The Mariner Monitor

It’s kind of sad when the most excitement you can get out of Mariners fans is the return of Ken Griffey, Jr.  Don’t get me wrong, I’d like to see Kid retire in a Mariners uniform but still, this team didn’t do much to improve from their 101 losses in 2008.  Yes, they were the surprise team of 2007 but that’s removed now that it’s a pretty distant memory.

It’s funny that out of the holes the Mariners have, it’s the bullpen that worries me the most.  J.J. Putz is gone and it looks like Brandon Morrow is being pushed into the rotation.  I like the idea of a Hernandez/Bedard/Morrow/Silva rotation though and that might actually make the Mariners better then a lot of people think.  And who knows, maybe Adrian Beltre has one more monster season left in the tank.  He is playing for a contract after all.

It also looks like Jeff Clement might get the nod over Kenji Johjima as the top prospect finally gets his chance.  This battle is particularly interesting to my son, who’s taking on the catching duties on his little league team this year.  He’s been breaking in his new catcher’s gear that he got for his birthday.  He also got a new baseball bag, and all of it we picked up at Baseball Rampage.

The Mariners lost yet another heartbreaker, this time a 3-2 loss to the A’s in the 11^th inning. But are the Mariners losing news anymore? I’ve gotten to the point where I am disappointed when I don’t see an item involving a fired coach or a complaining player. The results of the games have just become background noise.

So you can imagine how thrilled I was when I saw the news item that Ritchie Sexon, the guy that was supposed to make us forget that Ken Griffey, Jr. and Alex Rodriquez once played in Seattle, was released by the team Thursday morning.

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The Mariners’ season has turned into a Dr. Seuss book.

They can lose when they score a lot or when they can’t score enough.

They lose when a pitcher’s on fire and they lose when his outing is rough.

They even lose when a backup catcher closes the game.

Man oh man, these Mariners are lame.

OK, but really, they do suck. Thankfully last night’s 2-0 loss to the A’s lasted just 1 hour and 45 minutes. Unless you’ve been trying to drink away the season. Then that sucked for you since 1 hr and 45 min isn’t enough time to drink until you forget the game.

Carlos Silva was money, going nine innings and allowing two runs while scattering seven hits. His counterpart, Justin Duchscherer, also went nine innings, allowing zero runs and just two hits. The sad part is that he struck out just four guys, which means his stuff wasn’t exactly Nolan Ryan-esque.

Then again I think I could throw three scoreless innings against this offense.

 Jim Bryant/AP 

The sight of backup catcher Jaime Burke taking the mound in the 15th (it was the 15th, right? I lost count after 12) was incredible not because a position player was forced to pitch in a tie game. What was incredible is that Burke taking the mound isn’t even the saddest part of what has been an abysmal season. If anything, it gave us fans a reason to smile while we continue to die a little bit inside every day.

Detroit got the best of the Mariners, 2-1, and by “got the best of” I mean they finally decided to win the game after 14 innings of complacency. I mean someone has to do it and Detroit had no excuses once they saw a backup catcher take the mound.

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  Charlie Riedel/AP