When my husband was twenty-one, he showed up at Safeco field early to catch the Seattle Mariners’ batting practice prior to a game, in hopes that he would catch a ball. He sat in the left field area where the score board is. Sure enough, he wasn’t disappointed. His favorite player stepped up to the plate and swung. Ken Griffey Jr. hit a ball almost directly to him – the girl behind him wound up catching it and keeping it.

It’s no wonder that the Mariners would want to induct such a figure into their club’s Hall of Fame. After all, Griffey Jr. spent 22 years playing ball on the field – that’s a rather long run in the world of baseball. He started out as a young man of 20 in 1989 and continued to play his heart out for three teams over the course of his career: Seattle Mariners, Cincinnati Reds, and a short stint with the Chicago White Sox. Griffey Jr. was a thirteen-time All-Star, and he has the sixth largest record for career home runs (630 after Barry Bonds, Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, and Alex Rodriguez – strikeouts reflect my personal qualms over giving records to players with suspected steroid use – sure they hit the balls out of the park a bunch, but would they have done so otherwise?). (more…)

I know that a lot of people don’t pay attention to the All-Star selections anymore. Just because of how subjective it is and that ultimately a few guys get left off every year that should have been included. I get that, but there is the kid part of me that gets excited every year.

I do think the all-star game has lessened in … I guess the word is anticipation, in the last few years. I think some of that has come due to the fact that there is inter league play. We get to see Albert Pujols face off against Justin Verlander, you get to see Felix Hernandez versus Justin Upton, Josh Johnson face off against Evan Longoria. Now those once a year or even once in a life time match-ups occur every few years.

It deadens the excitement to a degree. But again, that 11-year-old baseball nut inside of me can’t wait for a Mariano Rivera vs. Hunter Pence or Jose Reyes match up (two of the best hitters in the national league against cutters).

I don’t care about the who gets home field advantage in the World Series because, lets face it home field advantage means less in baseball than in any other sport, but I will always care about the match-ups. Seeing multiple hall-of-famers on the same field at the same time gives me goose bumps.

Remembering that Ken Griffey jr. hit a long home run off Greg Maddux in 1992 or the epic match up where Curt Schilling stuck out Alex Rodriguez and Ken Griffey Jr. back-to-back with a runner (Brady Anderson) in scoring position.  Then of course there is the Randy Johnson strike out against John Kruk and the Ichiro Suzuki inside the park home run in San Fransisco or the epic Randy Johnson versus Ichiro match up in 2001.

The point is there are tons of different memories and while the game and the players specifically aren’t important there are plenty of moments that will last for a life time.

There is no point in making a big deal for one play or another that should have been chosen. We had our chance as fans to make our voice heard. Now it’s over and time to at least enjoy the game.

Congrats to Brandon League and Felix Hernandez. It’s going to be fun to see what they can do as well as what happens in the game.

Mariners fans should still feel this way.

The longer I watch, write about, and discuss baseball with my peers, the more confused I become by the knee-jerk reaction crowd. After last season, I heard countless callers, and saw many comments around the blogosphere where people were asking why Jack Zduriencik’s job was secure after such a terrible losing season with an absolutely abysmal offense and a clubhouse full of cliques. I’m going to sound like a jerk here, but all I could think was “What is wrong with all of you?!”

While the 2009 Mariners only overachieved by a few games, fans have yet to grasp the magnitude of just how much the 2010 Mariners underperformed. Sure, the acquisitions of Milton Bradley, Chone Figgins, and the re-signing of Ken Griffey, Jr. didn’t inspire visions of winning the world series, but trading three mediocre prospects for Cliff Lee certainly enthused the fan base. The Lee trade was essentially what launched “believe big” marketing campaign, and for good reason. Let’s take a look at the big acquisitions for 2010′s team, and compare their 2009 and 2010 WAR. 2009 WAR is first, with 2010 WAR in parenthesis.

Casey Kotchman: 1.0 (-1.1)
Chone Figgins: 6.1 (0.6)
Milton Bradley: 1.1 (-0.1) [Was worth 4.6 WAR in 2008]
Cliff Lee: 6.6 (7.1–traded mid-season)

Pretty atrocious. It’s hard to really criticize Zduriencik for not predicting that the position players he acquired would severely underperform relative even to just the season before. It would have been foolish to expect Kotchman to become better than in 2009, however, it is equally foolish to believe that he would become perhaps the MLB’s worst regular player just a year later. While Figgins was not going to produce 6 WAR again, it would have been ridiculous to expect him to fall that far off the cliff. Bradley’s 1.1 WAR in 2009 could partially be explained by injuries, and while durability is a skill, Bradley still was a decent hitter in 2009. To have expected him to be a negative value player in 2010 would have been absurd as well. Cliff Lee being traded was largely necessary because of the underperforamnce of those three players.

It’s not just the new acquisitions that underperformed, though. Let’s take a look at some returning players from 2009′s squad.

Ken Griffey, Jr.: 0.3 (-0.8)
Jose Lopez: 2.6 (0.7)
Franklin Gutierrez: 6.1 (2.3)
Jack Wilson: 2.0 (0.0)
Rob Johnson: 0.8 (0.4)

Again, it’s hard to imagine all of these players would have fallen this far off of the map. While it could have been seen that Junior may fall off a cliff due to his age, he wasn’t really being counted on to be a great hitter. Regardless, -0.8 WAR in just 33 games is worse than most would have expected. Lopez wasn’t going to hit 25 homers again, but losing almost 2 WAR in value while entering his physical prime could not have been predicted. Gutierrez’s fall, while disappointing, was a bit more predictable, but he was still a valuable player.

This group of players (not counting Lee, since he was traded, and I don’t have his Mariner-only WAR numbers) was worth 20 wins in 2009. These same players were worth 2 WAR in 2010. These players’ production fell 18 wins in just one season, with only one of them, Griffey, really being a candidate for precipitous decline. If anyone can rationally explain to me how a general manager could predict that, well, I’d love to hear it.

When looking at the current roster, rich in young developing talent, and the minor league system, which is far deeper than it ever was in the Bavasi era, it’s hard for me not to give Zduriencik a total free pass on 2010. With neutral luck, Zduriencik’s team should perform markedly better in 2011, and hopefully end speculation that his job is in danger.