Tuesday, August 10, 2004
TWO BIG HITS...
...but the two biggest hits involving the Mariners had to do with two players not on the field tonight, and those two players won't be on the field for a loooong time (pending second opinions).
Gil Meche had probably his best start of the year tonight, with the only two hits off him being solo bombs by Justin Morneau in the 5th (a booming shot off the ads under the Hit it Here Cafe in right) and Lew Ford (pinch-hit to left) in the 8th. Meche threw a ton of first-pitch balls tonight (17 of 29 overall, 9 of 12 in innings 1-3), but instead of trying to nibble on the corners to try to get hitters to chase borderline or out-of-zone pitches, he realized he was a power pitcher and started to trust his stuff and blow pitches by people. It helped that the breaking ball was working for the most part also (sans Morneau HR and a couple of 55-footers). Five Twins total reached base against Meche; two walks, two homers, and Corey Koskie in the 2nd on Jose Lopez's throw that went through the webbing in Bucky Jacobsen's first baseman's mitt. The one thing that makes me cringe about Meche's line though is the pitch count, which topped out at 125. Regardless of how he says his arm feels, I'm going to be wary of pitch counts for a guy that has a torn labrum in his past. That's no minor injury by any means, but it sure was a popular one in the Mariners' minor league system. Gil Meche lowered his ERA tonight to a paltry 5.97. Yikes. His line: 8 innings, 2 runs, 2 hits, 2 walks, 7 strikeouts, 125 pitches (77 strikes).
The Mariners did something that (I thought) was a trademark to their 2000 run: score early and hold on, except now without the luxury of having the starter go six or seven innings, and then handing it off to Arthur Rhodes, Jeff Nelson, and Kazu Sasaki. Tonight, they scored all four of their runs in the first inning, and they all scored on homers off Terry Mulholland, who did a yeoman's effort tonight (7 innings after throwing 19 pitches to end an 18-inning game on Sunday). Yes, the Mariners played longball tonight, and they won. Ichiro had an 8-pitch at-bat to lead off the game with a single, his 324082034th hit of the season, or something like that. Randy Winn whiffed. Edgar took a ball on the first pitch, and took the next ball for a ride, an extremely concave downward parabola (and the math dorks smiled) ending a few rows above the scoreboard in leftfield to net the Mariners a 2-0 lead and send the crowd into a scene of unbridled happiness. Bret Boone got a 3-1 count and a pitch to drive, doubling to the wall in center. Bucky Jacobsen got a pitch up in the zone and put a hurtin' on the ball, a laser beam into the bullpens to put the Mariners up 4-0. The Mariners had five of their 10 hits in the first inning. Ichiro had two of the remaining five, and Edgar had another one in him also.
So good times, right? Edgar announces his retirement the day before, then hits a homer on the second pitch he sees. Crowd goes crazy, then Bucky hits one out too. Big fun, right? Some might say it was a changing of the guard of sorts. Fun to see, right?
Well, if they didn't flash the news on the scoreboard tonight (I'm guessing not) and if I went to the ballpark tonight and didn't have a radio, I'd be in for a really rude awakening when I got home.
Eddie Guardado: torn rotator cuff
Rafael Soriano: torn ulnar collateral ligament, something that would require Tommy John surgery
With Soriano and with TJ surgery, it could be a year before he can even throw. With Guardado, I think the time frame was 8-12 months. These are prognoses from team doctor Larry Pedegana, and both will be getting second opinions.
Before I go grim here, I'll just mention that some pitchers throw even faster after Tommy John surgery because a stronger ligament (correct me if I'm wrong) is put into the arm. Think Billy Koch when he had those good years with Toronto. Rafael Soriano threw flames already. Now imagine if he could throw even faster.
Okay, back to earth. We all sat here last offseason and were thinking the bullpen, though retooled, would be solid. A lot of that depended on Rafael Soriano and Eddie Guardado. We sit here on August 10th and are given the possibility that both of them might not pitch next year. Aaaaand, who knows how long it may take Joel Pineiro to bounce back from that strained flexor bundle or whatever the hell he's got.
Mariner fans, readers of Sports and B's, I now ask you this: do the Mariners have any choice but to rebuild now (i.e., ditch the "retooling" idea)? I mean, a good chunk of this team's success (which obviously it's not having right now) was going to depend on Soriano throwing flames like last year (i.e., the Garciaparra at-bat last year) and setting up the aggressive bulldog from Stockton, CA that is Eddie Guardado in the 9th. Blow those guys out of the bullpen, and what do you got? Granted, this season's been screwed for a while, so we know what it's like to have both of those guys out on a crappy team, but is there even a chance for the Mariners to be competitive in 2005 thanks to the news we've just been handed tonight?
One thing's probably for sure: they can't use the Sasaki money all on one guy (everyone that was still thinking about Carlos Beltran can shut up now), because unless they want to tear everything down next year, they're going to have to plug the holes. Soriano and Guardado obviously won't be your rightie setup guy and your closer. Pineiro, who the hell knows about him. Really, is there any choice but to tear everything down and go young all over? Do they think Shigetoshi Hasegawa can bounce back and gain half of his 2003 form? Is Ron Villone going to have to start for the 2005 Mariners? Ugh...
Unless Howard Lincoln comes out tomorrow and says the payroll next year is bumped up to $115M, I fear that next year is not going to be much better than the one Mariner fans are currently seeing. To those saying an extra $20M would get them a very good team, just remember how efficient the Mariner brass is right now with ~$90M or whatever it's at. To add, a lot of people I've been hearing on the radio (okay, you might take it with a grain of salt) who have forecasts for next year's lineups, etc. have placed both Randy Winn and Scott Spiezio on the bench. Folks, that's an expensive bench.
Boy, I haven't spent a lot of time these days thinking about the future of these Seattle Mariners. I'm usually just mindlessly cranking out the game recap night in and night out, giving a gameball and goat, trying to think of a nice title and a decent closing/looking ahead line, but a night when you discover two cogs of the bullpen will be gone for next year, I feel I don't have much choice other than to grieve and speculate.
Gameball: Edgar Martinez. 2-for-4 with the 2-run homer. Before the crap hit the fan, Edgar made everyone's night. If Edgar doesn't do that, Gil Meche is a lock with his eight innings of great pitching.
Goat: Raul Ibanez. 0-for-4, one strikeout. Maybe I'm being a little hard, what with Raul's injury to his side or whatever. It's not my fault Willie Bloomquist wasn't in the lineup tonight to protect Raul from getting the goat.
Your 2004 Seattle Mariners!! As Jeremy would say, even when they win, they lose!!
Radke. Madritsch. Tomorrow.
[Edit Wed ~11:58a -- Says Steve in the comment box, Meche had a frayed labrum as opposed to a torn one. If there's anyone I want correcting me on this, it's Steve. Check out his post backlog on the Mariners' busted arm situation if you haven't already.]
Gil Meche had probably his best start of the year tonight, with the only two hits off him being solo bombs by Justin Morneau in the 5th (a booming shot off the ads under the Hit it Here Cafe in right) and Lew Ford (pinch-hit to left) in the 8th. Meche threw a ton of first-pitch balls tonight (17 of 29 overall, 9 of 12 in innings 1-3), but instead of trying to nibble on the corners to try to get hitters to chase borderline or out-of-zone pitches, he realized he was a power pitcher and started to trust his stuff and blow pitches by people. It helped that the breaking ball was working for the most part also (sans Morneau HR and a couple of 55-footers). Five Twins total reached base against Meche; two walks, two homers, and Corey Koskie in the 2nd on Jose Lopez's throw that went through the webbing in Bucky Jacobsen's first baseman's mitt. The one thing that makes me cringe about Meche's line though is the pitch count, which topped out at 125. Regardless of how he says his arm feels, I'm going to be wary of pitch counts for a guy that has a torn labrum in his past. That's no minor injury by any means, but it sure was a popular one in the Mariners' minor league system. Gil Meche lowered his ERA tonight to a paltry 5.97. Yikes. His line: 8 innings, 2 runs, 2 hits, 2 walks, 7 strikeouts, 125 pitches (77 strikes).
The Mariners did something that (I thought) was a trademark to their 2000 run: score early and hold on, except now without the luxury of having the starter go six or seven innings, and then handing it off to Arthur Rhodes, Jeff Nelson, and Kazu Sasaki. Tonight, they scored all four of their runs in the first inning, and they all scored on homers off Terry Mulholland, who did a yeoman's effort tonight (7 innings after throwing 19 pitches to end an 18-inning game on Sunday). Yes, the Mariners played longball tonight, and they won. Ichiro had an 8-pitch at-bat to lead off the game with a single, his 324082034th hit of the season, or something like that. Randy Winn whiffed. Edgar took a ball on the first pitch, and took the next ball for a ride, an extremely concave downward parabola (and the math dorks smiled) ending a few rows above the scoreboard in leftfield to net the Mariners a 2-0 lead and send the crowd into a scene of unbridled happiness. Bret Boone got a 3-1 count and a pitch to drive, doubling to the wall in center. Bucky Jacobsen got a pitch up in the zone and put a hurtin' on the ball, a laser beam into the bullpens to put the Mariners up 4-0. The Mariners had five of their 10 hits in the first inning. Ichiro had two of the remaining five, and Edgar had another one in him also.
So good times, right? Edgar announces his retirement the day before, then hits a homer on the second pitch he sees. Crowd goes crazy, then Bucky hits one out too. Big fun, right? Some might say it was a changing of the guard of sorts. Fun to see, right?
Well, if they didn't flash the news on the scoreboard tonight (I'm guessing not) and if I went to the ballpark tonight and didn't have a radio, I'd be in for a really rude awakening when I got home.
Eddie Guardado: torn rotator cuff
Rafael Soriano: torn ulnar collateral ligament, something that would require Tommy John surgery
With Soriano and with TJ surgery, it could be a year before he can even throw. With Guardado, I think the time frame was 8-12 months. These are prognoses from team doctor Larry Pedegana, and both will be getting second opinions.
Before I go grim here, I'll just mention that some pitchers throw even faster after Tommy John surgery because a stronger ligament (correct me if I'm wrong) is put into the arm. Think Billy Koch when he had those good years with Toronto. Rafael Soriano threw flames already. Now imagine if he could throw even faster.
Okay, back to earth. We all sat here last offseason and were thinking the bullpen, though retooled, would be solid. A lot of that depended on Rafael Soriano and Eddie Guardado. We sit here on August 10th and are given the possibility that both of them might not pitch next year. Aaaaand, who knows how long it may take Joel Pineiro to bounce back from that strained flexor bundle or whatever the hell he's got.
Mariner fans, readers of Sports and B's, I now ask you this: do the Mariners have any choice but to rebuild now (i.e., ditch the "retooling" idea)? I mean, a good chunk of this team's success (which obviously it's not having right now) was going to depend on Soriano throwing flames like last year (i.e., the Garciaparra at-bat last year) and setting up the aggressive bulldog from Stockton, CA that is Eddie Guardado in the 9th. Blow those guys out of the bullpen, and what do you got? Granted, this season's been screwed for a while, so we know what it's like to have both of those guys out on a crappy team, but is there even a chance for the Mariners to be competitive in 2005 thanks to the news we've just been handed tonight?
One thing's probably for sure: they can't use the Sasaki money all on one guy (everyone that was still thinking about Carlos Beltran can shut up now), because unless they want to tear everything down next year, they're going to have to plug the holes. Soriano and Guardado obviously won't be your rightie setup guy and your closer. Pineiro, who the hell knows about him. Really, is there any choice but to tear everything down and go young all over? Do they think Shigetoshi Hasegawa can bounce back and gain half of his 2003 form? Is Ron Villone going to have to start for the 2005 Mariners? Ugh...
Unless Howard Lincoln comes out tomorrow and says the payroll next year is bumped up to $115M, I fear that next year is not going to be much better than the one Mariner fans are currently seeing. To those saying an extra $20M would get them a very good team, just remember how efficient the Mariner brass is right now with ~$90M or whatever it's at. To add, a lot of people I've been hearing on the radio (okay, you might take it with a grain of salt) who have forecasts for next year's lineups, etc. have placed both Randy Winn and Scott Spiezio on the bench. Folks, that's an expensive bench.
Boy, I haven't spent a lot of time these days thinking about the future of these Seattle Mariners. I'm usually just mindlessly cranking out the game recap night in and night out, giving a gameball and goat, trying to think of a nice title and a decent closing/looking ahead line, but a night when you discover two cogs of the bullpen will be gone for next year, I feel I don't have much choice other than to grieve and speculate.
Gameball: Edgar Martinez. 2-for-4 with the 2-run homer. Before the crap hit the fan, Edgar made everyone's night. If Edgar doesn't do that, Gil Meche is a lock with his eight innings of great pitching.
Goat: Raul Ibanez. 0-for-4, one strikeout. Maybe I'm being a little hard, what with Raul's injury to his side or whatever. It's not my fault Willie Bloomquist wasn't in the lineup tonight to protect Raul from getting the goat.
Your 2004 Seattle Mariners!! As Jeremy would say, even when they win, they lose!!
Radke. Madritsch. Tomorrow.
[Edit Wed ~11:58a -- Says Steve in the comment box, Meche had a frayed labrum as opposed to a torn one. If there's anyone I want correcting me on this, it's Steve. Check out his post backlog on the Mariners' busted arm situation if you haven't already.]
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