I want to cry
Dave · December 13, 2006 at 7:43 pm · Filed Under Mariners
I was at a Christmas party when my phone started going nuts. “Goodbye Snelling” was the first message, then they started pouring in.
Needless to say, the rest of the party wasn’t quite as enjoyable.
There’s no other way to put this – I want to cry. This sucks.
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The Cult of Doyle has been traded for an almost washed up, booze-faced, second baseman with a slow bat, a balky wrist, and an elbow with no cartilage? This really puts the “F” in RFK.
This is like a reverse Buhner. Except we also threw in a pitcher. And Vidro’s worse than Phelps.
“Vidro tags Bavasi, who climbs the turnbuckle! Wow! Look at the Speed! Bavasi leaps . . . and . . . ooooooohhh!!! He just performed a Reverse Buhner on the unsuspecting Snelling, who was too busy raking to notice the limping Vidro had tagged out! In-credible!”
I actually did shed a couple of tears of misery. Does it make me a loser if I cry in reaction to a baseball transaction?
We’d probably be better off with Troy Evers and Rick Balabon, too.
I know at least one of you out there will get that.
No. It only makes you a loser if you trade Snelling and Fruto for Jose Mothergrabbing Vidro.
I don’t think I can cry any more tears this offseason; I got them out of my system when Ogasawara’s clean-shaven doppleganger jumped ship for the Giants.
But I’m definitely feeling more sadness than anger or anything else at this situation. Sort of like the helpless feeling like being a kid and having your best friend’s parents move across the country and take your best friend with them. You know you might keep in touch, but it’s just not going to be the same.
Something tells me Bavasi’s not going to get invited to the next USSM feed…
I want to cry AND puke.
How am I going to live without baseball? I can’t support this team. Thirty years, gone like that. This trade isn’t so bad just for what it is in itself, but for what it says about our management.
In case anyone is forgetting him: Chris Snelling, I hope you have a hell of a career. I hope you hit 300/425/525 for twenty goddamn years. I hope they name a street after you in DC. I just wish it was here, man, I wish it was going to be here.
Can we schedule a Feed soon? A group therapy of sorts. We can cry and hold hands, maybe ceremoniously burn a front office collage.
After we get done skewering Bavasi for his moves the last week, I guarantee you he will decline any invitation we give him to attend any USSM function ever again.
How can Broussard be a better option at DH than Snelling? I still don’t understand that.
Me too, Deanna. What is absolutely heartbreaking about this whole offseason is that we’re seeing our young players get traded away forever, in exchange for guys that no one will remember in a few years.
Antonetti or not (and I’m certainly betting on the not; we’ll get another old-school retread after Bavasi), it can take an organization years to rebuild after a crippling administration like our current one.
And that makes me more sad than angry…
If the USSM function includes Bavasi in a dunk tank filled with frikking sharks with frikking laser beams attached to their frikkin heads, count me in. In fact, I would be honored to host the function in an abandoned warehouse somewhere in Southeastern Washington.
Even though Bavasi is an intimidating character who could tear my in half with one hand without even unbuttoning his suit coat, I wish he was standing in front of my right now to catch a gob my spittle and my “God damn you to hell”. Grrr. Very angry! And very sad. I used to love this team.
It seriously feels like we traded away the left-handed version of Edgar before he even got a chance.
Hi everyone, this is my first post here. I’m a Mariner fan in Pennsylvania…though with the news of Snelling being traded, I may very well be a Nationals fan when the sun rises here in the east. You mention the Buhner trade, and that’s when I became an M’s fan. I was raised a Yankee fan, but as i grew older I became tired of Steinbrener trading away young talent for mediocre veterans. So, being a fan of Buhner, I followed him to Seattle and became a Mariner fan. the past few years now I’ve watched Bavasi do nothing to improve this team, and today just about does it for me. Yes, I realize Snelling has injury problems and has yet to prove himself in the majors, but I guarantee you now that he’s gone, he will be a .320 hitter and solid all-around player. This just sucks. If the trade brought back a #1 or 2 pitcher, I could stomach it. But we have no need for a 2nd baseman — even if all he does is DH.
The worst part of this is the fact that I realized rooting for Vidro to fail his physical wouldn’t necessarily get us out of the woods. I remembered the fact that Omar Vizquel failed his physical a few years back and Bavasi turned around and found an even *worse* SS in Rich Aurilia. Ugh.
Dave … do you think there’s any chance this is the first part of a two-step trade tango? I can’t imagine the M’s would take on most of Vidro’s salary without looking to move more salary in return — either Sexson’s, or what they think Broussard may get in arbitration (if it might go that far)?
I’m grasping for some glimmer of a silver lining here ….
Bavasi is only intimidating because of the goatee. If you were to shave it off, you would find a miniature body – his real body – stuffed in the neck of the Giant Man Machine he drives around in place of his real body, which stands only four inches tall and weighs 9 ounces. Of this I am sure.
When do the Nationals make their first visit to Safeco? That’s the only game I’m attending in the next decade or so.
Honestly? And this is absolutely pure speculation on my part…
I hope that Doyle decided that the Mariners were never going to give him a real shot due to his injury, and asked to be traded.
It is very much wild speculation, and Doyle doesn’t seem to be the type…but it’s the only scenario that doesn’t make me violently ill that makes any sense of this horrible, horrible trade.
I hope Reed is taken off the trading block now… even though there are plenty of Mariner fans who don’t think he has much of a future, he still has trade value. Young, good defender, great minor league stats, but any chance of getting any valuable return at all is gone. Every GM in baseball knows they can steal players under Bavasi for their has-beens, expensive vets, or a no-talent 28 year old Double A player. I dont’ see how we will ever get a decent trade again with this front office.
Quick, somebody find Fruto and hit him in the leg with a lead pipe.
This nugget from Geoff Baker’s Times article sure puts me at ease (sarcasm):
I’m not going to lie, I seriously would like to reconsider why I spend so much time, attention, money, etc. with this team….
It is difficult to see any positives with this offseason as a whole. It seems like an eternity has passed since we heard rumors of Manny Ramirez and Tim Hudson coming to Safeco. Anyone want to put an over/under on the amount of wins that we will have next season??? 65? 70? 75?
#25 – I’ll throw a guess out there: 68-94 record.
Wsumojo, I hope Reed gets traded tomorrow. I want him to get off this sinking ship and have a career somewhere.
Felix too. I want the Mariners to trade Felix immediately to some team that can nurture and coach him and turn him into a major superstar. He’s going to have a terrible time here with this awful franchise, losing most of his games even when he pitches well.
I have to say that I’m pretty impressed so far with Geoff Baker as a reporter — he works fast, gets the necessary interviews on short notice and doesn’t work off the record nearly as much as Finnigan. He’s no analyst, of course, but he’s pretty good at what call the shoe-leather work.
#27 – You’ve captured my feelings with that sentiment. I said trade anyone and everyone who has any value: Ichiro, Felix, Betancourt, Reed, whomever. If you’re going to throw in the towel and pretend that you’re competing in the Special Olympics Fantasy League, you might as well go all out and really screw the pooch.
#26 – That sounds about right….if we reach 70 wins with this team, wow I don’t know what I would do. Anyways, time to pour myself another drink….
I’m more worried about how many wins we’ll have in 2008 and beyond. That’s when I was expecting to start seeing some results. This offseason has been disappointing until now, largely because there just isn’t anyone out there who could really make a huge difference. Now, of course, the question is moot. We’re not going to get better. And we’re driving 140 miles an hour directly towards the cliff.
I was quite concerned when I heard Bavasi describing the Winter Meetings as “miserable” when interviewed about it. It seems that he gets an itchy trigger finger after a while and makes moves simply for the sake of making moves.
He reminds of the poker player who has sat there and folded down his cards pre-flop for the last 10 hands and then decides to go all in with a 7-2 offsuit just because he hasn’t played a hand in a while.
What are the chances that 3 of the 4: Snelling, Soriano, A. Cabrera or C. Guillen are selected as all stars in the same year 2007 or 2008? I’d say a lot higher than any of these guys, Vidro, Perez, Ramirez making an (another) all star appearance.
I know this group mourns Doyle, but the Fruto thing makes it even crazier. Are we getting rid of every live arm in the pen?
Is Lowe anywhere near ready to come back?
A glut of righties has become a scarcity.
Bavasi has now cooked and buttered his own goose.
It’s been a while since I actually posted a comment here, but this is seriously awful. Any remaining optimism I had about this team just went down the tubes.
Well we basically are just going to have J.J. pitch anywhere from 2-3 innings for each save…I hope that Lowe is going to recover just fine, but knowing our luck, who knows….
I’ll give this to Vidro: If he can play everyday, you might as well play him everyday. He has virtually no platoon split over the last three seasons:
vs. Left: .288/.355/.424
vs. Right: .287/.352/.423
Not that a 779 OPS is really adequate for a full-time DH.
Out of curiosity, what are the park effects at RFK? I’ve always thought of it as a hitter’s park, but I not familiar enough with it to say that with certainty.
In any event, I suspect that Vidro’s OPS would hover around 700 for next year based on him being a right handed hitter at Safeco who has average power (at absolute best, probably more like below average). And if his OPS does end up around 700, then I really don’t understand why they traded 2 younger players to get someone who is a marginal improvement over Carl Everett.
I’d like to point out the new, improved campaign button on the left nav bar. Enjoy it while it lasts!
Also (I believe this was mentioned previously), why couldn’t they have picked up Marcus Giles off the scrap heap if they were looking for a marginal improvement at DH?
Giles’ OPS isn’t that far south of where Vidro’s was last year and he could have been obtained for a fraction of the price. And, he wouldn’t have required us to trade anyone to obtain him. Oh wait, there I go thinking logically.
Maybe if enough angry mail ends up here, something good will happen…
But Vidro is a three-time all star! Surely that’s worth the $5.5 million or so more a year that he’s going to cost, right? Right?
#41 – Bah. Those online feedback things just generate some canned message in a feeble attempt to placate people. The only way to get anyone important to stand up and listen is to vote with your wallet. Don’t attend the games in person. Watch little-to-no games on TV. Then, and only then, will anyone who matters actually care.
No fucking way.
Starting in 2007 I’ll be actively cheering against the Mariners.
Until the season starts, I’ll continue lurking around sites like here and LL, but after that, I’m done.
I hate this team.
As hard as this is to do, I’m going to attempt to put anupside on this and I don’t want everyone to jump down my throat. I’m mainly doing this so there’s still SOME people interested in this team and so there is not too many suicide attempts.
The guys we’ve acquired are bad, LATELY. When Ramirez was a rookie and even a year or 2 after that he was a quality #3 starter who got tons of ground balls. If he can regain that form I believe with our infield defense he could be a quality #3 starter on our team if healthy. It sucks there is so many circumstances for him to succeed, but he has a history of success and it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility that he could once again regain that form.
When Soriano is on he is a dominant reliever with one of the most explosive fastballs in the majors, he always kinda reminded me of Mariano Rivera in the way that he kinda lulls hitters to sleep with his windup and then pow a 95 mph fastball is right on ya, but in actuality he has always had arm problems and even in his best seasons he’s had to take some time off due to those problems. In this scenario lets just give the M’s the benefit of the doubt and say they knew somethin was up with him and traded him for someone they felt could help this team.
As for Batista, he was a bit more money than I would’ve liked to spend on a starter of his caliber, but hey that’s todays market and he’s a groundball guy who doesn’t give up many dingers and once again with our infield defense I think he can do quite well here.
Then comes the toughest one to swallow, todays trade is bad, plain and simple. But if you look at it with some blinders on, we traded 2 guys who barely attributed to this team last year for a guy who was an all star a couple years back and was known as one of the most underrated players in baseball. That player may very well be gone, but if Vidro is still the type of player who can hit .310-.320 with 15 dingers and a good OBP then that is going to help our ballclub. Who knows, Snelling very well could have posted those same numbers, but he also could just as easily not. I feel like a lot of M’s fans have some sort of infatuation and love for Snelling because of his happy go lucky, outgoing personality and don’t actually look at his stats. He’s a guy that’s easy to root for, but when you look at it there was many instances last year where he looked good, and others where he just looked over matched and his minor league numbers reflect that. The same thing can be said for Fruto.
The main point I’m getting at is that none of us know how this team is going to perform next year, and on paper things look bad, but lets just see how it goes. I guarantee you if somehow, someway these moves turn out good for the M’s and we start winning a ton of games you’ll all have a different opinion. We all write on this thing because the Mariners are our team, and we should support this team through the good and the bad. Our GM may be a tard, but don’t give up before the season even begins.
AQ: I was thinking the same thing. I saw Giles was free, and I looked at him, and went feh, not terrible but not great, not as good as what we got. And Giles is better than Vidro. Vidro would make this team worse if he was FREE, claimed off waivers, because he bumps out Lopez.
Let me be clear: I wouldn’t want Vidro on this team if his salary was $0.
And he’s not free, he’s EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE. Not just money, but Snelling and Fruto.
Disastrous. This is the kind of trade that pushes teams over the cliff.
Bavasi can redeem it if, and only if, he turns around and trades Lopez for a front-line starter, a Santana. Wanna bet?
I’ve been searching for an analogy.
The guy stands in line at the Thomas Cook FX window at the airport and exchanges Dollars for Euros at the worst possible rate. Then he has a change of heart, decides not to got to Europe and changes those Euros back in for what is now 6% fewer dollars. Gets a phone call and changes his dimished dollars back in for even fewer euros. He later calls his friends and brags about being an FX trader.
I love watching games at Safeco…
But I’m not sure I can bring myself to go watch games there this upcoming season.
That’s how sad this series of awful moves has made me.
Hell, I was considering season tickets for the first time ever, at the start of this offseason. There’s absolutely ZERO chance of that happening now.
No one’s argued that he’s looked inconsistent and streaky, but that’s just dumb.
His career minor league line is .312/.396/.476
And that includes the injury rehabs. There’s no way to look at that and think he can’t, or won’t, hit if he’s healthy.
true, his minor league numbers look good when you accumulate them like that, but look at him lasy year at the AAA level and his numbers in the majors, it’s below .250 and I’m not saying there’s no way he’s going to be a quality major league hitter, but he could just as easily not, that’s all I was trying to say.
And he was only recovering from injury and essentially affected by injury for the entire 2006 season.
Can this mean Broussard to Baltimore for Rodrigo Lopez?
Team League AVG G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI TB BB SO SB CS OBP SLG OPS
TAC PCL .216 69 241 36 52 13 1 5 39 82 31 60 4 2 .326 .340 .667
Minors .216 69 241 36 52 13 1 5 39 82 31 60 4 2 .326 .340 .667
MLB .250 36 96 14 24 6 1 3 8 41 13 38 2 1 .360 .427 .787
If you’re gonna go by what a guy has done a few years ago, then you can’t justify snelling’s stats and not justify vidro’s
Is there anyone else who wants to “get lit for little” before every Mariner game this coming season??? I have a feeling that I’m going to need to do this in order to put up with this team and organization
Today was the last day to put down deposits for renewing season tickets (I have a a 16 game plan). I struggled with the decision after the WFB extension and Soriano trade, but finally called them at about 1pm today and went with it. I figured it’d be fun to watch Snelling get some real playing time, and the rest of the team couldn’t be that bad.
I get home from work and fire up USSM as usual (long time reader, first time poster, blah, blah, blah) to find this news. Man, I’m gonna have to go to 16 games of this crap…or try to find a taker. Anyone interested in a field level 16 game plan, cheap?
The worst part is he is the DH.
“and he was recovering from injury and was essentially affected by injury for the entire 2006 season”
Yeah, well that’s essentially been the case for about the last 5 years, there comes a time where you have to realise a guy isn’t gonna come around. And in 2006 what injury did he have the whole season? when he was with the Mariners he was about as healthy as a Chris Snelling can be.
I love this. We’ll trade Broussard away for a bag of magic beans, and we traded Snelling.
In the end of this, we’ll have given up 2 DHs who are better hitters than Vidro, and a decent relief prospect for Jose Vidro and a non-prospect.
57 – All that money for a DH whose numbers have declined the last three years.
Still glad Bavasi is being aggressive in the trade market?
#58 – You’re completely missing the point. Even if (for some odd reason) I agreed with your assessment of Snelling, the fact remains that we needlessly gave up 2 players for a player of Vidro’s caliber. Conversely, we could have picked up someone like Marcus Giles for a fraction of the salary and without losing any players in the process.
Yes, Vidro *was* an All Star a few years ago. “A few years ago” is the operative part of that statement. You know who else came to Seattle via trade that was an All Stars “a few years” prior to arriving in Seattle? Jeff Cirillo. Want another name of someone who was an All Star “a few years” prior to arriving in Seattle? Rich Aurilia. I think that speaks for itself.
My condolences, Dave. I’m sure this hurts you as much as anyone.
These recent moves make me wonder if he’s doing this to spite the very blogosphere that invited him to two feeds and canonized players like Doyle. I mean, it doesn’t sound reasonable or plausible, but a part of me wonders how much of this was throwing it in sabermetrics’ face for the sake of conventional baseball ‘wisdom.’
Even if that’s a total crock, it’s still sad what Bill Bavasi has done to this team over the last 2 weeks. Maybe he IS a plant for the Angels.
I’m just curious…..what’s the going rate for a guy who couldn’t hit at AAA last year and has a difficult time playing a full season……and a pitcher who up until last year, wasn’t even in the M’s top 100 prospects and can’t consistantly throw strikes? I’m sure we could have gotten Santana from the Twins.
Just because Snelling is a Mariner Farm System favorite amongst the Mariner biased fans, doesn’t mean the rest of the league sees it the same.
If those guys were in another organization, there would be plenty of concerns.
I think Snelling will have a good career, but he has PLENTY to prove.
#64 – Let me break this down in the simplest of terms. The M’s have traded two young guys with potential for one former All Star who is in the decline phase of his career. They did this when they could have picked up someone off the waiver wire who could have performed at a comparable level. That about covers it.
64, what is the point in trading them for a declining 2B who’s going to cost $6 million?
I haven’t been this pissed since Heathcliff Slocumb.
I had been thinking for a few weeks that all my Mariners hats were getting a little ragged, but after the last two weeks, there’s no chance in fucking hell that this team sees one penny of my money for a long fucking time.
Baseball is supposed to be some sort of “public trust,” right (that’s how they get the anti-trust exemption)? So is there any chance of suing for fraud or something? There’s simply no way that screwing over this many fans with a rusty pole isn’t criminal.
Too bad Bavasi won’t be coming to any future feeds. I was looking forward to bringing my own torch and pitchfork.
Sooooo… the Sounders still around?