pull everything. That swing and miss was a good example in that he tried to pull a low and away fastball and looked silly. He’s making strides but he’s definitely still a work in progress.
Scorebook line drive. Big dude runs pretty well.
@Paul
Now that Olivo is out of the lineup, he is the next logical target.
As I understand it, making contact with the baseball infinitely increases the odds of getting on base – in comparison to not making contact.
I really don’t understand the hit and run there. They have the shift on so rather than creating a hole you’re just making one guy move about three steps and Smoak Ks often enough that it could very well be a strike ‘em out throw ‘em out.. Knock on wood
I thought for sure I was going to jinx that. *Phew*
Good gravy, Michael.
Wow, Ryan is in desperate need of a day (or 5) off!
Mariners making Shields look like Koufax.
Seager – SS. I am liking the idea – on a limited basis. Ryan is lost. Goes from open stance to closed stance but still manages to pull his head. He looks like a bobblehead doll up there. Watch some video of molitor or Edgar or Michael Young, Brendan. Geez, you wreak
Maybe the plan is to up his pitch count by making all of the outs strikeouts. After all, groundouts and fly outs only take one pitch, strikeouts require three!
2b’s ball all the way. No excuse.
@Mike
That’s exactly what I’m saying. I don’t think it should be permanent yet but Ryan could benefit from watching for a couple days and worst case scenario we find out that Seager isn’t a SS and it costs us two runs in 5 games. I think that’s worth it to see what he can do.
Yup, wear him out by strikeout. A rope a dope strategy.
Seager played some SS last year and bulked up a bit in the offseason. We already knew he wasn’t a SS last year, but he can make routine plays.
Okay, we are going to need five more runs
Yeah that’s true. I just don’t think he can possibly be worse than some shortstops in the league (I’m looking at you Derek Jeter) and it could provide our offense with some spark for the week or so.
Only player slower than Monty … Molina?
Gameday had Molina’s third pitch a strike three except the ump called it a ball…….. isn’t like the fucking baseball gods to then have Molina hit a go ahead double two pitches later! No love from any aspects of the game. I guess we can’t have anything nice in Seattle… EVER!
Benji Molina seemed even slower than Jose when he played. With that said, a race between those two and Montero would still probably be very close
Our leadoff hitter is hitting right about .200 now. While striking out roughly 25% of the time.. I’m glad going back to that spot in the order has really turned things around for him.
I missed the “pitch” that gameday was referencing, but that thing is not a good barometer. More of a guideline than a rule IMO
The pitch he’s referencing was right on, or just off the corner. The pitch tracker had it just on the corner. It was mighty close and probably should have been called a strike.
The only silver lining with getting struck out so much is Shields is at 106 pitches after 5 innings! Only being down by 1 at least gives them a shot… at least.
Wow Seager have a day!
Dingers! Someone else please show up today, too.
Go Tar Heels!…I mean GO M’S!
Comw on Liddi. Chase him
I guess we found James Shields’s weakness… he goes by the name of Seager… Kyle Seager.
Another walk! Unprecedented.
And there was the counter remedy to the krypton ite. smoak, Justin Smoak.
Ugh… Smoak… Please find yourself soon!
Dammit Saunders! That was another catchable ball… Is Guti throwing yet?
I’m really starting to miss Guti, I know he hit the Mariner’s first grand salami but c’mon now this is starting to happen more and more with Saunders.
He really really needs to sit down.
Jesus Ryan, you could at least freaking try…
Our 9 and 1 spot have a COMBINED average of .325. That would be one good player..
What did gameday show for that last pitch to ackley?
I wonder if Saunders just can’t pick up the ball well in that dome.
He probably walked on strike three, so that pick off might have simply been justice. God, this team does so many things wrong that it is now routine.
There have been a lot of misjudged fly balls and pop ups this series, Westy – so probably. Saunders also has running into fence issues that guti does not. It’s what makes guti special. Saunders makes some nice plays, but he has issues at the fence. Unfortunately. I missed seeing the play, but it sounded bad on the radio
We have a non power team that currently relies on the long ball to score. It’s crappy ball to watch. Hopefully they figure out a way to actually manufacture some runs sometime soon.
Nice bunt, Eech!
Crappy ump
Behind the plate tonight.
Nice knock Seager! Good call to hold Ichiro at 3b.
Looks like I’ve been missing a good game. Glad to see Smoak out of the clean-up spot.
Really hate seeing Justin chase the same bad pitch twice in a row
When you’ve got 1st and 3rd with 1 out, Ichiro on 3rd… and you can’t get him in… I’m sorry that is on management. Wedge needs to stop pretending that this team is in a funk at the plate. When crap hits the fan, you need to go out of the box. This was like 2010 when Wak said they would have to play small ball to manufacture runs… except he never did that. I’m seeing the same bullshit here!
I know that he’s our leadoff hitter, but I would have had Jaso hit for Figgins here.
0-5 with 3 Ks to drop him below .200. He needs to be out of our lineup. He’s not “raising his value” and he’s actively retarding our ability to win games. He needs to be gone.
Hard to believe Figgins would strike out to end the game. Stunning!
Someone tell me… PLEASE… If you’re going to pinch hit for a struggling Brendan Ryan when down by one in the 9th… WHY THE HELL Do you NOT pinch hit for an “oh so hot” Chone Figgins?!?!?!??!?!?!?!? This management needs to go back to school because this B.S. is getting really old!!! Thank you for your strike out and 0 for 5 day Chone… I’m glad that going to the leadoff spot really revived you!
@seattlesons
You just echoed all my sentiments for this game. I can’t even comprehend how we’re still wasting at bats seeing if Chone will “figure it out.” His average with us over 2 years and a month is barely over .200. That is a sufficient sample size. Sit him down!
When they were talking after the 8th they mentioned “Saunders, Ryan, Figgins” and I heard “Saunders, pinch hitter, pinch hitter”…. apparently I need to get my hearing checked…..
I was trying to follow the game on my phone (on the way home), but eventually got frustrated with the phone and gave up.
Had I been successful, it appears I would’ve *still* felt frustration.
Figgins now has 104 plate appearances. His BB%/K% is 7.7%/26% with little power. Those three really good games just don’t tip the balance against all the crappy games. It’s time for the Figgins rejuvenation project to end.
Why is my comment now being moderated? Did I say something?
I think there is a problem in the queue, Westy. I had the same thing occur an hour ago.
Either that, or they are just getting tired of your repeated expletive laced tirades
What do we do about Ryan? Or Smoak? These guys are looking really lost at the plate. Smoak’s 2-0 during his last at bat — ball was down the middle and up and he stood there looking at it. What the hell? And Ryan — jaysus. Does batting below .100 even *have* a freakin’ name associated with it (other than, ‘former major league ballplayer’)?
I wondered if Figgins would become the new whipping boy now that Olivo is out for a while. Glad to see you guys didn’t disappoint me.
We shouldn’t be playing this close to these guys. They are a good ball club and we’re a young rebuilding club.
Figgins will be gone soon. I’m worried about Ackley is wOBA is .271 Figgins is .276. Figure that one out.
Tomorrow we see Jaso and I’ll bet Montero sits.
Yes, if I’m known for anything – it’s my expletive laced tirades. hehe
“A devastating change up…” Broadcast dude, they’re *all* devastating for Figgins.
Hey, I was ragging on Figgins before it was cool!
I think everyone has always been frustrated with Figgins it’s just that there has been someone who has so obviously been superior at the same position as Olivo.
Also for me at least, I thought that Figgins would get a trial run if he did well he’d stay around, if not he’d be gone. He hasn’t done well so now is the time to complain. I was willing to give him a chance to raise his value or to see if he would improve in the leadoff role or any number of other things. Unfortunately nothing has changed and now I don’t want to see him in the lineup.
Much like my feelings with Seager at short, I’d like to see Liddi get at least a few looks in the outfield. He has one of the few bats that will play in the outfield so if he can be passable in the outfield (and really, can he be worse than Carp?) then that could be huge.
Really starting to wonder about outside sources of outfielders. Figgins’ days have got to be in the single digits now, despite Guti still being out. First base is a real concern as well, but I’ll assume Smoak and Carp will get the rest of the year to showcase themselves. I don’t see Carp being the left fielder of/for the future.
Wells hasn’t really been given much of a shot yet – I’m hoping Wedge will start running him out into left field with some regularity.
Once Guti’s back, Saunders should probably be our starting left fielder.
Wow, did I actually just type that?
I feel like the odds of Smoak “figuring it out” are really starting to dwindle. He’s had some really awful AB’s where he looks completely lost. He’s just guessing up there and it’s obvious. Ryan is hurting us, too, and he looks equally bad. Seager is probably a keeper, but not your prototypical corner infielder. Otherwise, I’m not sure which of the “kids” are going to stick long term. I’m still 50/50 on Saunders at best. Chone needs to disappear in a hurry and Carp better be ready to pick it up or I think he could be out of the picture sooner rather than later.
My comments are being moderated too now? I don’t think I did anything wrong..?
Marcus, Mike pointed out (when I said basically the same thing you did, a while back) something appears to be going on with the forum itself.
So basically the site is saying “It’s not you, Marcus – it’s me”.
Haha, now THIS comment is being held!
This just in, Wedge doesn’t like the strikeouts. Actually seemed pretty pissed about them. So, you guys can stop complaining that Wedge is ok with the hacking away.
Being aggressive doesn’t mean to swing at everything, it just means to don’t be afraid to swing the stick if the pitcher throws a meatball…no matter the count. I know some of you think his actions speak otherwise, and maybe they do, but I think his “problem” is that he has too much patience. Maybe being aggressive isn’t your style, but I’d rather see guys swing the bat. Looking for a walk is boring baseball. It’s marginal, but a hit is worth more than a walk
Yes, we need some woody ball “visualization.” That will fix it. Look up the walk to strikeout rates organization wide and see what other conclusions may exist.
I agree, the strikeouts are ridiculous. I’m just saying you all like to point to Wedge’s “aggressive” statements for the organization’s problems. And are constantly thumping the walk drum. When technically a hit is worth more than a walk.
And for the record, I don’t think Wedge is that good either. I’m just not going to drop all my frustration on him.
Yeah, Wells is still deserving of a harder look, but I’d really like to see another solid, MLB proven, outfielder on this roster.
Fair enough. Keep in mind though, nobody has EVER stated that players should not swing at good, hittable pitches. Problem is, too many guys take hacks at bad pitches to hit because of lack of recognition and/or overall approach. The BB/strikeout rate is an organization wide epidemic and a statistical fact.
While I haven’t been shy in regards to expressing my opinion regarding Wedge and his perceived shortcomings, I think right now the strikeout issue is being exacerbated in our thoughts by the recent losses, combined with the fact that a couple of our favorite players have been very guilty of that problem while hitting .200 or lower. And that’s not to mention Ryan, who’s somehow leading the team in walks while “hitting” worse than the 2011 edition of Michael Saunders.
Wedge (yeah, I admit that whole “Wedgie” thing quickly lost it’s charm for me) has more or less already said Figgins’ starting days are numbered; once he’s benched I expect the strikeouts to go down. Especially since I really don’t think Montero and Ackley will continue struggling.
Along the lines of the patience thing… I hope Alex Liddi’s game doesn’t get lost because of his late pop out. He had to have seen the most pitches today, in fact I believe (might be mistaken) every one of his at bats went to a full count.
This kid is becoming way more patient, swinging and missing a whole lot less, and is becoming one of the guys I’m more optimistic about. That is not something that I expected from a guy who was practically the infielder Carlos Peguero last year.
I would think that the best GM’s or leaders of any kind would be able to make decisions in a contemplative way, not over-react, not be impulsive, be willing to sleep on things for a day or two before making a tough decision,, not have a knee jerk reaction after a bad stretch of play, etc etc
With that said, I hope Jack springs out of bed tomorrow morning with his ‘scalp’ on fire and DFA’s Figgins ass into oblivion … Which I believe may currently be fielding a team somewhere in the Texas league.
Going home on a six game losing streak after leaving home on a losing streak wrapped around a perfecto is going to be reason enough for overreaction. No better way to stimulate the fan base than to get rid of Figgins, or for Guti to return … And that ain’t happening for a while.
You want to sell some tickets, Jack – to a fan base that is crap ass tired of the same bullshit song and dance? The music has stopped and there is only one chair left. Pull the trigger.
While I love your extensive use of metaphors and agree with your premise, don’t expect anything tomorrow. The very best case scenario would be Friday given that we’ll be returning home and that wouldn’t put us down a man for any games. Even that seems like a super long shot but I really hope it does happen.
Also, congratulations to Jered Weaver, he just finished off a no-hitter making us one of two teams to be no-hit now (I know, ours was a perfect game but this softens the blow a tiny bit doesn’t it?)
I wouldn’t be surprised to see Figgins on the bench tomorrow, though. Wedge has already said Jaso will catch, and I’d guess he’ll want to keep Jesus in there as DH.
Actually part of me would like to see something minor go wrong – I would really like to see Kawasaki catching! It would be painful and fun at the same time. Maybe he’d do pushups in between batters…
Haha, spoke too soon. Wedge says he’s going to play Figgins tomorrow because Figgy’s 7 for 14 against the pitcher career-wise.
So if Figgins gets a hit or two, I guess that buys him another month – because that, of course, will be his true talent level; not the 90% of other games when he’s terrible.
I guess this would mean that my hair has to be on fire, now.
However, I shall wait until after his second K today, before I reach that emotional pitch.