Saturday, January 31, 2004
LATE YEAR-END POST AT MONTH-END
The posts return! Sorry if anyone was let down by the amount of posts yesterday (zero); hopefully this helps make up for any such letdown.
Before I get into the meat of this post, I feel like I have to point out that while I was researching this for the post material, your Seattle Mariners were 12-7 against Oakland in 2003. We know what kind of opponents took down the Mariners though. Most of them featured people (pitchers) we learned about for the first time. That scenario happened many times. Anyway, the subject of this post is supposed to be positive, and sifting though the boxscores and recaps was a good way in which to relive the good parts of the Mariners season. If I ever decide to make a post about the other end of the spectrum, though, it could get ugly.
I know it's a month late, but I am trying to somewhat uphold my promise to myself (and maybe one that I may have made with the audience, I'm not sure) to do some type of year-end list. I used my late Friday night to compile a list of the best Mariner wins of 2003. The factors I used basically centered around a somewhat balanced effort (solid pitching and solid/timely hitting), a worthy (or division) opponent, a good game and sometimes the point of the season in which the win took place. Hopefully I didn't contradict myself too many times, but there's some of those criteria present in all of these games. I realize twelve (thirteen) is a high propertion of the wins (a little more than one-eighth), but I didn't feel like narrowing it down more than this without totally screwing over some really great performances.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my Top 12 (actually 13) Wins of 2003 for Your Seattle Mariners
(links taken from ESPN.com; SportsLine has already taken down their 2003 boxscores and put up the 2004 schedules in their place)
29 Apr -- 6-0 win at NYY: All the hype was around the first meeting of Ichiro and Hideki Matsui. Meanwhile, a great game took place for the Mariners. Gil Meche really brought his stuff in a big setting, taking a three-hitter into the 8th and beating Roger Clemens. Clemens, losing for the first time in six starts to begin the season, was left stuck on 298 wins after giving up homers to Bret Boone, Ben Davis, and Edgar.
30 May -- 6-0 win at MIN: One week before, Joel Pineiro got tagged for six runs and twelve hits by the Twins. On this day, Joel was on like Donkey Kong, tossing a brilliant 121-pitch (83-strike) shutout while striking out 12. Randy Winn and Carlos Guillen had RBI singles, and Mike Cameron had a pinch-hit 2-run bomb in the 9th for insurance.
5 Jun -- 5-4 win at PHI: The Mariners completed the three-game sweep of the Phillies, coming back from down 4-2 to take their 9th straight win. Jose Mesa was brought in to nail down a 4-2 Phillies win. Boone singled to start the 9th, and Olerud walked. Mike Cameron failed twice on bunt attempts, but roped the next pitch into the bullpen. Long live Joe Table!!
8 Jun -- 13-1 and 7-0 wins at NYM: For me, easily the high point of the season. In the first game, Freddy Garcia tossed a six-hit shutout and hit an RBI single, Mike Cameron drove in three runs, John Olerud scored three runs, and Bret Boone and Jeff Cirillo had RBI doubles. The second game saw Jamie Moyer win his 10th game of the year, throwing a scant 86 pitches in seven shutout innings. Guillen, Cameron, Dan Wilson, and Boone had RBI singles. This doubleheader sweep left the Mariners with a sparkling 42-19 record. From here...well, you know -- their final record was 93-69. From this point, the Mariners went 51-50, and much like the California penal code (5150, solid album, by the way), I was made insane over the course of the next three-and-a-half months watching the season go to waste in a slow, drawn-out, mind-numbing stumble to the merciful finish.
13 Jun -- 2-1 win v ATL: The first meeting of the two best teams in the Majors went the Mariners' way. A top-notch pitchers' duel between Russ Ortiz and (on this day, not truly terrible) Freddy Garcia was decided in part by Rafael Furcal throwing the ball to nobody at first, allowing Mark McLemore to score from second for the game-breaking run in the first inning. Rhodes nailed down the final two outs of the eighth, and Jeff Nelson got his 4th save in six chances. Freddy threw 7 1/3 innings to win his fourth straight start. What a great series this Braves series was...
15 Jun -- 2-1 win v ATL: Gil Meche outdoes himself again, this time beating Greg Maddux in another great pitchers' duel. Boone drove in both of the Mariners' runs. Other Mariners weren't driving in runs, and were probably striking out since Maddux whiffed 11 over his seven innings of work. Meche went 7 1/3 with no other real flashy stats other than beating a pitcher who was mowing down his hitters.
30 Jun -- 3-1 win at OAK: Jamie Moyer took a no-hitter into the 7th inning (6 1/3 innings) and was pulled after allowing an Eric Byrnes double. Art Rhodes came in and sucked, allowing a single to Scott Hatteberg and walking Erubiel Durazo to juice the bags. Luckily, he cleaned up the mess (Tejada forceout, Chavez groundout) and Nelson nailed down the game. All the while, Greg Colbrunn hit a pinch-hit solo shot for insurance in the 9th, easily his finest hour as a Mariner. Good division win for the Mariners.
23 Jul -- 6-0 win v OAK: Randy Winn hit a solo shot and John Olerud drove in four runs, but that wasn't the story here. Ryan Franklin tossed a 121-pitch, 2-hit shutout for his first career complete game, beating a struggling Barry Zito.
9 Aug -- 2-1 win at NYY: Two hits over eight innings in the Bronx...Gil Meche is amazing once again at Yankee Stadium, this time beating Andy Pettitte. Meche managed to beat Pettitte, Maddux, and Clemens in the same year. Runs were scored on a Cameron groundout and a Boone sac fly.
15 Aug -- 10-5 win v BOS: Shigetoshi Hasegawa had some top-notch relief, coming in with the bases juiced in the 8th and nailing down the game with a five-out save. McLemore somehow went 4-for-4. The big story, though, was Ichiro. With a 4-4 tie, the bases loaded, and Mike Timlin on the mound, Ichiro fouled a pitch into foul territory (by third base); Bill Mueller slid and dropped the ball. Ichiro hit a grand slam on the next pitch. Jubilation at the Safe in a crucial game.
17 Aug -- 3-1 win v BOS: Eight days before the same team would basically hand the Mariners the death knell to their season, Freddy Garcia was in the middle of his other good stretch. On this day, Garcia went 7 2/3 innings and struck out eight, retiring 17 straight after a Trot Nixon solo shot in the third. Garcia left with runners on second and third and Nomar at the bat. Rafael Soriano came in and delivered in the clutch, blowing the ball past Nomar and whiffing him on three pitches. It was Raf's finest moment in an already fine season.
19 Sep -- 6-1 win at OAK: Though this was well after the fall of the Mariners' season, I still think this one deserves mention. Not because of John Olerud's two-run homer. Not because of Ryan Franklin's eight strong innings, in which he gave up only a Durazo solo shot in the first in terms of runs (four hits overall). Not because the Mariners strung together three straight singles in the 5th. Not because Mike Cameron had an RBI walk (bases loaded). Not because the Mariners managed to beat Tim Hudson. No, this one's for Edgar, who went 4-for-4 and scored twice on a broken big left toe. That's heart, that's courage, that's mental strength. A mere five days later, Edgar is rewarded with this. He gets convinced to come back for 2004, and he gets rewarded with Bill Bavasi and a bunch of older hacks to be surrounded with. I'm sorry, Edgar, I really am.
There you have it. Damn, this took me a while. I have no life. Anyway, I hope y'all enjoyed reading this, meaning as to how Sports and B's had no posts yesterday, partly due to schoolwork, lack of material, and catching up on sleep.
[edit ~12:37p: I read through it and wanted to clarify that in the 19 Sep game against the A's, Ryan Franklin didn't one-hit the A's other than the Durazo HR (clarification now in the post), because I kind of made it sound like it. Also, just to make a sentence work better, in the second Atlanta game, I added the word "in" because "driving runs" just didn't look or sound right.]
Before I get into the meat of this post, I feel like I have to point out that while I was researching this for the post material, your Seattle Mariners were 12-7 against Oakland in 2003. We know what kind of opponents took down the Mariners though. Most of them featured people (pitchers) we learned about for the first time. That scenario happened many times. Anyway, the subject of this post is supposed to be positive, and sifting though the boxscores and recaps was a good way in which to relive the good parts of the Mariners season. If I ever decide to make a post about the other end of the spectrum, though, it could get ugly.
I know it's a month late, but I am trying to somewhat uphold my promise to myself (and maybe one that I may have made with the audience, I'm not sure) to do some type of year-end list. I used my late Friday night to compile a list of the best Mariner wins of 2003. The factors I used basically centered around a somewhat balanced effort (solid pitching and solid/timely hitting), a worthy (or division) opponent, a good game and sometimes the point of the season in which the win took place. Hopefully I didn't contradict myself too many times, but there's some of those criteria present in all of these games. I realize twelve (thirteen) is a high propertion of the wins (a little more than one-eighth), but I didn't feel like narrowing it down more than this without totally screwing over some really great performances.
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my Top 12 (actually 13) Wins of 2003 for Your Seattle Mariners
(links taken from ESPN.com; SportsLine has already taken down their 2003 boxscores and put up the 2004 schedules in their place)
29 Apr -- 6-0 win at NYY: All the hype was around the first meeting of Ichiro and Hideki Matsui. Meanwhile, a great game took place for the Mariners. Gil Meche really brought his stuff in a big setting, taking a three-hitter into the 8th and beating Roger Clemens. Clemens, losing for the first time in six starts to begin the season, was left stuck on 298 wins after giving up homers to Bret Boone, Ben Davis, and Edgar.
30 May -- 6-0 win at MIN: One week before, Joel Pineiro got tagged for six runs and twelve hits by the Twins. On this day, Joel was on like Donkey Kong, tossing a brilliant 121-pitch (83-strike) shutout while striking out 12. Randy Winn and Carlos Guillen had RBI singles, and Mike Cameron had a pinch-hit 2-run bomb in the 9th for insurance.
5 Jun -- 5-4 win at PHI: The Mariners completed the three-game sweep of the Phillies, coming back from down 4-2 to take their 9th straight win. Jose Mesa was brought in to nail down a 4-2 Phillies win. Boone singled to start the 9th, and Olerud walked. Mike Cameron failed twice on bunt attempts, but roped the next pitch into the bullpen. Long live Joe Table!!
8 Jun -- 13-1 and 7-0 wins at NYM: For me, easily the high point of the season. In the first game, Freddy Garcia tossed a six-hit shutout and hit an RBI single, Mike Cameron drove in three runs, John Olerud scored three runs, and Bret Boone and Jeff Cirillo had RBI doubles. The second game saw Jamie Moyer win his 10th game of the year, throwing a scant 86 pitches in seven shutout innings. Guillen, Cameron, Dan Wilson, and Boone had RBI singles. This doubleheader sweep left the Mariners with a sparkling 42-19 record. From here...well, you know -- their final record was 93-69. From this point, the Mariners went 51-50, and much like the California penal code (5150, solid album, by the way), I was made insane over the course of the next three-and-a-half months watching the season go to waste in a slow, drawn-out, mind-numbing stumble to the merciful finish.
13 Jun -- 2-1 win v ATL: The first meeting of the two best teams in the Majors went the Mariners' way. A top-notch pitchers' duel between Russ Ortiz and (on this day, not truly terrible) Freddy Garcia was decided in part by Rafael Furcal throwing the ball to nobody at first, allowing Mark McLemore to score from second for the game-breaking run in the first inning. Rhodes nailed down the final two outs of the eighth, and Jeff Nelson got his 4th save in six chances. Freddy threw 7 1/3 innings to win his fourth straight start. What a great series this Braves series was...
15 Jun -- 2-1 win v ATL: Gil Meche outdoes himself again, this time beating Greg Maddux in another great pitchers' duel. Boone drove in both of the Mariners' runs. Other Mariners weren't driving in runs, and were probably striking out since Maddux whiffed 11 over his seven innings of work. Meche went 7 1/3 with no other real flashy stats other than beating a pitcher who was mowing down his hitters.
30 Jun -- 3-1 win at OAK: Jamie Moyer took a no-hitter into the 7th inning (6 1/3 innings) and was pulled after allowing an Eric Byrnes double. Art Rhodes came in and sucked, allowing a single to Scott Hatteberg and walking Erubiel Durazo to juice the bags. Luckily, he cleaned up the mess (Tejada forceout, Chavez groundout) and Nelson nailed down the game. All the while, Greg Colbrunn hit a pinch-hit solo shot for insurance in the 9th, easily his finest hour as a Mariner. Good division win for the Mariners.
23 Jul -- 6-0 win v OAK: Randy Winn hit a solo shot and John Olerud drove in four runs, but that wasn't the story here. Ryan Franklin tossed a 121-pitch, 2-hit shutout for his first career complete game, beating a struggling Barry Zito.
9 Aug -- 2-1 win at NYY: Two hits over eight innings in the Bronx...Gil Meche is amazing once again at Yankee Stadium, this time beating Andy Pettitte. Meche managed to beat Pettitte, Maddux, and Clemens in the same year. Runs were scored on a Cameron groundout and a Boone sac fly.
15 Aug -- 10-5 win v BOS: Shigetoshi Hasegawa had some top-notch relief, coming in with the bases juiced in the 8th and nailing down the game with a five-out save. McLemore somehow went 4-for-4. The big story, though, was Ichiro. With a 4-4 tie, the bases loaded, and Mike Timlin on the mound, Ichiro fouled a pitch into foul territory (by third base); Bill Mueller slid and dropped the ball. Ichiro hit a grand slam on the next pitch. Jubilation at the Safe in a crucial game.
17 Aug -- 3-1 win v BOS: Eight days before the same team would basically hand the Mariners the death knell to their season, Freddy Garcia was in the middle of his other good stretch. On this day, Garcia went 7 2/3 innings and struck out eight, retiring 17 straight after a Trot Nixon solo shot in the third. Garcia left with runners on second and third and Nomar at the bat. Rafael Soriano came in and delivered in the clutch, blowing the ball past Nomar and whiffing him on three pitches. It was Raf's finest moment in an already fine season.
19 Sep -- 6-1 win at OAK: Though this was well after the fall of the Mariners' season, I still think this one deserves mention. Not because of John Olerud's two-run homer. Not because of Ryan Franklin's eight strong innings, in which he gave up only a Durazo solo shot in the first in terms of runs (four hits overall). Not because the Mariners strung together three straight singles in the 5th. Not because Mike Cameron had an RBI walk (bases loaded). Not because the Mariners managed to beat Tim Hudson. No, this one's for Edgar, who went 4-for-4 and scored twice on a broken big left toe. That's heart, that's courage, that's mental strength. A mere five days later, Edgar is rewarded with this. He gets convinced to come back for 2004, and he gets rewarded with Bill Bavasi and a bunch of older hacks to be surrounded with. I'm sorry, Edgar, I really am.
There you have it. Damn, this took me a while. I have no life. Anyway, I hope y'all enjoyed reading this, meaning as to how Sports and B's had no posts yesterday, partly due to schoolwork, lack of material, and catching up on sleep.
[edit ~12:37p: I read through it and wanted to clarify that in the 19 Sep game against the A's, Ryan Franklin didn't one-hit the A's other than the Durazo HR (clarification now in the post), because I kind of made it sound like it. Also, just to make a sentence work better, in the second Atlanta game, I added the word "in" because "driving runs" just didn't look or sound right.]
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