Game 75, Athletics at Mariners
Erasmo Ramirez vs. Tom Milone, 7:10pm
The A’s have cycled through six first-basemen so far this season. Due to a combination of injuries and an almost pathological need to make minor transactions, the A’s have used 20 pitchers and four catchers (and people thought the M’s carrying three was insane). They have acquired, willingly, Brandon Inge. They have essentially taken the Pacific Coast League all-stars of recent years and given them a few weeks to see what they could do at the big league level. Brandon Allen? Nope. Kila Ka’aihue? Nah. Collin Cowgill? Ehhh, not awful, I guess. How about Michael Taylor? The A’s are so ecumenical that they’re now starting 2003 Futures Game player Travis Blackley (as an aside, I’m thrilled for Blackley). This isn’t a typical rebuilding job – these guys aren’t exactly young, and none of them are really heralded. It’s also not surprising; the A’s acquired many of these guys in various deals this past off-season. All of this suggested a team that was a step behind the M’s, whose wholesale rebuilding job brought in name-brand prospects and whose starting rotation, while admittedly jury-rigged, included a mix of veterans and a few interesting young kids. The A’s starting 3B in April was an average hitter in the PCL last year, and he was mostly a catcher. Few things can make you feel a tiny bit better about being a fan of the team employing Chone Figgins, and I’m not even sure the Josh Donaldson experiment qualifies, though his sub-.400 OPS helps.
The M’s begin this series 4.5 games behind Oakland, and the A’s come in having won 7 of their last 10. The A’s soft-tossing lefty out of USC is Tom Milone, who came over in the Gio Gonzalez trade. The M’s tried a soft-tossing lefty out of USC last year, and that didn’t go so well. In the past decade, every M’s fan has grumbled about how everything seems to work out for the Angels – that even their jaw-dropping mistakes don’t sink the team, or the way they always beat their pythag winning percentage. I’ve developed that sort of feeling about the 2012 Athletics. They shouldn’t be better than the M’s. You can make a good case that the A’s themselves weren’t TRYING to be better than this year’s M’s. But here we are.
Let’s watch a baseball game!
1: Ichiro (RF)
2: Gutierrez (CF)
3: Seager (3B)
4: Montero (DH)
5: Smoak (1B)
6: Saunders (LF)
7: Olivo (C)
8: Ackley (2B)
9: Ryan (SS)
SP: Erasmo!
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122 Responses to “Game 75, Athletics at Mariners”
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Uh, I wont wake up with you, Mike. But it sounds like Westy’s game.
Oh, but I do look forward to the next game, anyway.
Much more of this and I am going to need beer from Papua New Guinea.
Speaking of gluttony… I wonder how the post-game spread is after a loss…
I look forward to tomorrow…
Pathetic offense.
I think we just love baseball. And stats. Nothing wrong with that. Pretty easy life, actually ,,, but I could sure do with less suckiness on the playing field.
It’s frustrating to Keep watching a team of ass.
Really curious what happens before the deadline. I say that every year, but after games like this, it’s nice to have something to look forward to, that MIGHT impact the future positively.
Agreed, Steve. Problem is, the players I want to see go away probably won’t.
Olivo is still sucking, Figgins never stopped sucking, League has been mediocre at best…
BTW given that Olivo has done ZILCH to increase his value since coming off the DL – why are we still seeing him so much?!
Yeah, and if Olivo was going to be traded, it likely would have happened by now. Unless a freak accident or injury occurs, I can’t imagine anyone taking a flyer on him.
Mariners acquire–Carlos Gonzalez, Chad Bettis
Rockies acquire–Felix Hernandez, James Paxton, Nick Franklin, Marcio Robles.
Who has a problem with this trade? We still have Hultzen and Paxton, with Bettis added to provide more depth. Carlos Gonzalez is the exact kind of hitter we need to build around, and this is the kind of deal we can actually *talk* about maybe parting with Felix. With the Rockies absolutely horrendous pitching, throwing in a couple other prospects including Paxton? You’re telling me they wouldn’t think about it?
I’m so confused this season… So does Ichiro suck now, or not?
He leads the team in Batting AVG (excepting Guty, but “small sample size” there), 3rd in dbles, 1st in triples… 2nd in steals… His defense is still above average.
He hit .391 over the past 10 days…
Ichiro, much like our entire team’s road success at hitting dingers and scoring runs (2nd and 4th in all of baseball), is totally not fitting into the fan induced stereotypes.
The screwy dilemma of the moment:
Our pitchers can’t pitch on the road
Our hitters can’t hit at home
Our pitchers are brilliant at Safeco
Our hitters are pretty damn good everywhere else…
Fix this, Jack Z!
You might want to check Gonzalez’s Coors/Away splits before you make that trade. Away from Coors his 2012 OPS has been .806 – in 2011 it was .757.
So yeah – I have a problem with that trade. Seems to me you’re trading Felix and three other guys for Kyle Seager.
Kyle-
(raising my hand)
Um, I have a problem with that trade… For many reasons…
Not even considering how rare it is for two teams to trade their absolute fan favorite, mega star players to each other. That just doesn’t happen.
What the hell Kyle?
I wouldn’t even trade Felix for CarGo straight up let alone throwing in our #4 and #5 prospects, are you dreaming or something?
I’m not even sure I’d trade Cargo for Paxton and Franklin straight up, crikey.
Maybe I oversold a bit (okay a lot), I admit that. But come on. Carlos Gonzalez is the exact kind of player we need to talk about, and the situation in Colorado is one that we can actually get a star-level hitter via trade, using our organizational strength of pitching to entice them into it. His away spits are .276/.329/.476/.809. Which would instantly make him the best hitter on the Mariners even if those numbers held at that level.
I don’t know what players we could use, but this is something we should talk about. The Mariners offense is putrid. Is no one else sick of watching low scoring 1 run losses year in, year out?
Maybe I oversold a bit (okay a lot), I admit that. But come on. Carlos Gonzalez is the exact kind of player we need to talk about, and the situation in Colorado is one that we can actually get a star-level hitter via trade, using our organizational strength of pitching to entice them into it. His away spits are .276/.329/.476/.809. Which would instantly make him the best hitter on the Mariners even if those numbers held at that level.
I don’t know what players we could use, but this is something we should talk about. The Mariners offense is putrid. Is no one else sick of watching low scoring 1 run losses year in, year out?
Maybe I oversold a bit (okay a lot), I admit that. But come on. Carlos Gonzalez is the exact kind of player we need to talk about, and the situation in Colorado is one that we can actually get a star-level hitter via trade, using our organizational strength of pitching to entice them into it. His away spits are .276/.329/.476/.809. Which would instantly make him the best hitter on the Mariners even if those numbers held at that level.
I don’t know what players we could use, but this is something we should talk about. The Mariners offense is putrid. Is no one else sick of watching low scoring 1 run losses year in, year out?
Players consistently outperform their road ops when they leave Coors.
Kyle, I’m not opposed to getting a guy like CarGo – I just wouldn’t trade Felix for him. I admit to resorting to a bit of hyperbole in my response though. 😉
I agree with you… our offense is terrible. On just about every other team, a guy hitting .270-ish would be a “decent piece” – NOT the “team’s best hitter”!
Westy said:
“I agree with you… our offense is terrible. On just about every other team, a guy hitting .270-ish would be a “decent piece” – NOT the “team’s best hitter”!”
I agree with Westy, hence my semi tongue-in-cheek Ichiro comments above, where we fret about his decline while he leads the Mariners in batting with a .278 avg. (DEFINITELY a decline- but better than anybody else currently on the team)
Westy already mentioned the Home vs. Road splits for Carlos Gonzales (and they are somewhat dramatic), so there is no reason to reinforce that point. There is also no way to know if ‘he’ would increase his away OPS once ‘he’ left Coors Field, but granted – the facts are the facts for other players who did leave. Thanks for that info bookbook.
2012 WAR to date:
Carlos Gonzalez 2.2
Ichiro Suzuki 2.1
Peekay ^^ seemed to capture the essence of the moment, pretty well.
You don’t trade a Felix Hernandez, a Cy Young winner, for a hitter that averages around .270 outside of a hitter-friendly park. IF you’re going to trade him for someone, you do it for a well-established, .300+ hitter with 100+ RBI production… and then some. Felix is a proven ace. There’s no reason you can’t ask for an elite hitter in return.
Having said that, I really like Gonzalez, and I’d love to see him here for a much smaller return.