SEAside Thoughts: Mariners Hit Rock Bottom in Week 11

Mariners SEAside Thoughts: Week 11

“Hope begins in the dark”

-Anne Lamott

• The Seattle Mariners are closer to the worst record in all of baseball than a playoff spot…let that sink in.
• What started out as an eleven game homestand full of hope and promise has quickly devolved into bitter disappointment, and some very loud booing from the fans. As the great Galadriel said in The Lord of the Rings: “The quest stands upon the edge of a knife.” – That’s where the Mariners find themselves before we’ve even hit July.
• With the surprising AL Central-leading Minnesota Twins in town, there was one big thing that caught my eye.
  • It’s hard watching these Twins have such great success this season. This offseason, after an extremely disappointing 2021 season, the Twins went out and made a major trade and a major free agent signing to bolster their team. Sound familiar to Seattle?
  • While the Mariners have seen recent promise in their big free agent acquisition Robbie Ray and a mixed bag on their big off-season trade for Winker and Suarez, the Twins appear to have hit home runs on both of their big moves. Both Sonny Gray and Carlos Correa look like All-Star players and the Twins look like a postseason team.
    • Don’t forget that both were attainable to Seattle as well, and without having to throw out 10-12 years to convince them to come to Seattle. There’s no way around it: this is a bad look on ownership and the front office.

• Back to the baseball on the field. How about the starting pitching Seattle is putting out there right now? This week, the traditional starting pitchers threw 31 innings, allowing only 10 combined runs and five quality starts. It’s an absolute travesty that Seattle went 2-5 in their starts; this could have easily been a 6-1 swing. Either way, everyone in the rotation is looking strong right now, and to see Robbie Ray be as dominant as he’s been in the past two starts is exciting and encouraging.
• The reason Seattle went 3-8 on this homestand? The offense and its lack of depth. That was 2010 Seattle Mariners bad. Averaging barely over two runs a game just isn’t going to cut it.
• Getting shut out at home four times in your crucial eleven game homestand just isn’t going to cut it.
• Leading the league in runners left on base, and being absolutely horrendous with the bases loaded just isn’t going to cut it.
• The lineup continues to look lifeless when France, Julio, Suarez, and JP aren’t carrying the team. Injuries play a huge role in this, but the lack of depth and shortcomings of off-season additions make this hole Seattle dig themselves into far too big to try to climb out of.
• At the end of the day, Seattle played two playoff-caliber teams to start the homestand, and I believe those games were perfect indicators of where Seattle is right now. Seattle can be a playoff threat when everything is going great and the team is healthy. When there’s injuries or adversity, they’re just not deep enough and good enough.
• All those close losses, do those change if Haniger and Murphy are healthy? What if Winker hit like the back of his baseball card? Seattle was competitive, yes, they just aren’t good enough to gain ground on the Red Six and Twins right now.
• The Mariners season could very likely be done before we even hit July. That’d suck, but I also do believe that there are signs that this team could be better; they just need more help. Injury comebacks and Winker/Ray being themselves will surely help, but not to the level that Seattle hopefully wants to get to. They need more stars, plain and simple, and there will likely not be any of those types of additions made this summer. I believe while they may look worse than last year, they’re closer to contention even in these dark times.

• What I don’t like to see is when a team rolls over, and that’s what the final two games against the Angels looked like to me. After the brutal extra innings loss in Game 3, the Mariners clearly looked like a team ready to pack up the season. I was shocked to hear they had a special team meeting, and then go out and promptly lay an egg.
• I love Scott Servais, and I believe Jerry Dipoto and him are too close for Jerry to fire him. That being said, it’s been a bad month for Servais and he really needs to find a way to turn this thing around quickly. What we saw on Sunday was far from it. Even if the playoffs seem like a pipe dream now, it’s crucial the Mariners play better to help springboard into 2023.
• What I do like to see is more of those Seattle Steelhead unis. Those are some of the best in baseball. My belief is that if Seattle haven’t made the playoffs heading into their 50th season celebration, they should be forced to rebrand and become the Steelheads permanently.

• Mike Trout is our daddy.
• The Mariners are 29-39 and have 94 games left to play. If you’re still into the playoffs/desperate/hopeful/praying mindset, then Seattle needs to go 61-33 the rest of the way to get to 90 wins… and even that might not be enough.
• Their next 13 games are against teams under .500 and 10 of them against last place teams. Consider this to be Seattle’s Alamo. Anything worse than 9-4 and this goose is cooked.
• This week’s “Mariners Music Mojo” is Go Down Swinging by Skrizzly Adams.