No, not “Lindy v. Dan = Over”: “Pitchers and Catchers Report.”
That means Spring Training has begun. A tradition that dates back to when professional baseball players were so poorly paid that they had to have off-season jobs, some of which involved sitting on their asses and not being in shape to play (not that there’s anything wrong with that . . . unless you’re paid to be in shape). Nowadays, Spring Training is primarily about deciding which over-paid veterans will not lose their jobs, which highly-talented minor-leaguers will be held back until May so they cannot become arbitration-eligible until their fourth year in the League, or free agents until their seventh year in the League, and which marginal players will be used to balance the team’s budget in the meantime.
So, time for some Mariners. If this year is anything like last year, I’ll do my best to add sports content to Slog, and then lose momentum, get busy, and give up sometime in July.
Sort of like Milton Bradley’s 2010 season for the Mariners.
But meanwhile, just to piss y’all off even more, Dave Van Dyck (baseball writer at the Chicago Tribune) says this is the only way that the Mariners can make the post-season:
Playoffs coming if … the other three teams secede from the West. Recovering from 101 losses to claim a division is an impossibility.
Well, OK, what other factors might come into play?
Uh, well, Eric Wedge, the new Mariners skipper, managed Milton back in the day. It didn’t go so well, as Milton once appeared in the Cleveland clubhouse wearing a t-shirt that read “Fuck Erick Wedge.” Bradley claims to be over it.
Nonetheless, the M’s own website says:
Will they roll the dice again with Milton Bradley?
There are 12 million reasons why veteran outfielder Milton Bradley might be kept on the Mariners’ roster, given that’s the dollar figure on the final year of his guaranteed contract. There’s also the fact that Bradley — if healthy and right — offers much-needed offense to a team that can use all of that it can get. But he played just 73 games in ’10 due to a stint on the restricted list and eventually a knee problem, hitting .205 with a .292 on-base percentage, both about 70 points off his career norms. The Mariners say they’re ready to give Bradley another shot despite an ’04 run-in with Wedge that got him run out of Cleveland. Whether the much-traveled Bradley ultimately is worth the trouble remains to be seen.
So, many things that are in play remain to be seen. But clearly, the slingers of cliches in play that remain to be seen are already in mid-season form. Myself, I look forward to seeing the M’s live in Spring Training (any Slog readers who plan to be in Arizona between March 21-25, get in touch: we can heckle Milton together! I’ve got tickets for the Friday March 25 game at Ho Ho Kam and might have an extra).
Also, as many Sports-savvy Slog commenters have pointed out, last year, Milton was the least of the Mariners’ problems. Ken Griffey Jr. was a much bigger problem, with his sentimental refusal to just, you know, get out while the getting was good. Until he did. So thank God that Junior—a first-ballot Hall of Famer in my book, just for the record--is going to be a consultant for the M’s. That should help come 2015 or so.
Pitchers and Catchers Report. Cynics and Stoics have been in Spring Training forever. And yes, the Cubs will suck this year.
Well, 413 comments on the Seattle Times article here and the only Slog post since is about baseball. Y’all are disappointing me.
NO FAT CHICKS ALLOWED!
Hohokam
At least I’m expecting the M’s to be terrible this year. Nothing’s worse than going into a season with relatively high hopes, only to have them dashed on the rocks of historically bad offense.
Well, the Rays came out of the AL east and went to the world series a year after losing 96 games, so I’d say it isn’t impossible for the Ms to at least make the playoffs.
“And yes, the Cubs will suck this year.”
But not as bad as the Mariners.
As a fellow Cub fan: yes, our baseball club will suck this year. It’s never too early to say “Wait ’til next year…”
Will be a tough season for M’s fans. On the field, plus missing the voice of Dave N on the radio.
And Bradley will be a dead man walking by the time the 25th rolls around.
to steal one from milton bradley, “FUCK ken griffey JUNIOR”. this from an M’s fan of thirty years. kenny is a CHOKE.
You know, just a few years ago the M’s were the third-richest team in all of baseball, in terms of revenue, and the fourth-richest in all of American sports — only the Yankees, Redskins, and Red Sox (barely) were higher than us on the Deloitte Touche ranking. Cowboys, Mets, Dodgers — couldn’t come near us.
But our payroll never kept pace with the big boys, and even when it did, it mostly went to poorly-judged elderly has-beens instead of good players. And we stunk. The ten-year decline in the M’s has taken place in one of the richest income environments in sports history.
Now, of course, the crowds are less than half what they were, and that income ranking is way down there. But we still have a respectable payroll, if not a top-tier one; but now we’re giving the money to….whom, exactly? David Aardsma? We have one guy on the team who can hit (who’s 37) and one guy who can pitch. A few guys here and there who can play defense. But we still think like a small-money team, just as we did in the wealthy days, so we’ll never improve the club by more than a WAR here and a half a WAR there. And we’ll lose ninety games.
If it wasn’t for the sheer luck of drafting Griffey and Rodriguez, and a fortuitous trade for Randy Johnson, this club never would have had so much as a winning record, after 35 years.
So why do I care again?
Sweet sweet words indeed. Bradley must have some serious dirt on Mariners brass. Spill it Milton!
“Lindy v. Dan = Over” should count as three words or five words, so the premise is faulty.
Maybe Griffey will come out of retirement just like Baseball’s-Worst-Hall-Of-Famer Ryne Sandberg did.
@10 Have a little faith in Jack Z. Give the man some time.
Fnarf: Ichiro. That’s why. Not why we think the team will be great or even good, but why we keep paying attention.
@10 Fnarf – The M’s were shopping Aardsma before his hip problem was found. Expect to see him showcased whenever he comes back and then quickly moved for prospects. Jack Z is definitely not committed to him.
As an aside, the funniest comment about Aardsma I’ve seen came from someone hating on him for making a major league roster and replacing Hank Aaron as the first entry in the Baseball Almanac. So we can keep bitching about him even after he’s gone.
Griffy back as a consultant? On what? The best places to snooze in Safeco? What are Lincoln and Armstrong going to do next? Charge us 10 bucks to watch him sit in a rocking chair?
Griffey as a consultant is pretty funny. You would be hard pressed to find a HOFer from the past 50 years who put as little effort into the job as Griffey. The amazing thing is that, despite barely trying half the time, the guy was one of the best in the game. Imagine what he could have done if he studied pitchers like Bonds did, or baserunning like Rickey. He was a guess hitter with a perfect swing and a speedster who never learned to slide. He also apparently never learned to stretch or workout very hard. I’m not exactly sure what legitimate baseball skill he is qualified to teach.
It’s really just a PR job, a way to halt the exodus of advertizing clients from a sinking ship. We have to assume that Junior got his mommy & daddy to OK this, as everything he’s done has been about “family”. Junior indeed.
Junior INDEED!