Orange County Register

Ichiro Suzuki -- face of the Mariners' franchise

A year ago, the Seattle Mariners were historically bad — they were the first team in history to lose 100 games (101, actually) with a payroll over $100 million.

They have begun to crawl out from under the landslide of bad decisions that led to last year’s bottoming out and could rebound to finish with a winning record this season.

Heading into September, though, they are only spoilers in the A.L. West as the Angels make their final visit to Safeco Field starting tonight. We checked in with Seattle Times baseball writer Larry Stone to get some answers about the Mariners.

Check out his blog — the Hot Stone League.

1) The Mariners have picked themselves up and dusted themselves off after that 100-loss season in 2008. But how close are they to true contention in the AL West?

Mariners CF Franklin Gutierrez

They still have some holes to fill, but first-year general manager
Jack Zduriencik has shown that he has an eye for unearthing talent –
and a lot more cheaply than his predecessor, Bill Bavasi.

It’s a chore, but there seems little question the Mariners are finally headed in the right direction after five dark years.

 2) From the outside, the Mariners’ trade for Erik Bedard looks like a disaster. How big a mistake was it really?

 The Bedard trade wasn’t a disaster. It was a monumental, epic
disaster.

Erik Bedard -- all downhill after this

It was a failure in every aspect. The talent they gave up could haunt them for years, especially All-Star center fielder Adam Jones and budding pitcher Chris Tillman (OC native and Fountain Valley High School graduate). That doesn’t even account for reliever George Sherrill, who was an All-Star last year and was flipped
this year for two Dodger prospects. Kam Mickolio, another reliever
acquired from Seattle, is in Baltimore’s bullpen, and pitcher Tony
Butler is in the minors. So they gave up tons.

And what did Seattle get? A pitcher, Erik Bedard, who has had each of his two seasons end in shoulder surgery – the most recent, for a torn labrum, likely to keep Bedard out of action at the start of next year. Not that it matters that much to Seattle, considering he’s a free agent after the year.

For their efforts, the Mariners got 30 starts and 11 victories in two years — and paid Bedard a total of $14.75 million.

3) Don Wakamatsu has some history in the Angels’ organization (two years as a minor-league catching instructor). How has he done as a rookie manager for the Mariners?

Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu

Wakamatsu gets high marks, especially for completely turning around
what had been a dysfunctional clubhouse. The dissension was rampant last year – with Ichiro a lightning rod for internal criticism.

But Wakamatsu, who preaches what he calls “belief systems,” has everyone pulling together and getting along.

Helping considerably has been the presence of veterans Ken Griffey Jr. and Mike Sweeney, who have hepled immeasurably in rebuilding clubhouse camaraderie.

4) Ichiro Suzuki, first ballot Hall of Famer — right?

Ichiro is close to getting 200 hits for the ninth straight
season — no one has ever done that in baseball history; Willie Keeler
is currently tied with Ichiro with eight straight 200-hit seasons –
and should be a no-brainer first ballot choice. And that’s just on his MLB feats, not his seven batting titles and three MVP awards in Japan.

He’s a handful of hits away from 2,000, and at age 35, it’s hard to imagine he won’t get 3,000. That’s on top of the single-season hits record (262) he set in 2004, the nine All-Star appearances, the eight (probably to be nine) Gold Gloves, the MVP award and Rookie of the Year in 2001, and the two batting titles.

5) Have you ever typed a more painful phrase than “severely bruised
testicle” after Adrian Beltre’s recent injury?

Never. Just typing it makes me wince.

The fact that Beltre played five innings with that injury qualifies him for some sort of award for valor.

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