Preview: Seattle @ Detroit

First off, I understand that everyone is going to be looking forward to the game on Wednesday night against Jarrod Washburn, and with good right. Jarrod played in Seattle for almost four years. That’s along time to spend in a given place, even more so in a time of baseball where players are constantly moving from city to city. The game will even have some heart string attached emotion because this year Washburn has given us his single best career performance. which we then rightfully turned around and sold to the highest bidder (Which was the right move to make) the Detroit Tigers.

Since the wavier dead-line, Jarrod Washburn has struggled. Us here at Sodo Mojo are not surprised. In the eternal words of Morpheus in the Matrix, “Welcome to the real world”.

The series will feature two teams that have had poor offensesive production and have been rather lack luster all season. So far the games between the two teams have all be rather close. We are going to be in store for some great pitching match ups that are going to look even better with these offenses. I’m sure Griffin or Cody will be putting up some reflecting blogs during the post game.

Regardless of what type of playoff hopes the Mariners have. If they want to win more than just the game Felix throws, they are going to need a strong outing by either Ian Snell or Ryan Rowland-Smith (I’m betting on Rowland-Smith). Beltre will be out for the series but Jack Wilson who sat the bench through the Yankee series, due to the cat. 1 tear in his hamstring, should be able to get the start on Tuesday.

The real need and concern is must have quality starts from their pitching with a solid defense backing them up. Even more so they need their relief pitchers not to relinquish leads in the late innings, and being well rested they should put up some solid innings. It seems like we get one or the other. Strong outing by our starters with lame relief or we get lame outings by out starters with strong relief performances from the bullpen. We need both. Because we want to win more than just the one game

Tigers vs. Mariner: Team Preview

Position Players

Going through all these rosters really has shown me that we are a better offensive team than what I had thought and while we do struggle bringing runners home from scoring position we are making baby steps forward, and progress is progress.

They have a better infield than us even with Jack Wilson and Adrian Beltre in the line-up I think they are a shade better. Polanco, Inge and Cabrera are amazing pieces in their line-up. However, our Outfield is quickly becoming one of the very best in baseball between Gutierrez in Center, Ichiro in Right field and the young Saunders in left. The Tigers aren’t terrible with Granderson in center but have an average left fielder in Thomas and Magglio is either having a VERY off year or is showing considerable career decline.

I really don’t care for their recent transaction of Aubrey Huff. I don’t think he will add anything extra to this lineup that isn’t already there. He is however an upgrade off the bench in a bench hitting situation, and considering what they gave up for him. It didn’t cost them much of anything to bring him aboard. really good article right here about the trade. Made me laugh as I share similar thoughts.

Some really excellent match-ups this series. We miss out on Justin Verlander who is pitching very well as we start to roll into the late part of the season. I really like the young match-up of Porcello and Hernandez tonight as well as the Edwin Jackson, RR-S game 3. However, the game I am most looking forward to is the Ian Snell, Jarrod Washburn game.

Yeah, picking game 2  sounds pretty typical, but really I have other motives than to see if Washburn beans Ichiro. The thing I am most looking forward to is the fact both pitchers have recently been acquired by their perspective teams and both have struggled since the trade. In his defense, Snell didn’t pitch badly in Texas, however he hasn’t had a real solid start yet. Washburn on the other hand has pitch rather poorly and has looked nothing like the guy who was in a Seattle Uniform less than 3 weeks ago.

Fading back to Ian Snell, his fastball hasn’t been that bad. Its just been all about the location. If he can start locating his fastball, its going to make his awesome off-speed stuff work so much better. Unfortunately it doesn’t work to good when your location is completely off.

Honestly when looking through the Detroit bullpen i ran into Frenando Rodney, keep your eye on this one. A free agent at the end of the year. Should Detroit let this guy go, I wouldn’t mind having him around.

Someone i neglected to mention during my Yankees-Mariners post series review was that Sean White pitched very well in his 2 innings of work. 2IP 2H 4 SO 0BB … I like that type of line.

I say Mariners take 2 out of 3. I’m feeling kind of optimistic at this point. Really I don’t know why and I honestly have zero reason to be, maybe because it’s Felix day.

Happy Felix Day, Seattle fans!