Game 57, Tigers at Mariners
1:10. Bonderman v Batista.
Both pitchers are playing pretty badly so far — Bonderman’s strikeout rate is way down and his walk rate is way up, and Silva’s in about the same place by having smaller declines. The thing is, Bonderman’s 11 years younger than Silva. Except for injury, it’s hard to explain what may have gone wrong with Bonderman — his 4.34 ERA conceals a year much worse than last year, aided by a higher-than-expected strand rate and a low .279 opposing batting average when they do put the ball in play. His G/F ratio’s about where his career totals are, too. He’s just not pitching as well, which is a big cause for the Tigers’ struggles so far this year.
Speculation continues around Sexson, who hasn’t played in a while — first there were the Hatteberg rumors (which is kind of classic rumor-mongering, as rumors became a note by Baker in the Times that there were rumors, a note then cited as confirming the team was after him) to fan-level speculation he’ll be DFAd or released. There’s been no speculation that he’s injured, and McLaren’s reasoning for starting Cairo grow increasingly unbelievable with each game. But this seems like a fine chance to play Sexson: Bonderman’s giving up walks and he’s always been a little above average in HRs surrendered, and his ability to strike batters out has been off this year.
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198 Responses to “Game 57, Tigers at Mariners”
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Why would you not PH Sexson here?
Why is Cairo in the batters’ box?
Todd Jones has his OWN BOOK on how to handle dangerous hitter Miguel Cairo.
Thus Sayeth The Forehead.
The one time McLaren has someone on the bench who is suitable for the situation and he doesn’t PH with him. Wow.
OK, with not having Sexson pinch hit for Cairo, I think the rumors are only going to increase.
Good grief.
Morrow isn’t going to be a starter for the Ms. It’s time we move on to the next stage of grieving regarding this issue.
I was thinking he must not have pinch hit Sexson because Sexson hasn’t hit Jones well. Not that I think those matchup numbers mean all that much, but I’m sure McLaren thinks they’re important. So I checked the numbers.
Sexson is 5 for 11 against Jones with 3 HR, for an OPS of 1.727.
Controversial opinion time, that’ll never happen:
-We should consider trading Ichiro and rebuild this team. Only a guy like Billy Beane would have the huevos to do so (and probably would).
150: By the way, “mean all that much” should be “mean nothing”. Seriously. That example is a 16-at-bat sample size. “Tiny” is a gross understatement. Even the biggest samples for batter-v.-pitcher are like 50, which is still tiny.
(I understand what you’re saying and you’re totally right, just pointing out that matchup numbers don’t just mean very little, they mean nothing. Trivia.)
I think Mac and company still believe Richie can carry the team “when he gets hot.” To get him ready to do that, they need to protect his fragile ego and not put him in situations where he can fail spectacularly (I think they think).
147 & 150: Interesting…because if that’s the case, there’s definitely something going on with Sexson which I’m sure we’ll find out shortly.
*11, not 16
We should consider trading Ichiro and rebuild this team. Only a guy like Billy Beane would have the huevos to do so (and probably would).
Billy Beane would have a legitimate CF before he did that. The Mariners don’t have one (Reed is marginal in CF).
That seems plausible.
I would think if they were going to DFA Sexson they’d be playing him into the ground right up to the bitter end hoping he’d “get hot”. I don’t know what this means.
151: If that happened, then the attendance probably would drop to the level of Oakland’s.
Sitting on the bench in an obvious pinch-hitting situation, watching Miguel Cairo hit in your spot can’t be any easier on his ego than going in and striking out.
LOL KJR is saying we should trade Sexson, even if “only” for $2 million.
Would anyone pay $2M for Sexson?
$2?
How long do you think it’s going to be before we have a a Miguel Cairo mural on the side of Safeco? I had my wife take a picture of me giving Vidro’s mural the finger before Thursday’s game, and I will treasure it always.
Also, Wlad was on the bench to pinch-hit as well. Mac seems to be throwing in the towel on the year, I guess.
what a let down. M’s chance to win two series in a row. But no. Meltdown Mariners.
Ralph, I agree. At least Richie doesn’t get booed when he’s on the bench.
Mac was asked in the post game why he didn’t PH for Cairo, “He’s been swinging the hot bat and we wanted to stay with him”.
that’s the first time I left before the 9th finished. I just couldn’t talk watching Arthur Lee come in.
I think Felix summed up the entire management philosophy after the Los Marineros game. Just substitute “anyone involved in Mariners’ baseball” for “players.”
From the Times Notebook:
Sometimes i wonder if the real morale issue on the mariners comes from management, and if they fixate on things like clubhouse chemistry and leadership because they fail to see the morale impact of their own dumb decisions.
Not pinch hitting there just makes no sense.
I was applauding because he came out of the game. Sadly, the only reason he came out, it turns out, is because he tweaked his groin. Not because he loaded the bases.
Tough loss, but at least this team is playing A LOT better the last 5 games. Once this team gets a few more pieces and the kids on this team play more and more games like this, I think you might like what you see.
Personally though, John McLaren has to figure out it’s time to feature the kids more.
Clement needs to be full time catcher, Morrow and Frierabend should be starting games, eventually the Mariners should consider calling up Mumba Rivera from AA West Tennessee this year (a guy who throws the ball well at 96 MPH) and see if maybe he can be in ’09 what Morrow has been this year and save this team some money, you need to see if R.A. Dickey is the next Jamie Moyer in this starting rotation, and you need to see if Tug Hulett, who is hitting the ball well in AAA, can be the next utility infielder on this team.
Forgive me if this is rosterbation, but the point is, it’s time for this team to start thinking about ’09 somewhat because the math doesn’t favor the M’s competing in ’08 obviously.
But believe me, if this team keeps playing the way it does the next 5 games and keeps focusing on fundamentals and making pitchers work deep into counts along with a little bit of patience with younger players (notice I said players, not GMs), I think you will like what you see at some point.
I couldn’t see Sexson on the bench– was he visible during the dugout shots on tv?
I’m not sure he is as valued elsewhere as he is here.
#180: He’s not valued in Florida with Larry Beinfest, I know that.
174-Cairo’s bat is so hot, since being put into the starting lineup against Boston, he’s hitting .294/.333./.333.
Of course, the way the Mariners hit, that probably does qualify as being hot.
Here’s what the Mariners see:
.294/vet/grit
.294/ears/bulgytemples
Tough loss, but at least this team is playing A LOT better the last 5 games. Once this team gets a few more pieces and the kids on this team play more and more games like this, I think you might like what you see.
The M’s have outscored the opposition 19-17 over their 5 games, going 3-2. So yeah, they are playing “better”, but this isn’t going to get it done in terms of getting back in contention.
What we’re likely to see is Mariner management move into the “false hope” stage of things. We’ve already seen the 2005 Astros being plugged as a model, which is ridiculous, because the Astros had Oswalt, Clemens AND Pettite pitching great and a good defense with guys like Adam Everett, not Felix and Bedard pitching OK and the rest of the rotation being crap, with a bad defense behind them.
I figure that will be over and done with by the All-Star break…
#185:
Obviously we are going to be done by the All-Star Break, heck, we are done now.
I was just talking about our prospects for NEXT YEAR, if we keep constantly playing the way we have over the last 5 games for the rest of the season and that carries into next year, add a few more pieces at the plate, bullpen, and possibly the starting rotation, along with giving some of the kids on this team that haven’t been with the club that much (i.e. Clement, Balentien, Frierabend) some experience playing in games that are tough to win and are close until the end like this one and give them more room to grow, you might like what you see with this team in ’09.
With that said, Bavasi and Armstrong must go to make way for Terry Ryan, Larry Beinfest, Wayne Kirvisky, Chris Atonetti, or Brian Cashman.
186… you forgot Kim Ng.
Wayne Kirvisky
Please tell me that was a cleverly embedded joke.
#187: Good point.
#188: Last time I checked, the Reds are in a lot better shape than we are in terms of young talent.
JJ looks injured still to me … something isn’t right …
I too think JJ is injured. As for Clement starting, forget it. That would imply that management made a mistake in signing Johjima to the 3 year contract, and one of the several ways this management resembles the Bush administration is that they never, ever admit a mistake. (Other similarities include stubborn adherence to ideology over facts, groupthink and incompetence. Feel free to add your own.)
#191:
BB said it himself though that the Mariners have no plans to trade Clement and that Clement and Joh would battle each other for the starting catching job and playing time. Think it through, if the Mariners felt Clement was expendable and Johjima (who had 2 good years before ’08) was “the guy” behind the plate for years to come, Clement probably would’ve been included in the Bedard trade instead of Adam Jones.
Because like BB said when Johjima re-signed, good catchers and catching depth are hard to come by. And while BB doesn’t do a great job with contracts and this organization on top doesn’t understand sometimes even when you spend money on free agents it just isn’t the cure-all you are looking for; I’ll at least believe him when he says good catching can be hard to come by because that is just a general observation from someone who has followed the game and been inside the game for a long time.
So don’t be surprised if you see something in ’09 where Clement got 60-80% of the playing time and Joh got 20-40%. Because right now Jeff Clement could be literally one “Jay Bruce-like” outburst from sending Joh to the pine. John McLaren finally had it with Richie even with the good effort he was putting in day after day (according to Mac) because Richie wasn’t producing any results, so I don’t see why the Mariners wouldn’t do that with Joh.
Trust me, unlike the Bush administration, the Mariners usually do admit mistakes through their actions (i.e. benching Richie Sexson, benching and trading Jeff Cirillo, etc.). The big problem is they just do that when it is way too late.
Wayne Krivisky actually didn’t do that badly in Cincy, he just made one bad trade, (and the Hamilton trade was also questionable) but otherwise did pretty well.
#193: What bad trade was that? I can’t remember.
#194:
If Kenji would feel insulted about riding the bench like Richie is right now because he wouldn’t be producing as good of results as Jeff Clement then that’s his own fault and he would just have to suck it up. No one is going to force John McLaren to do anything in terms of who is being trot out there every day, so he should feel no obligation to bench Johjima if he isn’t producing any good numbers.
Obviously the Mariners were idiots for not waiting until after the season before thinking about extending Kenji, but that’s the front office’s problem. John McLaren’s job is to try to put the best starting nine out there every day with the roster he’s been given, regardless of who makes what.
191… and the Ms still think they are in contention, so they are also like Hillary.
193: Um, isn’t this the same guy who gave an LOL years, WTF million dollar deal to a relief pitcher (Francisco Cordero) after overpaying massively in trade for a couple relief pitchers (the Kearns/Lopez deal) and who thinks batter strikeouts are an abomination?
Sounds like a bad GM to me.