A Few Notes and an Apology

First off, I hereby apologize to our loyal readers for my month-long absence from blogging.  I was off doing music-related things in New York, and, as all of you sports fans know, that validates anything because ESPN loves New York.  Is this sarcasm?

With that out of the way, I’d like to present a few thoughts in bullet-point form.

• As a team, the Mariners are hitting .237.  This will improve next year when Jose Lopez is no longer a Mariner, Dustin Ackley is playing second, and Justin Smoak remembers that he is good at baseball.  Already this team looks a whole lot better as soon as 2010 is over.
• Michael Saunders is hitting .222/.297/.401 with 8 homers and a positive UZR value.  For reference, this is significantly better than 2010 Ken Griffey, Jr.  Saunders is continuing to progress, and I’m really not worried about his development just yet.  But keep this in mind: the M’s do have another left-field option in Greg Halman, should Saunders turn out a complete bust (which is very unlikely).
• The Mariners have hit 108 less home runs than the Toronto Blue Jays.  The M’s are also last in the league in doubles and second-to-last in three-baggers.
• On a positive note, the M’s are fifth-best in the league at avoiding double plays.  Oh wait, you can’t hit into a double play if there isn’t a runner on first.  So I guess this bullet point isn’t very positive at all.

A fact: Jack Zduriencik needs to pull off a string of excellent deals to put the M’s in position to contend in 2011.  Another fact: Doing so will be mighty difficult.  It is not my intent to be a needless pessimist in this post.  However, reality is reality, and the M’s are probably looking at another mediocre season – albeit one with more highlights than this one.