U.S.S. Mariner

Confirmation links to follow.
Guillermo Quiroz got pushed out in the Blue Jays catcher battle, and the M’s picked him up, presumably to back up while Rivera seasons in the minors. Quiroz is 24, right-handed, and hasn’t hit well since 2003, when he put up a stellar season in AA. Since then he’s bounced between levels [...]

Two days left until the big event at Safeco Field, and we still have some spots available. If you’re interested in attending, the information is below. The only difference for late registrars is that we cannot guarantee you that we’ll have snacks for you, since I already placed the food quantity order. [...]

Unnoticed as the televised match featured the M’s beating the Dodgers in Las Vegas (booth interview with some guy from the Chamber of Commerce or something, presumably hired goons had producer/engineer Kevin Cremin in the desert somewhere, with a gun on him) was the ugly performance of Pineiro, who went six innings, gave up ten [...]

The Rainiers v Mariners exhibition game Saturday would be played at Safeco and would be free! free! free! to all fans if it’s rained out in Tacoma.
“Hopefully, the game between Mariners and Rainiers will be played as scheduled at Cheney Stadium on Saturday, and every attempt will be made do so. We appreciate the interest [...]

…by Baseball America.
“Utter lack of pitching prospects has roots in run of poor drafts in late 1990s, early 2000s.”
or, as the in-depth look writes:
“By contrast, Seattle’s 1998-2002 were extremely barren, peaking with Willie Bloomquist and featuring a series of expensive reaches such as Michael Garciaparra and Sam Hays.”
Owwwwwwwwwwww.
To look on the upside, I’ll say this [...]

Dave covered the many roster moves. Only one got articles written up. Petagine’s on the roster, occupying the Dave Hansen/Greg Dobbs spot. PI, Times, Tribune.
There’s a split-squad game v San Diego @ 11 and a split-squad game v the Dodgers in Vegas that’ll be on TV at 7. It’d be shocking if they didn’t send [...]

Moves:
Nageotte and Morse optioned to Tacoma.
Appier, Atchison, Cruceta, Green, Dobbs, Morban, Ransom, Jones, and Miller reassigned to minor league camp.
Summation:
The last two bullpen spots are down to a fight between Jake Woods, Luis Gonzalez, Jeff Harris, and Emiliano Fruto. Harris is the only non-roster player on the list, so he’s [...]

PI: Random notebook stuff, including this cool tidbit:
Rafael Soriano was warming up in the bottom of the third inning when Betancourt homered into the bullpen. Without stepping off the mound, Soriano caught the ball on the fly, flipped the ball into the stands and continued warming up.
Both Beltre and Sexson should be sluggers, but one [...]

“And now I must leave — for no raisin!” — Giant Brain
Ryan Church got tossed off the Nationals. Church is a 27-year old, left-handed-hitting outfielder who can play center field fine and is good defensively in the corners.
A while ago, I was bitching about the M’s roster makeup and how their bench choices as discussed [...]

Times: Lopez “makes most of 2nd chance“… at second, get it?
They shot some X-rays through King Felix’s leg. Looks fine [PI].
That’s it: two stories.
Update! The Seattle Times is reporting Reed’s wrist isn’t broken. The fracture they saw on the X-rays was an old injury.