Tuesday, February 7, 2012 @ 11:35pm

Building blocks

About a week and a half ago I got into a rather spirited debate with a couple of people in the sports pit over what happened with the Mariners in 2009. One co-worker stated that the biggest mistake Jack Zduriencik has made so far was that he didn't go all young with the team from the get-go. He tried to do too much in 2009 with the big club and that perhaps the success he had that year slowed the rebuilding process down.

An aside here, contrary to what some who read this blog believe, this team has not been constantly rebuilding since 2001. The rebuild did not begin until Zduriencik arrived. Before that we saw attempts at reloading – spending money on established players but not rebuilding from the ground up and developing their own players. That started with Zduriencik. What did he inherit in 2009? Could he have gone all young then?

No. While the Mariners recently have been finding a good number of their prospects near the tops of different lists, that was not the case in 2009. Prospect lists are not the end-all, be-all when it comes to measuring young talent and I am the first to say don't count your prospects until they are hatched, but the more prospects on the lists the better the chance you will have that at least a few will pop in the big leagues. This is Baseball America's top 10 prospect list for the Mariners in 2012.

1. Jesus Montero, C
2. Taijuan Walker, RHP
3. Danny Hultzen, LHP
4. James Paxton, LHP
5. Nick Franklin, 2B/SS
6. Francisco Martinez, 3B
7. Chance Ruffin, RHP
8. Tom Wilhelmsen, RHP
9. Vinnie Catricala, 3B/1B/OF
10. Phillips Castillo, OF

You most likely are familiar with the majority of those names. That's a good thing. How about the list from 2009? Could Zduriencik have played the kids three years ago? You tell me.

1. Greg Halman, OF
2. Michael Saunders, OF
3. Phillipe Aumont, RHP
4. Carlos Triunfel, SS/2b
5. Juan Ramirez, RHP
6. Adam Moore, C
7. Mario Martinez, 3B
8. Jharmidy DeJesus, 3B
9. Dennis Raben, OF
10. Michael Pineda, RHP

I would give anything to be able to talk about Greg Halman's upcoming breakout 2012 season. That is not getting any easier. That is the first thing that jumps out from the list. The second thing? There is only one full-time Major League ballplayer on that list.

Baseball America has to come up with 10 prospects for each organization and I get the feeling that wasn't easy in 2009. The list appeared so thin that I went back and checked the organizational roster that year to see if they missed anyone. One name, one diamond in the rough if you will stood out. Doug Fister. That is it.

So back to the original argument. Would Zduriencik have been better off if he "played the kids" in 2009? Did he have enough kids to play? No. He did not inherit the talent.

What's to say that the same thing won't happen with the 2012 list? I suppose it could but I have a higher level of confidence in the talent evaluators who are bringing players into the organization now than I did then. Again, BA had to pick 10.

How did the Mariners' list in 2009 stack up against other teams' lists? No other team in the American League had just one big league player with significant experience. Two teams, Chicago and Boston, had two. All other teams had at least three. What did the rest of the division look like?

Oakland A's

Brett Anderson
Trevor Cahill
Gio Gonzalez
Vin Mazzaro
Jemile Weeks

Angels

Hank Conger
Peter Bourjos
Mike Trout
Jordan Walden
Trevor Bell

Rangers

Neftali Feliz
Derek Holland
Justin Smoak
Elvis Andrus
Taylor Teagarden
Julio Borbon

Not too shabby. You can see the impact that prospects, their own prospects, have had on division teams. Never mind what the Rangers spent this year. Prospects and a $65 million payroll in 2010 and $92 million payroll in 2011 were enough to get them to the World Series in those years. What will we see when we look back at the 2009 list three years from now?

One unrelated note: Anthony Castrovince, who wrote the great Chicken runs at midnight story at mlb.com, has found another gem in the story of Cam Perron, a 17-year-old who has tracked down dozens of former Negro Leagues players whose stories to date have largely been untold. It reminds me of the journeys of Lawrence Ritter, who wrote my favorite baseball book "The Glory of Their Times". Incredible stuff. Give it a read if you have the time.

Monday, February 6, 2012 @ 12:00pm

Mariners add to the pen

Jack Zduriencik has added to the bullpen once again. The Mariners have signed lefty Hong-Chi Kuo and former Blue Jay RHP Shawn Camp to major league contracts. To make room on the 40-man roster, Mike Wilson and Chris Gimenez were designated for assignment.

Kuo is an interesting choice, a risk/reward type guy. Two years ago he was an All-Star. Last year he had a horrible year and missed time due to anxiety. This offseason he had elbow surgery. That pretty much covers the gamut of highs and lows in a two year period. The Mariners clearly are hoping to see the All-Star version.

The second pitcher the Mariners have added is Shawn Camp. Camp has pitched at the major league level for eight years and appears to bring the "veteran presence" that Zduriencik has said he would like to have. He brings durability and experience and aside from last year, effectiveness in the recent past.

Both signings are interesting in that the bullpen appeared to be somewhat set. The fact that they were major league deals is what was most surprising. According to reports from Taiwan, Kuo's deal is worth $500,000 guaranteed with incentives that could take it to $2.5 million.

On a completely unrelated note, tune in tonight from 7-9 p.m. for the Hot Stove League Show, where farm director Chris Gwynn, Jeff Datz, Kyle Seager, USA Today's Paul White and Steve Delabar are scheduled to join us.

Sunday, February 5, 2012 @ 10:08am

Was the '03 offseason a turning point for the Mariners?

I'm not a big "what if" person when it comes to looking back into the past, but a Larry Stone blog post this week hit on the one "what if" I often come back to when looking back at the Mariners.

Larry pointed to the Carlos Guillen trade before the 2004 season as being the move at the forefront of the Mariners' decline. The drop-off was indeed spectacular, going from a 93-win season to 63, 69, and 78 win seasons the following three years. Of course, over those same years Guillen became an All-Star and posted OPS of .921, .803 and .920, finishing 10th in MVP voting in 2006. Needless to say he thrived in Detroit when he was healthy.

I wasn't a fan of the trade at the time and would wonder from time to time if Guillen would have had the same breakout seasons had he stayed in Seattle, but it was a move that didn't happen that winter that I think hurt the Mariners even more. It was a move that appeared to be possible at the time and not only would have helped the team avoid a huge slide, but very well could have put them on the winning path.

The Mariners missed out on their offseason target that year -- shortstop Miguel Tejada. Tejada was a free agent for the first time in his career and a highly sought bat. General manager Bill Bavasi had discussions with Tejada's agent, Fern Cuza, at the winter meetings but Tejada would leave New Orleans with a six-year, $72 million contract from the Baltimore Orioles.

The deal at the time raised some eyebrows, not so much for the dollar amount, but rather the amount of the years. Six years was something Bavasi was clearly not willing to do. Throughout the offseason he talked about not being a fan of long-term deals because, in his words, they always seemed to end badly. There were reports at the time that he may have gone five years with Tejada but six was out of the question.

What happened next? Many will remember what happened down the road with Tejada. In 2007 he was listed in the Mitchell Report as having received a shipment of steroids and in 2009 he pleaded guilty of perjury for lying to Congress in his testimony about performance-enhancing drugs. There were certainly headaches that came with Tejada, but let's take a look at what he did on the field over the length of that contract.

In the first four years of the deal he put up OPS numbers of .894 .865 .878 and .799. His wins above replacement (WAR) for the same years: 6.5, 5.1, 5.2, 2.4. In 2004 he drove in 150 runs. Over the life of the contract he posted a 25.3 WAR and Fangraphs put his overall value at $94.3 million ($66.7 million in the first four years alone).

After failing to land Tejada, the Mariners went with Plan B. They signed Scott Spiezio (yes, that still hurts to type) and traded Guillen. They then embarked on the beginning of their downfall as Stone wrote, or the "era of the black hole at shortstop" as I prefer to call it.

Rich Aurilia was the first to take the ball and didn't last long, hitting .241/.304/.337/.641 before being traded to the San Diego Padres. Who would take his place? None other than a 20-year-old Jose Lopez, who played 57 games at short that year.

The following year the unforgettable Wilson Valdez was claimed off waivers just three days before the start of the season. He got the start at shortstop on Opening Day after Pokey Reese missed most of spring training and all of his Mariners career with a bad shoulder. Lopez eventually underwent wrist surgery that would sideline him for over a month and Valdez ended up sharing the position with Mike Morse and Yuniesky Betancourt.

In 2006, order would be restored at shortstop with Betancourt taking over the position. Yes, I am being very sarcastic here.

To recap, in the six years after Guillen was traded and after they whiffed on Tejada, the Mariners' shortstops were: Rich Aurilia, Jose Lopez, Wilson Valdez, Mike Morse, Yuniesky Betancourt and Ronny Cedeno after Betancourt was traded. The total WAR for that group over that time span? A whopping 0.8, not quite a full win.

Over a six year period, Tejada: 25.3 WAR; Assorted Mariners: 0.8 WAR.

It gets worse. One of the first moves after failing to land Tejada was to sign Spiezio to a three-year, $9 million contract. Spiezio, as you no doubt remember, was a disaster, putting up a negative WAR, and was released in the second year of his deal after playing in just 29 games.

Hindsight, of course, is always 20/20 and no one knows what would have happened if the Mariners had taken a different path in the winter of 2003, but that is the time period I always go back to when I look at pinpointing what went wrong. The kicker is, they could have made the decision to land Tejada and keep Guillen, moving him to third.

If those two had duplicated their 2004 numbers in Seattle things could have looked very different.

Wednesday, February 1, 2012 @ 6:30pm

A special day for Billy Butler

By Shannon Drayer

Just three miles from Safeco Field some of the world's top doctors and scientists work day-in and day-out to try and find a cure for cancer and other life threatening illnesses at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. The FHCRC has a unique tie to baseball in that it is named after a pitcher and manager who succumbed to cancer in 1964 at the age of 45, just one year after being diagnosed.

Each year the Hutch Award is given to the player who best exemplifies the honor, courage and dedication of the late Fred Hutchinson. The award is given at the Hutch Luncheon, an annual event which to date has raised over $2.9 million for cancer research.

Billy Butler of the Kansas City Royals is this year's recipient. Billy and his wife Katie started the Hit-It-A-Ton campaign to help feed disadvantaged families in the Kansas City area. For each home run or double he hits a ton or half ton of food is donated. To date the program has provided more than 960 tons of food to needy KC area residents.

In addition to the lunch, Billy and Katie visited a lab at the FHCRC and the Hutch School, a unique K-12 accredited school that serves family members of cancer patients.

At the school Butler and his wife visited with about 20 children. Billy told his story and answered questions for the kids, who were thrilled to meet a big league player.

Preston, 9, and Bryson, 8, were two of the kids who took part in today's activity. Both have younger brothers who are battling cancer and receiving treatment through the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance. For them the school provides a bit of normalcy in what is a very difficult time for families.

"I am really excited that I got to meet him," said Preston, who is from Kirkland.

"I think it is neat that he is from Florida and his wife is from Idaho because I have a military family and we have lived in Florida and now I live in Idaho," said Bryson.

Bryson has been attending the school on and off for two years and recently has received the news that he will get to go home in two months.

"I am sad that I have to leave but I am happy my brother is not sick anymore," he said. "Seattle is my home."

What he likes the best about the school is that there is no bullying. He looks forward to coming every day, even in the summer. He also likes seeing his friend Preston, someone that he has a unique bond with.

"It's helpful to have a friend who is going through the same thing," said Preston. "My younger brother, who is three has kidney cancer. Me and my sister have been going through a lot but I have been hanging in there."

The school has helped.

"We get to go to fun places and hang out and play," Preston said. "This is a better school than my other school."

Meeting with the children was a warmup for a bigger audience that was waiting at Safeco Field. To be accurate, on the field. The lunch is held in the outfield and there was a huge crowd on hand to participate in the auction and hear Butler and the keynote speaker, Cal Ripken Jr.

Butler told the audience he was very uncomfortable speaking to a crowd. He said it was tough for him, but not quite as tough as facing Felix Hernandez on the same field.

He took a rather curious item to the podium with him. A can of corn. Of course "can of corn" is a baseball term but the can had a different significance to him.

"I have learned from my charity back in Kansas City that there are many people who cannot afford to buy even a can of corn," he said. "My family has been very blessed, and Katie and I feel very strongly that we teach our daughter to give back."

Ripken followed Butler on the stage and received a warm welcome from the crowd. Earlier in the day he spoke of the importance of giving back, something that he said is not hard to do despite the busy schedule many athletes have.

"There are many opportunities to use the platform that baseball provides you to do good work in the community," he said. "I always thought, and this came from my mom, that you do use your fame or celebrity in order to shine the light on something that needs to have the light shine on it and it is a powerful tool if used the right way."

Many baseball players are using that platform. Butler is the 46th player to receive the honor since the award was first given to Mickey Mantle in 1965. He said that he was inspired by former Royals teammate Mike Sweeney. With any luck he will inspire others in his clubhouse to give back as well.

Monday, January 30, 2012 @ 10:10pm

After a rollercoaster year, Iwakuma looks to settle in

When Hisashi Iwakuma put on his Mariners jersey for the first time we saw what we have seen from many who took the podium in similar situations. We saw the smile, we saw the excitement. With Iwakuma, we perhaps saw a little relief as well.

Hisashi Iwakuma signed a one-year deal with the Mariners earlier this month.

"It was obviously a crazy year," he said after a day of house hunting in the Seattle area. "We had the earthquake and the flood which we can never forget. A different year with a lot of things happening all at once. But with that, at the end of the day, I got to sign with the Mariners so it is a new challenge for me. I look forward to the new challenge."

We will see how much of a challenge adapting to the big leagues is in the coming months. No matter how much of a challenge it turns out to be, Iwakuma will not lose sight of why he plays the game. For him, it is about the fun.

"Baseball has always been good to me and I have always had fun," said Iwakuma, who was drawn to the sport because of his father.

"I naturally got to see baseball on TV and it happened to be with my father and that is how I got into baseball," he said. "My father loved baseball."

He decided at an early age that he wanted to pitch. His baseball hero at the time was Hisanobu Watanabe, the star pitcher in the late '80 for the Seibu Lions who was known for his big-game pitching.

As a kid, Iwakuma idolized Japanese pitcher Hisanobu Watanabe. (AP)

He caught the eye of scouts pitching in tournaments his senior year in high school. It was then that he began to think that he could pitch professionally. He was drafted in 1999 and made his professional debut May 29, 2001. At the time he was a very different pitcher.

"With my kind of stuff, early on I threw hard but learned pitching is about throwing inside, outside, up and down," he said. "You learn that it is about the pitch count, keeping it low so you can go long innings. It is the game of pitching. That is the beauty of pitching."

Iwakuma throws the "shuuto," which basically is a two-seam fastball or sinker as he sees it. It is at the top of his repertoire, his bread and butter pitch.

"The sinker is my pitch. Not many people said I threw a sinker but in my feelings I have always had that imagery of that fastball sink," he said while motioning the downward action. "Let the hitters swing, roll over and hit it to (Brendan) Ryan."

Iwakuma met and spent some time with Ryan at Fanfest this weekend. In Ryan he found a teammate that in his words was "very outgoing, energetic, enthusiastic and fun." Again, the fun. Something that his important to him in his baseball life and something that understandably was missing last season in Japan.

Iwakuma's Japanese team, the Rakuten Golden Eagles, play their home games in the coastal city of Sendai, which was ravaged by the tsunami that followed the earthquake that hit northeastern Japan last March. Iwakuma was with the team 400 miles away in Akashi when the earthquake hit. The start of the Japanese baseball the season was pushed back three weeks and it was Iwakuma who took the ball on the delayed Opening Night.

"It was big for myself, for my team," he said of the experience. "I felt very responsible for my city, because we gather up together to win a ballgame for the city. As a team that is all we can do. As a baseball player, too. We are out there to play, give it our all and win for our city. To keep our city going and to give each other smiles and that is all we had in mind."

The experience has changed how he looked at his job.

"It was a different feeling," he said. "It was special after the tragedy. Until then you played for the fans and you want to give them their dreams. One day I want to be like him or I want to play for the Rakuten Eagles, but after the tragedy it is all about winning for the city, to give back."

Now he is in a new city with a new team and his goal is to help the Mariners. He said as much, in English, in his opening statement to the press this weekend.

"Hi, my name Hisashi Iwakuma of the Seattle Mariners. I am here to help the team," he said carefully.

For now the rollercoaster continues as he looks for a home for his family in Seattle. His wife and three kids, the youngest just four months old, are with him now. Uprooting their lives and moving to a strange land is hardly easy for a family, but they look forward to the challenge.

"We have to fight as a team back at home, too," he answered when asked what he hoped his family would get out of the experience. "We have to get used to the customs, the culture, the language, the city, the environment and I have to support my wife, too, as well in raising three kids. That is our task."

His task on the field begins in less than two weeks.

Saturday, January 28, 2012 @ 10:01pm

Eric Wedge gives further insight into possible lineup

A chilly but fun Hot Stove League Show at Fanfest today where we had the opportunity to talk with several of the young Mariners prospects as well as Jack Zduriencik, Eric Wedge and Miguel Olivo.

In talking with Wedge you can see that he is absolutely itching to get to Peoria, get his team out on the field and resume the process of breaking in his young players. The process is to the point where he expects to see improvement on the offensive side of things.

"I feel like this will be the highest upside we will have in regard from one year to the next," he said. "I think these kids are ready to perform, not at the top level that they are going to perform at eventually, but significantly better."

His confidence that we will see a big jump this year is due in part to the fact that the offense didn't do much last year but also because of what he saw from his young players as they struggled to adapt to the big leagues.

"I really trust the kids that we have offensively," he said, "and I trust the work that we did last year. The foundation, albeit thin, is there."

We could also see improvement because Wedge will be able to put the lineups out on the field that he thinks will best score runs. Last year he often had to juggle lineups to give certain players looks and experience. He also wanted to see certain players in certain situations. It wasn't always the best lineup, rather it was a lineup that could give him information about what he had as well as give young players experience. This year it will be about scoring runs.

At the Winter Meetings in December Wedge said that he saw Franklin Gutierrez ideally hitting second. Today he said he saw Ichiro near the top of the order. He seems to favor hitting Ichiro second. Where does that leave Gutierrez?

"With Ackley and Ichiro up there, you kind of run out of spots," he said. "Then I saw how big Guti was, and right now he looks more middle of order after (Jesus) Montero and (Justin) Smoak. We will see."

Wedge said that there will be times when he looks to protect Montero a bit but overall he wants his bat in the lineup every day.

"With Jesus, we are slow playing with the catching but we want him to get everyday at bats," he said. "There will be days when we have to take care of him a little bit. Make no mistake, we feel strong about the young guy, we feel he will be a middle of the order guy for us."

I don't think we are going to see a lot of Montero behind the plate in games this year. The priority is to get his bat going at the major league level. Let him feel comfortable with his offense while working daily outside of games on the defense. One person who will help is Olivo. Wedge asked him to help out with the young catcher and he is more than happy to do so.

"He come to me and say, 'Wherever you go, anything you do, I am going to do,'" Olivo said of Montero. "I tell him, 'I am open, I am going to help you out. If you listen to me you are going to do it the good way.' I like to go early to the field (Olivo is always the first to get to the clubhouse in Peoria, arriving usually between 5 and 5:30). I told him my routine, he wants to do it. I am going to help him because he is a good hitter. He is young, he is the future for Seattle being the top catcher in baseball. I see him that way. He already has the bat, but he needs to get the defense."

There is a lot of work that goes into being a major league catcher and Olivo has learned from some of the best. Tony Pena, Sandy Alomar Jr. and Ivan Rodriguez were all guys that worked with Olivo when he was young and he wants to carry on the tradition regardless of the fact that he will be training the man who could take playing time away from him.

"He will help us win with his bat, maybe I can learn something from him," Olivo said.

Friday, January 27, 2012 @ 3:16pm

Hot Stove at Fanfest

We will be at Fanfest Saturday doing a Hot Stove League Show from 12-2. If you are at Safeco Field stop on by section 135 to listen live and say hi. Guests scheduled to appear with us are Jack Zduriencik, James Paxton, Taijuan Walker, Miguel Olivo, Eric Wedge, Danny Hultzen and Vinnie Catricala.

Others that will be at Fanfest include new Mariner Jesus Montero, Brandon League, Casper Wells, Brendan Ryan, Jason Vargas, Hisashi Iwakuma (Sunday), Trayvon Robinson (Sunday), Jay Buhner, Julio Cruz, and Dan Wilson.

Fanfest will run from 11-4 Saturday and Sunday with $10 tickets for adults, $5 kids 6-14, under 6 free. As in past years fans will have the opportunity to ask questions to the players, coaches and members of the front office in the Dugout Dialogue sessions which will take place throughout both days on top of the Mariners dugout. Fans unable to attend can watch on mlb.com.

For more information on this and other events including autograph sessions log on to mariners.com.

Thursday, January 26, 2012 @ 4:52pm

Mariners going forward with what they have got

By Shannon Drayer

No earth shattering news to come out of the Mariners annual Spring Training press conference but there were a few things to pass on.

The Mariners are going to be very young.

The youth movement continues. The commitment is without a doubt to the young players. These guys are going to play period. Of the 65 players invited to spring training, 55 of them have less than 5 years big league service time and 45 have less than one years time. They are comfortable going forward with the youth according to Tony Blengino.

"It is refreshing that we didn't need to go out and fill as many holes as we have in the past and are able to go more towards our younger players," he said of the spring training roster.

The wealth of young players the Mariners have right now at the big league level is seen as a good thing because those players will develop as other players are brought in. Zduriencik has been rebuilding and makes no bones about how he will continue to build this team.

"This is not going to be a fly by night thing. We are doing this thing the way it is supposed to be done. Do we have superstars? We will see. Do we have great players? We will see," he said. "I like where we are at as an organization. I am not satisfied where we are at, I am not content but given all of the issues we are in a pretty decent place going forward we are climbing up a ladder and we are moving up those steps in a very positive way."

Jack Zduriencik is pretty much done for now.

Zduriencik stated both today and last night on the Kevin Calabro Show that while his eyes were open, he didn't expect much to happen on the trade front so close to spring training. As for free agents it would appear that he is not pursuing anything else on the pitching front but he did admit that he would like to add something in the form of veteran presence to the offense. It will not be a big move by any means.

"If we do something it will probably be a little chip. There's not much out there," Zduriencik said.

The team is healthy.

Head athletic trainer Rick Griffin took the podium and had nothing but good news regarding the players health and fitness levels.

Felix is fine after getting hit in his last start. Casper Wells is no longer suffering from equilibrium problems. Brendan Ryan is running and throwing after spending the off season dealing with is neck issues. Griffin expects him to be good to go for spring training but admitted there is no way to prevent this from happening again. A bad slide or dive could be trouble but he his hopeful that the work he had done to strengthen the area will keep him from missing significant time should something happen.

Franklin Gutierrez has experienced no stomach problems and has put on 19 pounds. His weight is up to 197 "all muscle" according to Griffin. Eric Wedge who had Gutierrez in Cleveland says he has never seen him look so good. 197 would be a huge change for Guti who looked flat out breakable at times last year. A healthy Guti is a good thing and Wedge said that he is expecting big things out of him.

Justin Smoak has dropped 14 pounds and lowered his body fat by 4%. Wedge had told Smoak that he wanted him to return stronger and to that end Smoak along with Mike Carp took a trip to Santa Barbara to work at the P3 Institute early in the off season. Wedge said that Smoak should be a 30/100 guy. To do that he will have to stay on the field something he wasn't able to do last year.

Chone Figgins is going to be busy this spring.

I have said that I thought this would happen several times but Wedge said today that Figgins, who also appears to be stronger, will "play everywhere" this spring. When asked who was a candidate for third base Kyle Seager's name was the first out of Wedge's mouth but said we could see Figgins there too. Believe it or not, with the current roster if they decide to go with three catchers Figgins all of a sudden becomes more useful to this team. A guy who can play 2nd, 3rd short and the outfield is actually something they will need if they carry the third catcher which is very much a possibility.

News and notes...To celebrate their 35th anniversary the Mariners will wear patches on their sleeves and place the anniversary logo on the outfield wall. Also, every weekend of the season they are home they will welcome back a former player...The broadcast schedule for the games in Japan has been announced. The team will play exhibition games against the Hanshin Tigers and and Yomiuri Giants on March 25 and 26, and then the opening games against the A's on March 28 and 29. 710ESPN will carry the exhibition game against the Tigers and both games against the the A's. The games against the A's will be at 3:10 and 2:10am PST and will be carried live but also rebroadcast later in the day. ROOT Sports will carry the two games against the A's live and also rebroadcast them at a more reasonable hour...Vinnie Catricala is listed as an outfielder on the spring training roster. He could compete at third but will also get looks in the outfield...