Sunday, March 28, 2010

The Numbers Game: Seattle Mariners

If you've been paying attention to the pre season prognosticators you may have noticed the hype machine is in overdrive about the potential of this years Seattle Mariners.

People jumping on the Mariners bandwagon have two things to hang their hat on as in the one two punch at the top of the lineup of Ichuro Suziki and Chone Figgens and the one two combo at the front of the rotation in King Felix Hernandez and Cliff Lee. Formidable stuff indeed, but enough to vault them past the halos?

For a real look at what the future holds for this years club I think there's a much more important set of combos to examine: the 3,4,5 hitters. As in Casey Kotchman (.742 career OPS, 21 homeruns over last 2 seasons) your 3 hitter , Milton Bradley (1 very good season with texas in '08 and a whole lot of mental instability) hitting cleanup and Ken Griffey jr. (he of the .214 average in '09) protecting him in the fifth hole. Yea , you read that right, thats the meat of the order.

But wait, there's more, as in the 3,4,5 starters in the rotation. Thier names are Ryan Rowland-Smith ( 11-7 career win-loss, though a respectable 3.62 ERA, 1.30 WHIP) Ian Snell ( 38-48, 4.71, 1.53) and one of a series of names that at this point looks like Doug Fister (3-4, 4.13, 1.28) yea you read that right too. At this point is there any reason to keep writing?

I will anyway. Keep in mind this is a team that ranked 17th in the league in home runs in '09 with 160, 84 behind the league leading Yankess and 28th in runs scored with 640, an unbelievable 275 behind New York, and decided not to resign their leading home run hitter in Russel Branyan (31 HR) and traded their highest upside pitcher, not named Felix, 2006 top pick Brandon Morrow (5th overall), not for help in the lineup, or in their starting rotation but for help in the bullpen (Brandon League) which was arguably one of last years biggest strengths.

On top of that they traded their top pick from 2007, Phillippe Aumont (11th overall) for one year of Lee, who according to reports had already priced himself out of the Phillies future plans, and their top pick from 2005, Jeff Clement (3rd overall) for Jack Wilson (career .268 AVG, .684 OPS) appearently all with an eye towards....winning it all this year? And for this they are being lauded throughout baseball for their shrewd moves and considered a threat to the Angels and Rangers?

This must be one of those situations where the real value lies somewhere outside the numbers because from where I'm sitting, it obviously dosn't lie within.

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