Running out of patience
Robertson went nine innings allowing two walks and one strikeout. The thirty-two times the M’s went up to the plate against a pitcher who threw hittable strikes and they saw barely three pitches each time. When they made contact, it wasn’t as if good things happened: they hit two singles and two doubles, and that’s it.
The story of the game of course is that the M’s ran out of arms, putting Jamie Burke on the mound, but the real issue here is how utterly futile their flailing was. They couldn’t score two runs off a guy who might as well have thrown the ball underhanded to the plate for their ease of hitting.
Robertson pitches seen
Ichiro: 4, 2, 3, 3
Lopez 3, 1, 3, 2
Ibanez 7, 3, 3, 6
Beltre 1, 7, 4 (IBB), 4 (IBB)
Sexson 5, 2, 3, 4
Cairo 3, 3, 5
Johjima 2, 1, 1
Bloomquist 3, 2, 3
Betancourt 2, 3, 2
(I get 100 pitches including the IBBs against the box score count of 99, but oh well)
I agree with the post, and hated to see 14 innings of solid Mariners pitching go to waste, but watching position players pitch is awesome. It feels like they could have pulled somebody down from the stands that won a contest and put the ball in their hands. I think it reminds us all how specialized athletes have become.
Jamie Burke has always come across as the selfless type, but this gave me a newfound respect for him. Again I’m sorry it had to end the way it did, but I’ve never felt myself smiling this much after an extra innings loss.
So…you hit two home runs and sit the next day? Sexson gets 6 at bats? WTF is going on here? Chuck, Howie…where’s the accountability? This team is horrible, horribly ran, horribly managed, and a horrible way to torture myself for an afternoon.
The only position players on the team I wouldn’t trade sometime before July 31, 2009 are Jose Lopez and Jeff Clement. The rest should be dealt, including Ichiro! Ichiro is obviously in a decline and day by day Dave Samson looks smarter and smarter.
Proof this was a poorly managed game…
Combined Plate Appearances for Sexson, Cairo and WFB : 17
For Clement and Reed: 0
Case closed.
Lookout Landing had a great post about how there’s nothing wrong with Ichiro this season. He’s not obviously in anything.
I thought that pitches thrown during an IBB don’t count toward the pitch count? Am I wrong?
Do I have to dig up Jeff’s “Ichiro is fine” link again, plus his “Contend in ’09” link?
I would love to know how .302/.360/.372 (that is including his traditionally slow April) constitutes “decline.”
I’m going to have to tape a tearful plea for people to leave Ichiro alone and put it on Youtube to stop this silliness
Ichiro is the least of our problems. This team is leaking bad, overpaid players. Ichiro is a bargain.
I’ll bring the sheet, but you have to bring the eyeliner.
Oh Kenji … No, no, no …
Rick Rizzs is already working on a “leave Boom Boom alone!” video.
#8: DMZ, I’m not sure you have the right hairstyle to pull it off.
The biggest issue with today was that Cairo (Bloomquist Light, all the taste and half the calories), Sexson, and Bloomquist were all in the starting lineup and all no point were pulled for a pinch hitter seemed to be more of an issue.
I just found an evaluation of AL 2B that rates Lopez dead last:
[fixed]
Well, it could be worse. Here’s a link to BPro and Will Carroll reporting briefly how the M’s are ‘paralyzed’.
why didn’t ichiro pitch?
Clearly, there are some people who still think Lopez is a good player.
Time to wake up. Decent position players = Beltre and Ichiro and that is it. The remainder range from useful roster rounders to youth with potential to complete wastes of time.
Burke looked better on the mound than he would have in right field.
Ichiro will pitch when the cosmic forces are properly aligned. He will not be wearing some gimcrack flag hat, either.
I wonder if the Mariners’ deficiencies in talent valuation are manifest in the lack of plate discipline? We are 27th in BB, second to *&#@ing last in OBP, and dead last in XBH. If you can’t get extra base hits, you damn well better be able to draw some walks. Singles hitters and a shitty rotation is no way to put together a baseball team.
19 – Who said Burke had to to go RF? Send Cairo there and move Sexson off the DH to 1st. Or move him to 1st and replace him with Clement. Or replace Sexson with Vidro and send him to RF. Who cares if your P pitches if your P is a position player?
No way would they have a star position player pitch. It had to be a scrub.
No manager is going to risk putting a star out of position like that. If Ichiro hurt his arm pitching, for example, it would have been Riggleman’s career ending decision.
No, clearly there are some people who remember Lopez’s age.
So, Ichiro supposedly asked Riggleman if he could pitch. As interesting as it was to see RRS pitch really well and Burke throw ok, I’m looking forward to the day when the manager signals to rightfield for a pitching change.
I’ll tell you one thing, I am totally fed up with Betancourt and his hacking at the plate. Something like 70% of his plate appearances last 3 pitches or less. Tonight in the 15th with Willie on first, he hacks into a DP on the first pitch instead of giving the runner a chance to steal 2nd.
I totally agree that the only regulars worth keeping are Ichiro and Beltre. We’re going to need a new manager too, because Riggleman’s performance today, with his lineup, his wasting of Clement/Reed, and using Burke to forfeit the game, sucked.
I get the whole matchup angle of things, but to sit Clement after the day he had yesterday is foolish. Not to mention, since this team is going nowhere, and Clement is what’s considered part of the future, shouldn’t they work to get him more experience vs. lefties now when the games mean nothing?
Riggleman’s gotten better results, but he’s managing for a chance at another full time managerial gig. He’s looking to produce results to make himself look good so he can have a chance at another job, regardless of what’s best for the organization. Sitting Reed and Clement is proof enough of that.
As a fan, when Riggleman leaves Morrow, Rhodes, and Dickey in the pen in lieu of Burke in the 15th is the textbook definition of rolling over and giving up. I was at today’s game, but had I actually paid for my tickets and not received them for free, I’d have felt inclined to ask for a refund on my tickets. We’re in a long, dark season, but that kind of attitude really pisses me off.
You can’t justify just rolling over and giving up.
Man, that would have been awesome.
25 Re: Yuni
This kid is out of control. Picked off base again today on another base running error. Hacks at everything, erratic throws, etc. It’s like he’s still playing with his pals on the street at home. It’s sad really. Where is the leadership he needs? Oh that’s right Cairo is his mentor…
PS: Ichiro should have pitched. I’m sure he would not have hurt himself and would certainly have fulfilled his dream… What ever happened to having fun with the game? Like this team is a contender and we would have jeopardized our chance to make the WS.
27 – Agreed. So what if Burke had 4 IP in the minors?
Ichiro wasn’t bad either. He had experience in his senior year in HS, pitching his team to the Koushien tournament in 1991 losing 3-2 to Matusho Gakuen (who BTW went all the way to the championships that year). Yeah, it’s 17 years ago, but don’t you think he’s practiced here and there since then?
25 – Agreed with Yuniesky. But the whole plate discipline thing is just about a team thing. On the other side, you can see the effect Fukudome has had on the plate discipline of the Cubs. While people thought he was a power hitter, he is more of a selective hitter and hits for average. We know the M’s aren’t built for Billyball, and I don’t think we can expect that to change this year. Unless the M’s clear house (which I doubt).
I was at the game, and the only thing worse than the hacking was the number of times Richie came to the plate to have Jim Leyland basically say “you ain’t gonna beat me” and the number of times Riggleman just said, “you’re right, he won’t, and I won’t try to beat you either.” Apparently, they have no interest in Clement learning to hit major league lefthanded pitching (great comment on BPro08 about how the lefties Clement would have for dinner in AAA were not the equivalent of major league lefthanders), and yet even when the Tigers did not have anyone warming in the bullpen with Sexson coming up in extra innings, Riggleman still wouldn’t put the guy who hit two dingers the night before in.
Bet this is organizational philosophy, and not just Riggleman. Can’t let the youngsters get overmatched by same-handed hitting.
Which begs the question…how did vets like Ibanez learn how NOT to get overmatched by same handed pitching, hm?
One could fairly respond that he didn’t.
His career tOPS+ is 108 against righties, and 77 against lefties.
Of course, this doesn’t address the major point, which I agree with completely, that youngsters should be given lots of at bats in a lost season.
Maybe if, before Yuni steps to the plate, somebody duct tapes his arms to his sides, he’ll walk every now and again…
Well, more like, how does he learn to hit same-handed big league pitching if he never SEES same handed big league pitching….but the end result is the same…