Game 66, Mariners at Athletics
DMZ · June 13, 2006 at 6:30 pm · Filed Under Game Threads
LHP Jamie Moyer v RHP Joe Blanton.
This series is going to be an interesting test. The M’s may have played better than their record, but if they want to move up in the division, they’re going to need to climb over the A’s and Texas. Getting wins here would be big. Can the pitchers continue their success against a team that so far is even worse offensively than the Twins? Can they keep hitting against a staff way, way better than Angels, the Royals, or the Twins?
Blanton vs the M’s so far this year: 2-0, 1.20 ERA, 15 IP, 9H, 0 HR, 1 BB, 8 K.
Moyer vs. the A’s so far: 0-2, 6.17 ERA, 11.2 IP, 17 H, 1 HR, 4 BB, 8 K.
Comments
170 Responses to “Game 66, Mariners at Athletics”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
USSM uses and recommends
Let’s certainly hope so
am I the only one who gets the feeling that this series will really go a long ways to defining the M’s season?
Note: Jose Lopez has moved into the Top 5 in AL 2B All-Star Game Voting. He obviously deserves the start, but with Ozzie Guillen picking reserves, he might not even get a spot on the bench.
#1, No. Also, I think I would move Beltre to # 7 or 8, his swing and approach at the plate is not #2. I would move Lopez back to 2 because he is capable of hitting behind the runner. I would move Ibanez to 3, Sexson 4 and take your pick from there.
I agree derek,
M’s hitting will be the key. we’re going to give up 4 runs, the question is, can we get 5?
if we get swept, we will really struggle to recover (doom + gloom)
if we take 2 or 3 games, we’ll *really* start believing, and things may look up and up and up from there (happyX2 + joyX2)
ichiro will need to keep getting on base to keep the dream alive in oakland.
/ramble
I follow the Mariners year round so I really don’t fit the description of a bandwagon fan. However I can say that my game time enthusiasm for this team has been relatively low for 2 to 3 years now. But this is the first non-Felix game that I am truly excited about in a long time. I don’t expect the Mariners to win this series. But if somehow they do, then my enthusiasm goes up yet another notch.
So Harden’s out for at least a couple of months, Thomas probably won’t be in the lineup tonight after “tweaking his quad,” and they have a black hole batting at second base (.216, three homers, 17 RBIs) even by their low offensive standards.
Despite their sweep of the Yankees (which probably says more about the state of the Yankees with all their injuries than it does the A’s), the A’s are vulnerable
I’m not sure I buy “deserves the start” based on less than a half-season. Sure, he’s the best 2B so far, but that’s not what the All Star Game is about. I get annoyed when the All Star Game becomes the “All First Third of a Season Game”. Especially when that’s really all a player has. Lopez is not actually a star yet. And at the very least, shouldn’t the last half of last year count as much as the first half of this one? Am I wrong?
Wow, anybody watching the Bosox/Twins game? Schilling vs Santana:
Schilling: 7ip, 5 hits, 1 run (earned – solo HR by Cuddyer), 1BB, 5K
Santana: 7ip, 3 hits, 1 run (earned – solo HR by Varitek), 0 BB, 13 K
Santana’s 13th K (of Ortiz) was also his 1000th career K
Talk about your pitching duel….
Well, that was an underwhelming first inning…
Hendu on the ‘averages average out’ kick again…I hope it doesn’t last 3 innings again.
Tap, tap, tap… this thing on? Bueller?
Is everybody watching basketball or world cup rebroadcasts or something? Oh, wait, it must be Stanley Cup….
The umpire just screwed Moyer right there.
Struck Swisher out.
12 – even the A’s announcers agree with you.
He escaped.
How many pitches will Blanton use to shut out the M’s tonight?
I’m going with 103.
>>because he is capable of hitting behind the runner
If there is a more overrated hitting skill than the ability of a number two hitter to hit behind the runner, I can’t think what it is.
I think everyone’s watching the NBA finals. Heh. Basketball.
Oh, is that still a sport?
Is that the one with big round orange ball? I don’t get it.
Wow, what a terrible call by Dave there.
That was a very creative route for Bradley.
Basketball in June… I don’t get it unless the SuperSonics are actually playing some of the games.
He did hit that extremely high.
What was the exchange from earlier in the year?
“A bunch of oversized freaks run down to one end, jump around, and then all run to the other end, and repeat”
“To be fair, not all of them are oversized freaks. And not all of them jump.”
“But enough about the Nicks.” Ba-dum-dum.
Nice to see other teams make bad base running mistakes.
re: #19
Are you at the game?
Wow. Hargrove rubbing off on the A’s.
That was a very creative route for Bradley.
Yeah, very Ibanez-esque.
And then Ibanez makes a nice play. That’ll learn me.
That was just BAD.
I think Randy Winn could have thrown him out. Bloomquist would have made it.
He thought he was Willie Bloomquist? Perfect!
Nah, screw the NBA finals.
I’m watching the M’s while trying to write a scholarship essay due by Friday, and cramming for two finals on Thursday.
Somebody needs to force the Mariners 2-9 hitters to watch a 1000 of Olerud’s and Edgar’s at bats.
That we can’t hit Blanton drives me crazy.
So I guess that’s the game, eh?
he certainly has the M’s number, for whatever reason– whereas the Rangers love to see him coming….
Kurkjian was on KJR earlier and was asked about a piece he’d done on greenies — he talked a bit about the general belief that it will be noticible as the summer wears on and some guys start to wear down where they hadn’t before, and then he had an interesting quote from an unnamed AL manager, who thought that another effect of guys not using might be felt “by pitchers like Jamie Moyer who use a batter’s emotion against them” — that an unhopped up hitter would take more pitches and be more effective… not that any of the A’s have ever needed help against Moyer.
I think these guys are just getting caught up in World Cup fever and trying to emulate the scoring in soccer.
Yeah. If we could just hit the league average against him, that would be 11 hits if he went the whole game, 27 outs. The M’s don’t look like they’ll get even 4 hits.
For any of you outside the M’s local market, this game is on HD on the INHD channel. The groundouts and non-hitting of these two teams looks spectacular in Hi-Def.
Joe Blanton would be three innings from a no hitter if Carl Everett wasn’t on the team.
I wonder if we’re getting a better quality feed on the non-HDTV channel because it looks extra sharp on digital cable/FSN tonight. But baseball in true HD is a great experience.
#37 – Damn, and I’m stuck in my damn hotel room IN Seattle without the game on.
#40 Haha, you must be staying at where I work…
That was a questionable called 3rd strike on Beltre according to my ultra-sharp tv picture (no broadcast in Seattle tonight?)
#40 Wait, that’s only possible if you’re on dialup
Mr Thomsen is pretty damn good. DJC in Seattle and games Thursday.
I wouldn’t even follow Mariners if USSM didn’t exsist.
Yeah, staying at the damn W and they don’t have the game. and yeah, I could get mlbtv but so far it doesn’t seem like its worth it tonight.
DJC?
ok, wierd. I just let the machine pick up (ground-outs being so fascinating) and found it was one of those phone spams — only this time not for a particular political candidate, but a call from Carmen Electra (?!) shilling for some website. This I don’t need. (well, I don’t need councilmen telling me who to vote for, either, but sheesh)
Jose Lopez reminds me, Phil Rogers has him as the guy who should be the All Star AL 2B
heh, 45 posts heading into the 7th.
we must be getting shut out.
I want them to hit the ball so very badly.
The only thing I can figure as to why the M’s cannot hit Blanton is the uniform on his back. It’s as if Blanton turns into who he potentially could be when facing the M’s (or KC but who doesn’t against them?). 2 hits through 7 innings and none of them by Ichiro? Huh…strange.
they are hitting the ball so very badly.
I love how Ichiro! wasn’t on the list of guys that should be on the All-star squad even though earlier in the article he was talking about how only Ichiro had a higher BA than Mauer in June.
#45 Why aren’t you at a bar? Not that it matters, by the time you’d get there, the game (and postgame for that matter) would be over…
#51– yah, but Raul gets a look in there
Oh, and why is Oakland’s best (current) hitter batting 7th? is Hargrove Managing the A’s now too? what kind of logic is that?
Where in Seattle are you ever *that* far from a bar?
Yeah, just got done with dinner with a co-worker and I didn’t think the game would be this far over this quick
I also don’t know any bars around here that are actually fun to watch the game at, and I refuse to go to Fox Sports Grill
So, as usual the media will look for “evidence” that suits their case, and will construct it out of a million things that could easily be explained by a million other things — in other words, out of pure nothing. Whatever happens, I guarantee you it will be used to support the story they have already written.
Looks like Kenji’s still got considerable spring in those legs.
It’s a damn good thing the A’s don’t have much of an offense, eh?
well there goes this game. M’s can’t do anything against Oakland.
Well, Moyer left 3 on with nobody out in the 7th which along with the home-run is about as good as you can hope for I guess. Sherrill gets out allowing only 1 run (force at home, basehit scores a run, and then a double-play for those of you who are tv deprived). 2-0 A’s going to the 8th. But we’re back to looking like the Little Sisters of Charity at the plate so I’m not hopeful.
3-0, two scored on that hit.
Boy, FSN hasn’t allowed that 3rd run yet.
Since Kenji got a hit, Grover will now bunt Reed, thus wasting an out for ‘a runner in scoring position.”
#62– I’m guessing the nuns hit better.
Only 1 scored on the hit
Huh, I was about to reply saying that it’s actually 3-0 and two runs scored on that single but it appears that MLB Gameday is way off.
Not that 2-0 is all that much better than 3-0, the way our offense is looking tonight.
Reed flies out makkng 2 down in the 8th. Johjima on 1st.
The only bright spot I can see here is that we’re getting boned in near record time which somewhat eases the pain.
It’s a pretty common occurrence in all media these days… print, television, sports, news, politics, etc. Define a storyline or narrative and then fit all stories into the narrative. Over-report all stories that fit into the narrative. Under-report or don’t report at all on stories that don’t fit the narrative.
Oakland is pure kryptonite to the Mariners. Somethings just never change.
71….yup, except it’s even more obvious when done in sports.
#57– ordinarily, I’d say Kells, which is about 4 blocks towards the water, but I’m guessing it is all soccer all the time down there right now…. although it’s the middle of the night in Germany, right? so maybe they’d have the ballgame on….
I love the ESPN “3-0″ and the MLB.com “2-0″ ‘gamedays’ too funny.
I’ll probably have to find a place to watch the game on thursday
Either score appears to be insurmountable for the team tonight.
1-0 looked insurmountable.
Blanton is 3 hitting the Ms going into the 9th. We’re being mangled by a fat f**kin’ hillbilly with grease spots on his cap. Since we can’t beat the sob, nothing to do but get personal.
Blanton is at 88 pitches. I predicted it would take him 103 to shut out the Mariners, so that is what I’m rooting for.
Yeah it certainly does. Which makes me wonder, will Joe “Cy Young” Blanton get to go out for the 9th or will Huston Street be closing it out.
Ichiro gets his mandatory hit anyway.
guess “Cy” gets to go in after all…
If you have ANYONE bunt, bunt with Beltre.
If you bunt with Lopez, I will ring your freaking neck Hargrove.
Look at that cap. I swear the CDC should impound the damned thing.
Wow! I just got home and it’s dead in here tonight. Has the game really been that bad?
The Ichiro hit is nice. Down by 2, there’s NO NEED to bunt (like there ever is).
Well, color me happily suprised.
Beltre belts a double. Nobody out, runners at 2nd and 3rd.
Oh settle down.
Beltre!
“Cap Decency Committee”???
holy crap
Something bad is going to happen.
all right, not even two hours in and Blanton has this game all wrapped around his finger. who didn’t see it coming?
just curious, nobody’s done this post yet, so let’s compare tonight’s game’s rosters and see who you’d rather have:
1B- Swisher/Sexson: Oh, without a doubt, Swisher. I see him being a pin in the M’s sdie for a long, long time/
2B- Lopez/Scutaro. Heh.
SS- Betancourt/Crosby. It’s a toss-up. Both have great potential, with Crosby offering in power what Yuni provides in defense.
3B- Beltre/Chavez. Heh.
LF- Ibanez/Payton. Ibanez.
CF- Reed/Kotsay. Tempted to call it a toss-up, siding towards Reed due to his youth but Kotsay’s a gamer.
RF- Suzuki/Bradley. Not to put Bradley down, but… heh.
C- Johjima/Kendall. Obviously Kenji, but if he continues to put as much wear on his legs he’ll end up hitting like Kendall.
DH- Everett/Thomas. Definitely the Hurt.
Did Beltre just line a shot into the left field and put the tying runners in scoring position?
over/under on the M’s scoring a run this inning?
Exit Joe Blanton: stage left. Beltre 2b. Now is the time for 2 runs to score. but of course, Street will come in and strike out the side.
Tsk tsk.
Blanton is going to get soap in his mouth for that naughty word he just uttered.
Getting that fat greasehat out of the game is the best thing Beltre has done all season. Bravo.
“Cap Decency Committee�??
Center for Disease Control.
Wait … Gamecast has teh score 3 – 0 … is it actually 2 – 0 (because they also show -1 runs in the 8th inning, after showing 2 in the 7th)
Based loaded nobody out in the 9th. Now you *know* we’re going down.
Ok, please let us not blow this. PLEASE!
Can this be? Basebs loaded, no outs?
Anyone remember that 1-0 game the M’s won agaisnt the A’s a couple years back by a balk from Duscherer?
HBP? wow, is Lopez turning into Carlos Baerga? God, I hope not.
#94 – What about pitching?
One down, two to go.
Called 3rd strike on Raul. That’s one down.
Yes, it’s 2-0. ESPN programmers got it wrong (again).
Are we trying to set a record for bases loaded/ no out futility?
Thanks for the correction.
crap. crap. crap.
104- hm. that’s a tough one. what good would Blanton be on the Mariners if he can never pitch AGAINST the Marienrs?
Well, I predicted 3 ks. that stil can happen (oh, please score ONE run).
Sexson has to be up next.
What are the chances of Sexson getting a hit?
Negative something?
#102 Of course I remeber that game. That’s when I learned about balks.
#108– haven’t they already done that?
“He’s got the bases drunk.” Don’t think I ever recall hearing that one before.
Sexson blows
two done one to go.
I’m sooo glad I turned this game on. So glad.
Sexon dives for one in the dirt. That’s 2 out.
Next. K. UGH.
Pitiful.
… sigh
why let Everett bat? why? WHY?
#111 – That’s very true. Can he pitch well against any other AL team? Or is it just us that he has figured out?
Game. Set. Match.
At least that was quick.
Well, our pitching was maintained, but we showed that we can’t hit “better” pitching.
#117. this is Huston Street, of course.
WHY?!?! What about bases loaded/no outs causes us to do this? It’s even affecting my softball team now. Sheesh.
Well, that 9th inning was especially painful to watch.
according to Yahoo!, Beltre was the ‘top batter’ of the game for the M’s.
How predictable.
And Carl is number 3.
2 hours and 6 minutes of Mariner fun. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have to go get mocked by my friends from the Bay area.
125, Blanton pitched his only CG SO against KC.
Why, oh why, did I turn the game on?!?
A fitting post-game commercial.
No, Richie. No you most certainly do NOT hit the ball a country mile.
#124– who are you going to have bat instead? (well, if you are Hargrove, of course)
That’s a depressing loss. And way too short of a game. I tuned it on while I was driving through Cottonwood and the game ended about 5 minutes after I checked into my hotel in Colfax. (on my way to Seattle)
We suck.
This one, with the tease in the ninth, was painful, but expected. Does this kind of ineptitude with the bases loaded happen to any other teams? It sure does not seem that way.
Who says baseball isn’t educational. I had no idea Colfax had a hotel.
remember how they used to say some Mariners had Safeco in their heads? I think this group of M’s have MacAfee in their heads– they just do nothing down here lately, and Moyer gave them as good as you’re going to get from him against Oakland, esp. in Oakland.
Red just helpfully let us know that Blanton is 2-6 with a .750 ERA against everyone not in a Mariner uni. so, how many points did his ERA drop after this game?
It’s a very nice Best Western.
138- The answer to that question is obvious.
WFB, of course. He would’ve provided a “gritty” two-run single, thus guaranteeing an extended streak of starting in CF, and the front office signing him to another extension….
Polish??? she was Angie Marzetta in her UDub/Silver Bullet days….
One would guess DMZ would post a meet Saturday or Sunday for newly graduated Mr Corcoran. UPS accepted Mr Corcoran really?
Okay. Honorary Polish Princess. Just vote.
I’m guessing none of the other eligible anchors were high-school linebackers, or led their NCAA division in stolen bases, or were the first Silver Bullet to charge the mound after being plunked by a pitch ….
I also don’t know any bars around here that are actually fun to watch the game at, and I refuse to go to Fox Sports
Well, I like to go hang at the bar at Maneki. They don’t have much of a TV, but where else can you sit with half a dozen tiny ancient Japanese ladies as they knock back beer and sake and cheer Ichiro (and curse the other team) in Japanese? It’s hilarious, even the bartender is a lady over 70. The sushi’s pretty good too.
#135 – Thats great to hear. We’re just a smidgen better than KC. Wow.
#141 – I didn’t know that either. I live in Idaho and I drive through Colfax regularly.
#146: It was Angie Arlotti. Worst. Name. Change. Ever.
Almost as bad as this game. I’m mostly mad at Ibanez for looking at strike three. Bases loaded you go down swinging.
#151– Angie Marzetta (daughter of Dante Marzetta) Arlati (from her 1st husband, one-time UW tennis player & now tennis coach Ornello Arlati) Mentink (from Jarrett Mentink, 2nd husband & father of her son, children’s author with a Ph D in Ed., formerly an asst. basketball coach at SPU & head coach at Todd Beamer High School)
Angie cracks me up … I mean, there was the whole move from high school football team manager to player … in JuCo she was a right-handed hitter playing 3rd, who moved to center AND to hitting left-handed, and was hitting .454 when the UW recruited her a year later.
Back when she was playing pro ball, she had some interesting things to say about the switch to baseball — a bigger change for the Bullets, as it was a lot more than learning to use a wooden bat:
“Marzetta has used tips from batting coach Johnny Grubb, a 16-year major-league veteran, to build a .213 batting average, fourth on the team. Her ability to draw walks has enabled her to reach base four out of every 10 times. But when you’ve hit .472, as Marzetta did for the Huskies as a junior, .213 is hard to deal with.
“Defense hasn’t been that big of an adjustment,” Marzetta said, “but hitting is a major change. You can’t get a hit just by making contact like in softball. I’ve had some good contact and the ball doesn’t get
out of the infield. And anticipating the different spins. Knucksie (Manager Phil Niekro) threw me this pitch in batting practice the other day, some friggin’ sideways-spinning thing. I still have no idea what it was.” Marzetta applauds the patience of the coaching staff, saying: “They’ve been understanding of our frustration of jumping to a new level. We’re not accustomed to losing. I’m certainly not used to it.”"
damn, i was almost getting to the point where i thought the m’s had made some strides, that their offense was coming around, that their pitchers were waking up. and then they had to play a decent team and f it all up.
way to go mariners.
Why do we always make Blanton look like a Cy Young canidate. I mean come on. His ERA this season 5.04 (including tonights game), compared to an ERA close to 0.00 in his three starts against the M’s. Seriously we turn decent pitchers into All Stars!
Did anybody catch some of the M’s minor-league transactions today?
1. Todd Sears released; Bryan LaHair promoted to Tacoma.
2. Guillermo Quiroz “sent to Everett”; Rob Johnson activated.
Also, Mike Nannini released.
Didn’t kow about Sears and Quiroz but did see LaHair’s first AAA hit (1st AB) in person. Why was Quiroz sent to AA? Playing time issue? Last I saw, he was holding his own in AAA.
Quiroz was hitting .304/.354/.452. In other words, better than Rene Rivera could ever dream of.
In looking over the Rainiers’ transaction history this season, it seems that “transferred to Everett” is merely a way of procedurally stashing a player for safekeeping while the organization works out it next move or moves.
For instance: Francisco Cruceta was transferred to Everett on April 10, and brought back to the Rainiers on April 16. The same thing happened again from April 29 to May 2, and May 10 to May 12. And MIke Nannini was transferred to Everett on June 11, one day before he was released.
Ok, here’s my completely unresearched crazy-ass theory: Moyer hurts M’s batters. Seriously. Moyer wins when he can persuade the ump that those balls in the corners are really strikes. So if the ump goes along with it, he expands the strike zone for the M’s batters too (fair’s fair, right?) And suddenly the M’s don’t know where the strike zone is… except they’re also dealing with actual fastballs and other pitches Moyer can’t throw. And it completely messes up their heads. It takes them about 4 or 5 days to get their heads together again… and then Moyer has another start.
Just wanted to add, at this ungodly hour at my home computer in Ballard, that I saw the 8th and 9th, and at no time did I feel that we were going to pull it off. That’s just sad. When Richie weakly fouled off strike two in the ninth, I said, “He’s going to K,” and he did, on a ball way out of the strike zone. And what the F was Beltre looking at? The guy has no aggressiveness. Get some guts and swing the damn bat.
Bah, I’d rather watch the US men’s soccer team get killed in the World Cup than watch the Ms get shut out by Oakland AGAIN. Too much pain.
An awful lot of angst here for a two-run loss after a great span of games.
#160 – Huh? Do you mean Ibanez?
#158 – yeah, ‘transferred to Everett’ means a lot of things. Rob Johnson went on bereavement leave, but the transaction page shows ‘transferred to Everett’ instead. I think that’s what it said when Emiliano Fruto went on the ‘temporariliy inactive list’ as well earlier this season to attend the birth of his first kid.
LaHair did indeed get his first AAA hit yesterday, which is notable, since the Rainiers got shelled. Okay, maybe just Nageotte got shelled (8 runs in 1 2/3 innings? Gawd he looked awful). Who IS Dan Wright? It was very nice watching him go 4.1 innings in relief and facing minimum # of batters in 3.1 of them….
IIRC, Dan Wright was a guy who played for the Chicago White Sox at one point and is now basically a AAAA/Replacement Level type of player. The only difference is that the Mariners don’t pay him 3-6 Million to get the results 2 other Replacement Level Pitchers born days apart do.
#159– a nice theory. Of course, it wouldn’t account for those years when he gets some of the hightest run support in the league….
#161– I think it is because it was amlost exactly a month ago when they took those two out of three in Anaheim, Fruto had his big game, and “the bats were coming around” … they went into Oakland, were swept into another giant hole, and slowly slowly started to crawl out, only to go back into Oakland and get smacked down by Joe “Asesino del Mariner” Blanton
#164 – When Moyer did have the highest run support, we had more batters in the middle of the line-up who could bat. I don’t think any one explanation is the only answer but this theory is interesting to consider. Jamie lives on the outside corners which of course are no-man’s land to Beltre, Sexson and Everett. A full third of our line-up is vulnerable to those pitches.
Of course it doesn’t explain why the whole line-up is mystified by Blanton. Anyone have a clue as to why Blanton is so effective against the Ms and pretty much league average or less elsewhere? Is our line-up that silly or does he know something about us?
Of course I got accepted into UPS. I even got most of my tuition paid for. I’m not an idiot Corco.
159. Explain the games he won last season. By this theory, wouldn’t he have a Franklin-esque record, since his umpire gerrymandering would leave his own team at an inherent disadvantage?
I know there’s no new game thread up, but is Loaiza pitching today after spending the night in jail? ESPN reported it at 11:30 EST.