Well it's only day one of the blog and I'm already going to break from Seinfeld as a topic for this post. In this case I just couldn't resist looking at the 2010 Seattle Mariners, who currently sit 13 games under .500 and 15 games behind Texas in the division. Even though the Mariners haven' t made the playoffs since 2001 I can't remember another team that garnered as much optimism from Seattle fans heading into a season since the days of Johnson, Griffey, Martinez and company. Coming off a season where the team had won 85 games and shown a huge amount of improvement from the disastrous 2008 101 loss campaign, I was feeling confident that with a new GM and manager who both seemed to be major upgrades, that the team would take the next step and seriously contend in the division. I, along with most Mariners fans bought into most of the off-season moves that brought Chone Figgins, Casey Kotchman, Eric Byrnes (just threw up a little bit in my mouth as I was typing that), Milton Bradley, CLIFF LEE, Brandon League, Ian Snell, Jack Wilson, and Chad Cordero to Seattle.
Looking at the team now after 75 games, it's obvious that this may turn out to be the worst offense that the Mariners have ever put together. They currently occupy second to last place in overall team offense with a measly 255 runs scored and only 44 total team home runs, the league average is 344 and 72. This is a team who regularly starts 4 guys hitting at or under .200 and their home-run leader is Milton Bradley at 7. Beyond individual statistics is the fact that this team has been incapable of situational hitting all season. There have been so many times where they've had runners in scoring position and failed to score, Figgins has been especially bad..hitting into more double plays than any player I've seen so far. The lack of focus on offense extends to base running where there have been numerous errors by both the runners and base coaches. The image that sticks in my head is of Rob Johnson motoring around second base on a single and being thrown out by about 10 feet. Which is a good segway into my next section that outlines my hatred of a player who should be bagging groceries back in Montana somewhere.
Rob Johnson should not be a major league baseball player. It really is as simple as that, he can't hit, throw, or catch. This is a guy who has already allowed a ridiculous 18 wild pitches to go along with 7 passed balls, by far the worst catching numbers in the league. Teams should be supremely confident at their ability to run on him, he's only thrown out 28 of 66 runners or 30%. Offensively he has been a non-factor hitting .198 with 2 home-runs and 11 RBI's. The logical question would seem to be: Why is this guy a regular starter for the Mariners this season!? The answer is that Felix likes the way he calls games and nothing more. It would be less frustrating if the team just owned up to this fact and only started Johnson on days when Felix pitches. I guess we just have to hope that the front-office is able to land a great catching prospect in the inevitable Lee trade.
