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Lookout Landing

Bad Ideas And The People Who Love Them

*sigh*

With Bedard sidelined, the Mariners will return Ryan Rowland-Smith to the bullpen and start Jarrod Washburn on Saturday, then Miguel Batista on Sunday.

And after the All-Star break?

Riggleman said the tentative plan was to start Felix Hernandez, Washburn, Silva and then Bedard after the break.

“It would be nice to start the second half with the pitching staff we envisioned coming out of camp,” Riggleman said.

There are currently three pitchers in the Mariner dugout who may be capable of starting games next year and delivering a reasonable performance for next to nothing. If Riggleman has his way, none of them will be able to prepare for such an opportunity down the stretch. But hey, at least Batista earned his way back. While his season numbers may be beyond embarrassing, those three innings of relief were something else.

0 recs  |  417 comments

Comments

Incompetence is running wild in this organization.
WHATCHA GONNA DO, BROTHER

WHEN IGNORANCE RUNS WILD ON YOUUUUUUUUUUU

AWOoooooooooooooooooooo
Not knowing shit is just... too... sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet
God Dammit.

Get your fucking heads out of your asses, FO/Rigglemania.

When I got tickets for the second game after the AS break

I envisioned Felix starting that game. Fuck you Bedard, pitch through pain you little maggot, pitch til your fucking shoulder turns to hamburger.

Dusty Baker?

That you?

Strasburg!
I really believe

that the team is covertly tanking the season to land the #1 pick, hence crap like this and Vidro batting cleanup.

It's not like RRS is going to be amazing as a starter right now though

he still needs to work on stretching out, so right now if he’s giving them ~4 innings and 1-2 RA, you can always call on Batista or Corcoran to blow the game anyway.

but of course...

Batista is amazing as a starter right now haha

But RRS has upside as a starter

Why take chances when Batista’s pitching assures you of losses? You can always stretch RRS out next year ;P

If they had brains

Train him up now while we have a throw away season and virtually nothing to lose (oh right…if we win we wont get the #1 pick) so that he can be used next year when we have a fresh plate and he will have built stamina to be a successful starter

(keep in mind I'm being facetious)

I agree with gustaf below that they’re likely just showcasing their crap in hopes that someone will make a deal for said crap, and then they’ll slide RRS back into the rotation.

They'd better not sit on their asses during trade season

that iswhat im hoping for!

(but if they trade RR-S I will shit a brick)

For your butthole's sake

I hope they don’t trade RR-S.

*For your (Souther's) sake
Well played.
Yeah, I figured the silver lining this year

is that we’re the season was already over 2 months in, so we can at least see if what we want next year. Like Jeff said, who among RRS, Morrow, and Dickey can be a starter? But if only one (and possibly none) get to start, it might be hard to decide come spring training. Hopefully we’re just banking on Batista getting 2 good starts in so we can trade him, and hopefully we trade Washburn and move RRS back into a starting role.

I'm almost certain Wash is going to be dealt.

Tits…not so much.

I'm just not sure how good I feel about RRS, Morrow and Dickey in the same rotation

yeah, all three are made of awesome for varying reasons, but when you get right down to it, you have three relatively high risk guys that you’re counting on (Morrow/RRS due to stretching out and experience concerns, Dickey due to his erratic pitching this season). You’d probably expect at least one of them to flame out, but then I guess that’s what replacement level left-handed starters in AAA are for.

That's why smart bloggers always reccomend signing a few of those guys every year.
Do the guys turn green after five bloggers recommend it?
Only when they get really angry.
I can't believe I didn't get any recs for this
flag'd
Flag > rec >> LFoJL rec
I try to make my flags something the mods look forward to reading.
You should turn on them
I try to use flags as they were intended because I'm not fucked up in the head.
Why are you lumping the two of us together now?
I wasn't responding to you.
Taste the sad, JI. Taste the sad.

Tastes a lot like happy.
I found something

better to recommend

We are getting closer and closer to the first LL intervention.
I plan on opening tonight's gamethread with a link to butthol's disastrous comment.
I plan to comment for one inning using now but comments of mine from the past
I would have planned on flagging this comment were I at my computer when it happened
I warned

you about Riggleman.

FUCK THIS MOTHERFUCKING SHIT!!!

I’ve been trying to have patience with Riggleman and company starting the likes of Jose Vidro, Richie Sexson, and Miguel Cairo with the understanding that THIS HORSESHIT WOULD STOP WHEN THE TRADE DEADLINE PASSED!!

No matter how delusional, as long as there was any hope of trading these bums I could cross my eyes and tilt my head and suffer through it. But WTF. Once the trade deadline is gone, if Riggleman is still trotting Vidro, Sexson and Cairo out there then I. Give. Up. What on earth does this accomplish other than pissing off your fan base and wasting time that could be used to have a look at pieces that actually might be useful to the future of this ballclub.

Man, I really hope this team is sold and Howard/Lincoln/Riggleman and all just disappear.

It'll be okay, just take some deep breaths.
Who are Howard and Lincoln
Well, Hyphen, it was fun.

Thanks for the memories.

Amen to that!

Back to saving money on (random bought, non season plan) tickets!

I think we are overreacting

I think management is hoping to showcase Washburn’s mediocrity in order to deal him. (All of us would do backflips to get his salary off the ‘09 books). Assuming that happens, we only have a couple more Washburn starts to live through.

RRS will be primed and ready to slide into the rotation when Washburn gets dealt.

As for Batista, I bet management is hoping to create a market for him as well. His dealine is not July 31. He will EASILY clear waivers, meaning he has a month and a half to fool teams into thinking he can get outs.

For ‘09 purposes, starting those two guys actually makes sense in that it increases the chances that one or both will be traded for a bucket of balls.

There is no way I'm settling for a bucket of balls for Batista

We had better get at least 50 high-quality wood bats in return as well or no deal

Batista is untradeable
We could throw him into a deal and hope the other GM doesn't notice
I'm pretty sure former M's GM Bill Bavasi wouldn't notice

I mean the man traded for Jose Vidro and didn’t notice that he got Pepe Vidro too.

BTW, anyone else have a pet peeve

when people spell it Bautista, or Bautitusta, or other variations that are clearly wrong.
It seems like a lot of Mariners are untradeable… what does that say about our ability to properly assess talent?

A lot of things that have already been said
I still think we've got a good chance to trade Bataster
To Tacoma.

For Ryan Feierabend.

That's why I just say "Tits".
I am (not so secretly) hoping that

Washburn has done well the past start and will be looking good to the NL as a middle reliever and at least has SOME trade value if he continues to pitch somewhat well.

As to if they would put RR-S in the rotation if Washburn gets dealt…one can only hope.

I would rather see RR-S than Batista or even Silva lol (didnt say myy wishes were realistic) but maybe you are right.

Heh, Washburn is probably looknig pretty good as a #3 to a bunch of NL teams right now

Let’s see if we can swing a Washburn/Yuni + some AAAA guy for Loney/Kemp right now

And let's see if we can get Kim Ng in this deal too, come to think of it
Yuni/Wash for Loney would be everything we ever dreamed of.
which means

it will never happen.

I dreamed of winning the Final Four one time

Not sure how getting James Loney would help that…

He's non-white.
Didn't he play hoops at some point?

Also Kemp is way more likely to be dealt than Loney.

Ned Coletti's not that bright of a guy, is he?
someone expected something different

from this organization? I seriously doubt anyone on the team gets moved or demoted while in this “temporary” flux situation with the GM and Manager…. maybe one player, but doubtful anything more then that.

So ESPN has a rumor that the Twins are talking to the M's about Beltre.
I thought that rumor was that they were talking to themselves
That's probably about as far as it will get.

Are the Twins really going to absorb Beltre’s payroll for a season and change?

There's a rumor on the street that I talked to the bus driver about the weather today
How shall we confirm this?
We saw it on the internet, it must be true.
Post a link to gomezconversationrumors.com
Try NWAAweatherrumors.com
Either one is fine ;P
Riggleman is a shitty manager

He’s just as bad as McLaren at least. God if he’s around in ‘09 that is going to suck so bad >:(

Even if Lee P. is the new GM, I doubt they retain Riggleman.

Hell, I bet the only member of the coaching staff they retain is Norm Charlton, just so we can hang on to that ‘95 magic a little longer.

The bullpen has been pretty good.

Not that he really has anything to do with it.

ESTABLISH TEH FASTBALL!
Why, because he's playing Vidro, Bloomquist and Cairo? And this throwaway comment?

How do we know these are entirely his decisions?

And the comment about having his original rotation means nothing. It’s a throwaway thought.

Why would the front office tell him to play Vidro? Or Bloomquist? Or Cairo?

Or Batista? All of these are guys who will be gone next year most likely and we are playing for nothing. It’s not like they have any trade value either. Certainly there is a possibility that he is being ordered to play these guys but it wouldn’t make any sense as far as the goals of the front office are concerned to go out of their way to play them, and there is no evidence that his lineups are being dictated for him.

I don’t buy that they’re intentionally trying to lose, Lincoln and Armstrong must still be concerned about their jobs and a strong finish would help them keep them even if it was bad for the future success of the club.

Artificially inflate trade value.
What the hell kind of trade value do three guys who can't OPS .600 have?

Okay, Willie is slightly above .600, but he’s slugging .248…..248!

What value does one of the worst pitchers in baseball in Miguel Batista have?

They have no trade value to inflate, NOBODY is that stupid. You’re not going to get better than a warm body for any of them if you even get that so what is the point? They are all farrrr below replacement level and every front office in baseball must realize that.

We know they don't have trade value, I admit that.

This season is toast, another three weeks of Vidro/Sexson/Tits/Cairo isn’t going to hurt. Showcase them, see if something materializes. If not, dump them after the deadline.

It's an idea

But “Riggleman totally did this himself because he’s an idiot” is also an idea.

He's the one who makes the lineups

It’s less of a stretch to hold him responsible for his own responsibilities than it is to say his bosses told him to do it without evidence. Do you really think the front office commanded him to bat Vidro cleanup 8 times? Putting him in the lineup is one thing, but telling Riggleman where to bat him too is some serious meddling. Did his bosses call him on the phone during the middle of a game and tell him to pinch hit Vidro for Clement a few days ago too? Like I said, it doesn’t serve the FO’s interests to keep losing as their jobs are still on the line, so if it is happening, whatever the reason is it’s probably not sabotage.

Maybe they did, or maybe he doesn't want to explain to them why Vidro isn't playing

There could be a variety of internal reasons he’s doing it, besides “He just does it by rote because has the intelligence of a FAS baby.”

Why, because he's playing Vidro, Bloomquist and Cairo? And this throwaway comment?

How do we know these are entirely his decisions?

And the comment about having his original rotation means nothing. It’s a throwaway thought.

Glad to see I'm not the only one having issues posting
But he had that ready to go.
LL's being wonky the last hour or so
I've had weird issues with it over the last couple of days.
Too much penalty box wank
I approve of this answer.
I'm not angry at Riggleman for this so much as I'm just angry in general

God this photoshop is a lot more disgusting than I remembered.
I say focus your anger via the ban button!
I'm only angry at these lineups when we win.

I’m fine if we roll out the roll-over-and-die lineup and lose. But if we win, it hurts twofold since a) it convinces management that they’re on the right path, b) losing at this point only gets us a worse draft pick.

FWIW,

as long as Putz is out or ineffective, Morrow may be worth more to the organization as a closer than as a starter. Of course without seeing what he can do in 6 innings prevents you from being able to say one way or another. But… let’s say he goes from being the angry deity reliever he’s become this season to a ~4.5R/9 guy. That’s a net loss, right?

Worth more as in... give us a better win/loss record?

I still hope we get Strasburg. (Pie in the sky dream, Felix, Bedard, Sheets, Strasburg, Morrow?, drool)

I should mention

that I think it’s crucial to see what Morrow can do as a starter first, so please put away the pitchforks and the noose.

But I spent so much time digging them out of the garage!
Oh, okay. You can lynch me just once.

But it’s off to bed with you after that.

Why does a team whose season is over need a closer now over a starter next year?

JJ (hopefully) won’t be hurt next year and we’re going to need another SP. We also have Josh Fields to take Morrow’s spot in the bullpen if necessary, and bullpen arms are easier to find than starting pitchers anyway. There’s no way we can lose by at least finding out if he can effectively transition to starter during the rest of this throw-away season.

Because the FO

still thinks we have something to play for this season. Why else would they stick with crap like Vidro and Cairo, while also throwing RRS into the bullpen instead of sending him to Tacoma to stretch out and bringing up someone like O’Flaherty if they need another lefty? We can’t get any worse then we already are so why not send Morrow to Tacoma to stretch too?

I doubt they have any such delusions

I don’t know why Vidro is still on the roster, but whatever their reasons for this are, it’s not trying to contend.

That was tongue in cheek
EOF is injured if I'm not mistaken.
He's been hurt for a while.

Any info, Gomez?

Per Kirby Arnold, guess what?

Back spasms. Tacoma was hoping he’d be back this past week… but not yet.

Potatoes has back spasms?

How disappointing.

Seriously?!?

That seems to be “the injury” this year.

Like "high ankle sprains" in the NFL a few years ago.
Dammit we could have beaten the Bears had Tru not gotten that high sprain.
Can we hire Tim Ruskell

To GM the Mariners during the NFL offseason?

Wooo bears
Fuck you >:(

Devin Hester is a god

I could watch this all day

Fuck Dreamboat

but still, I love you forever for this.

Kick returns and punt returns are the most exciting plays for the Bears

Or the rare occasion where they use him on offense

He's going to be their #1 receiver next year

stifles laugh

Oh dear.

That makes our receiving situation pale in comparison.

The Bears are a sad offensive team
At least you've got a respectable quarterback in Rex Grosmahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Even more sad than last year though

By a lot. Berrian/Muhammad was mediocre, Hester/Booker is going to be epicly bad.

Hester is going to be amazing

Shut yo mouth

Doesn't he have some serious issues running routes?
He has issues doing pretty much everything but returning kicks

but is so other-worlding amazing at it that it really doesn’t matter.

*other-worldly
At least he'll be fun to watch
Do we play the Bears this year?

I want to see Tru and Jennings have a field day with him.

I have a feeling he'll be running a lot of deep routes, screens, and reverses
By a lot of I meant only
You're underrating Mark Bradley

Rashied Davis is ehhhhh
Brandon Lloyd has a chance to not suck

Your quarterback is still Rex Grossman.
I think there was a story last year about Tommie Harris beating one of the Bears wide receivers in a race

Which pretty much cemented Tommie Harris’s position as one of my top 5 favorite players

Lloyd and Davis are both awful

Bradley might be okay. But considering who will be throwing to him I doubt he’ll look very good.

And the Bears have serious question marks at RB too and a mediocre O-line. I’d be really surprised if they weren’t the worst offense in football next year, maybe one of the worst of all time.

I'm fully expecting this
the niners could give them a run for their money

although Frank Gore will probably keep the niners above the bears.

I hope those two teams play each other. First one to 0 wins.

I was at that game

And after that tackle I said some things that would have gotten me kicked out of Safeco Field.

Did you go all EnglishMariner?
In person?

Dear God

The things that I say on this site are the same things that I say in public...
So you openly ask people to recommend you in public?
He does.

Brett was talking about this at the softball game. Who asks for recs in real life?

JESUS FUCK IT WAS A JOKE
...and you made that joke to a guy who doesn't post on LL or know at all what the fuck you were talking about
Considering the fact that I was around two regular vistors of this site

Than yes that would classify as a joke.

Don't defend yourself so hard, its just a slip up.
Wow Duke's special teams really sucked

Like 3 guys had a full wrap-up on him and just fell down

You really are a monster
This can only improve my ROY standings.
This monster is also my teammate so thats unlikely
Yes, there is a continual second/third place struggle.
You're the one who suggested you might try to steal Hyphen from Jeff.

You’re back in the pack now.

At least Seattle has a good chance to be good this year
This team is better than the '05 Superbowl team.
Not true

There is a ceiling of awesome

I really think it's a better team.

The offense has taken a step or two back, but the defense is leaps and bounds better than what we had in ‘05. Overall it’s a net improvement.

Yes but this team doesnt have Babs intercepting Bledsoe with 5 seconds left

Or Mack Strongs 34 yard run against the redskins or the Monday night massacre or Seneca’s over the shoulder catch or the…

There will be other awesome moments.
RRS raises 12th man flag at Qwest field

Ichiro suits up and plays a shutdown corner opposite Marcus Trufant

Seeing Ichiro raise the 12th man flag last season was fucking awesome.
I would kill for an Ichiro "raise the roof" gif.
Impossible the only thing better is never going to happen to me
Because this team hasn't played a game yet.

Just wait and see.

I think this is going to be a really special year.

I’ve thought that before and been totally wrong, though.

This year will be awesome

Its just that the 05 team was my version of the 95 mariners. Nothing will ever bet them in my heart.

What if they win the Super Bowl?
The same way that you guys would have felt towards the 95 team if the 01 team had finished the job
Okay, I get what you mean.

And I agree to a certain extent. But if the Seahawks win the Super Bowl this (or any other) year, they become my new favorite Seahawks team ever.

The one thing holding us back last season was the run game.

We didn’t have one. Period. Think how much that could have helped us in Green Bay to keep the Packers offense off the field.

Look at what we’ve got now. Just by adding Mike Wahle and shifting Rob Sims to RG, the O-Line is leaps and bounds better. We’ve got a backfield committee of Julius Jones, Mo Morris, TJ Duckett, Leonard Weaver, and Owen Schmitt.

I think the offense is going to be better than a lot of people thing.
Small sample size from last season

but I think Courtney Taylor is really going to surprise people this year.

We will still miss DJack and Joe J.
lol steve hutchinson rofl
Rex Grossman.

I’m going to use this every time you bring up the Bears.

I understand he sucks

and I hated their draft. I’m treating them like I treat the Mariners

Do the folks that run the Bears SBN blog have a penalty box too?
You guys need to head over to Field Gulls.
I'm still worried about our WRs.

I guess if our TE pans out, we can be ok on our WR, since Hasselbeck seems the type of guy who can throw to anyone. I’m pretty confident in our running game as well.

See comment just above yours

and the point is that any team needs both quality relievers and starters. Some guys, like Putz or Raffy Soriano, are way, way more valuable as relievers and I’m not excluding the possibility that Morrow’s one such guy.

Jamie Burke for #4 starter!
Cesar Jimenez has a tRA of 0 right now.
WOOOOOOOOOOOO!

CY YOUNG!

Has he ever started before?
He failed as a starter
In 2006... before he blew his arm out
Out of curiosity, what is Brad Ziegler's tRA right now?
I would love to see someone with a negative tRA
Is that even possible?
If you struck out every batter or induced an IF fly

those have negative run values

That would require one remarkable small sample size.
Something like this?

tRA = -.928

And that’s assuming that the two unknown batters both hit line drives, which I really, really doubt.

(assuming MLB run values, obviously an iffy proposition)
Yes

Dennis Sarfate broke my spreadsheet for a while last year

Oh good, you're here

I have a question

How bad of an assumption would it be to use the MLB values for a college pitcher? If the approximate values scale with respect to each other, would the final result be a (marginally) useful product? I have an idea for a side project for the day.

Its relatively easy to come up with the values yourself

just a lot of data entry or a bit of programming.

Well I'd have to compile the data for [X sample of college pitchers]

and I’m not particularly interested in doing so for a conference or a region.

Also, correct me if I'm wrong

but tRA scales similar to ERA (in a general, general sense), correct? So the average tRA should be equal to the average runs allowed per game throughout MLB per season?

pretty much
It's always interesting to guess what's going to turn into the open thread of the day.
Answer: all of them.
The Silva post survived
I wonder how long that lasts now.
You are so fucked now
It is you who is fucked
Rule 7 of LL:

Once you mention a threads on-topicness, it is doomed to become off-topic.

Maybe Jeff secretly wants the Silva thread to go off-topic so he won't have to think about Silva anymore
This beats the shit out of Rule 34 of LL
False

Rule 34 has to be awesome on the basis that it is rule 34

It's not good when I have the same thoughts as Robert.
If it makes you feel any better

I just stole your thoughts from you.

This site badly needs to become a forum
Like hell it does
Sister off topic forum where the unpermabannables become mods?
We already have a sister blog

they recently raped us

Hey, I actually talked about baseball in this thread

for once it’s not my fault

Thingray's and BrianL's faults for bringing it into football
I blame you more for the whole Bears thing.
Where were you with the shift key on that one by the way?
I'm getting a day off.

JI’s been inserted into my spot in the lineup.

Again with the... oh nevermind.
BrianL has been pretty slow on the Shift key lately

like Shaun Alexander circa 2007-2008

Or like Vidro running to first?

See? Baseball comment!

But Vidro was never fast

BrianL used to be good with the [shift key.jpg]

I haven't gotten a day off yet.

I’ll be back to form tomorrow.

Maybe you should go every five days with that?

don’t want to blow out your HTML.

I figure I'll blow out my HTML the same day Sean Green blows out his arm.
NEVER

WOOOOO RUBBER ARM SEAN GREEN!

BTW, I'm also OK with selling high on Sean Green before his arm explodes
Like this?

</fuckneedsurgery>

Tell me about it.

I’m on pins and needles waiting for Arshavin to head somewhere.

North London would be nice.
He wanted to go to Barcelona

per Pravda.

Yeah, he'll probably end up there

Spain seems to be his preferred destination. I can’t say I’d be too disappointed – dude has a good tournament, and all of a sudden he’s the Next Big Thing? I’m skeptical.

Russian players are well under the radar, and for good reason.

So its not terribly surprising he’s getting some love now. If you see some video of him playing in the russian leagues, and granted some of those teams would lose to the U-17 teams here, he’s been pretty hot shit for some time.

There was also the UEFA cup run
Where he was upstaged a bit by Pavel Pogrebnyak

bet the Russians wish he was healthy for the Euros…

I'm surprised there's so much baseball in the thread of the day.
I think I'll ban LFOJL for 24 hours and see what happens
Who will give out cheap recs if LFoJL isn't around?
No one.

You have to earn your recs.

Oh no, that would be just plain awful.
But who would you pun around with?
I was trying to kill that meme
Please tell me it's dead.
I've tried my hardest
This would be remarkably easy to pun but notice how I didn't
I speak for almost all of us when I say gracias.
and I speak for the rest of us when I say Rich Garcés
Don't start.
That was for the Super Bowl picture
I think you need to rePence
NOT FUNNY ANYMORE
I don't think it ever was....
The first pun thread was amazing.
No it wasn't and I'm just emphasizing how terrible they are.
At least when it was just that one thread

those of us that found it hilarious could stay and participate, while those that found it to be terrible could avoid it.

It was surprisingly interesting...but there is a bad stigma attached to puns

It’s quite sad. They are useful when used in moderation. But we know how this blog roles.

Oh god that had the exact opposite effect of what I Esteban Yan-ted

You have a tablet or something?

That’s insanely good freehand typeface

I have an insanely boring job.

Although this only took about two minutes.

Hm... so your job is like every other

job in the world.

I feel that there are unboring jobs out there. They are just not in front of my face.
I agree.

It’s infinitely better than my handwriting using a pen. The more I look at it, the more it blows my mind away. How can someone be better with a mouse than I am with a pen?

Please do not make me answer this question.
It was more of a rhetorical "Why have I not mastered

things one is supposed to master in 1st or 2nd grade?” type of question.

Not as impressive as being hand written.
It's only impressive if you don't have girly handwriting
Which I don't.
My icon begs to differ.
So legible = girly?
I think it's the cursive f.

But I like it.

How else are you supposed to write a cursive f?
In print?
That's like dividing by zero.
I would just like to state that I like the icon with its mix of printing and cursive and little hearts.
Somehow I feel this was really intended for me.
actually it was not.
Thank you, oh gracious and wonderful overlord.
Kiss ass
Damn straight.
I didn't understand why he felt this was an insult.
I will hold it down for you.
The original pun thread was absolutely fantastic.

The problem isn’t necessarily the jokes, it’s the fact that the jokes keep going for days and days and weeks and weeks. Few jokes have that kind of staying power.

Don't have a cow, man.
Nobody and that's I endorse this drastic but necessary move
Wait did he actually do it?

LFoJL hasn’t commented in like nine minutes

He's busy training in Robert's School of Stalking and Curating.
He shouldn't get anywhere near his car...I've rigged it to explode if it gets within 6 blocks of my house
Recently its mostly been this running joke

about ROY and blog-comment trade value. Which is an early candidate for dead meme of the year if you ask me. I think over 2/3 of all comments on this blog have had to do with this recently.

Excuse us for trying to talk about something that makes us happy

Fuck you.

That year is still a Bastille for personal happiness
This is fucking retarded.

RRS wasn’t even stretched out yet.

Shit.

If every grounder to short off him

didn’t go into LF for a double he’d still be in the rotation.

I just do not understand what in the hell the thought process behind this is.

He’s been effective, let’s yank him!

This team sucks...

Oh well, I guess I’m used to it by now.

I'm used to it like I'm used to having allergies in the summertime.
I really have trouble grasping what Batista has done to earn another chance

I get that you paid him to be a starter, but he is bad. Move on.

It's a continuing inability to identify sunk costs.

It’s mind bogglingly stupid, and it drives me insane.

This confuses me to no end.

I think we all agree that ownership likes money, and therefore running this club like a business is a good idea. Hell, we’ve accused them of caring more about profits than winning.

Why, praytell, can’t this team identify sunk costs? It’s a basic business skill!

It's because the baseball people DON'T have any business sense

and the people WITH business sense only tell the baseball people what to do when they want to feel like baseball people. It’s totally backwards and insane.

3 good relief innings.
so Dickey is also out of the rotation?

I don’t get it.

“With 90 games left in the season, we thought we owed it to our fans and ourselves to win as many games as we possibly can,” Pelekoudas said.

:sigh:

Well, look on the bright side

They won’t.

He's just trying to 'keep' his job..can't blame him, but fuck this season.
With so much salary to eat, we really need some revenue.
YOU OWE ME MEANINGLESS WINS YOU ASSHOLES FUCK GETTING BETTER!!!
Its funny because while I am all for tanking in the MLB for a higher draft pick

I am staunchly against it in the NFL.

There are far fewer picks in the NFL draft and way more positions

Plus, 2nd chances for failed head coaches are much harder to come by when you fail.

I'd rather have the 20th pick in the NFL draft than the 1st

the 1st pick is going to cost a ton more money and probably isn’t a heck of a lot better (although there are exceptions).

Trading down for extra picks is awesome
I <3 Timmay.

Seriously, though, I wish you could trade draft picks in baseball.

So true

didnt Tuesday Morning QB do an article that proved that second round and later picks were a better value than 1st round picks by a wide margin?

I believe so

Even then, all you have to do is take an overall survey of active NFL players, their roles, and see where they were drafted to realize that there’s enough talent in the middle rounds that 2-3 good but lower picks often net you more value than a single top 5-10 pick, because they can address several team needs rather than a top pick addressing one.

Not too mention initial cost

top picks get way more money. I’ve learned to be way more excited about multiple second round picks than one first rounder.

Gregg Easterbrook also proved the "you can prove anything you want if you pick and choose the facts" corollary

so I’d take anything he writes with a grain of salt.

This is so wrong
Top 5 draft picks are more overrated than Jose Lopez
While I agree with this (almost everything is more overrated than Jose Lopez)

Is giving yourself more money really worth taking away 19 players from the draft pool?

Depends, obviously, on how much better those ~19 players are than the players available at the lower slot

History shows the marginal difference, on average, usually isn’t that great.

I guess it depends on how much you value the money/how well you trust your GM to spend the money well
That in itself is a whole other fundamental issue, no matter what picks you have
well that expalins it

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
You have no idea what's been going on here.
I've missed alot

I’m not in the loop anymore.

It's... yeah just lurk a bit and you'll figure it out.
Commenting for a month = ability to know that capitals are a good idea.
Not entirely what I'm referring to

it’s more about the genius of the place.

I'm going to go ahead and focus on the 'tentative' part.

If god is merciful, Washburn is dealt before I turn the calendar and that RRS is the guy to take his place. So.

If God is extremely merciful, James Loney will also be the new starting 1B
If God were merciful

He would have taken Richie, Vidro and Cairo out behind the shed and put them out of their misery… and by extension the misery of M’s fans everywhere

Them being in the lineup is proof that God is merciful

we’ll understand in 2011

I'm sorry but I don't See any way

That making me watch Vidro bat fourth and Richie pretend to be a baseball player somehow makes God merciful… I’m open to being enlightened though

Sorry

That picture below was supposed to be my response to that

Oh come on.
What?

I’m supposed to be alright watching this filth the Mariners toss out on a nightly basis because we “MIGHT’ get the first pick and get this KID who MIGHT be good in three years?

Yeah, that about sums it up.
I would be a little more excited

If he was a power hitting lefty that would end up in the heart of our lineup. But man, I didn’t realize our situation was that bleak..

We already have that guy

He’s struggling.

Any worse then Vidro?
Like that's possible.
They could sign me to DH and play occasional first base.

I’m less of a power threat than Robert.

Like that's possible.
I could take Willie's spot

I can hit singles, run, and play just about any position save 1b and C

Actually,

it’s going to be a hard throwing college reliever with control problems, but you gotta live for something.

Not "alright" necessarily.

But it’s the best you can hope for at this point.

Dickey would probably replace Washburn
Do you think Dickey could be a serviceable #5 in the long term?

He’s a great spot starter to be sure, but I think they should do better in looking for a starter beyond this season.

I think it's worth finding out if he could be a decent #5 for cheap next year

I’d sooner find out about RRS and Morrow, though.

That's what I'm saying.

I think he’s more valuable as a swing guy and would rather leave him in that role. Morrow I think should start in AAA first, just so he doesn’t go all Ankiel.

I think I like this.

Under your suggestion, the rotation would look like this after the deadline:

Felix
Bedard
Silva
RRS
Dickey

With Morrow at AAA or AA to stretch out. We could concievably recall him in September when callup space is available to see how he fares. At the same time, you get long, extended looks at RRS and Dickey.

If that were Batista instead of Dickey at number 5

it’s equally good. Bedard being who he is means Batista needs to stay stretched out as a stater while Dickey is a freak of nature. So Batista makes more sense in that scenario.

I think I'd prefer to see Dickey at 5.

Like Jeff said, it’s worth finding out if he can be a cheap #5.

I have great news in case we have a rotation spot available this offseason

Jon Garland rhp
3 years/$29M (2006-08)

  • acquired in trade (from Chicago White Sox) 11/19/07 (as part of deal, Angels paid White Sox $1.5M)
  • signed extension 12/05
  • 06:$7M, 07:$10M, 08:$12M
Oh shit he's going to be the right-handed Washburn.

::sobs uncontrollably::

He's worse than Washburn.
I've taken a lot of shitty M's moves

But if they gave Garland a Silva contract this offseason I’d probably have to give it up for a while.

You should start making bullet points with hearts:

♥ Jarrod Wasburn sucks
♥ Jose Vidro sucks
♥ STRASBURG!

This is an amazing idea that the Secretary for Little Hearts fully supports.
2 points:

-Dickey pitches long stints out of the pen, going 4, 5 innings at a time. And he’ll be picking up whatever starts Bedard misses, so five or six more this season.
-Batista is not really as bad as he has been this year. He’s only stranding 65% of runners despite a normal HR rate and a slightly elevated BABIP. He’s walking way more batters than ever before, but he’s also been pitching through injury. He’s not this bad.

Batista has a 7.32 tRA

That may be all injuries, I don’t know, but I’d like to see him pitch well out of the bullpen for at least a month before I think it’s worth seeing if he can start again.

That would be the 6+BB/9

And pitching out of the pen is unlikely to help with control problems. Minor league rehab might be a better solution, I don’t know. But tRA is not in itself predictive, is it?

It's more predictive than anything else we've got

At this point, finding out if RRS/Morrow/Dickey can contribute out of the rotation would mean a hell of a lot more than trying to get Batista back on track. We know that a healthy Batista can put up a 5-5.50 tRA, and that an unhealthy Batista is terrible. What we don’t know is much of anything about the others.

Wouldn't tRA* be more predictive?
Yes, but that isn't stored online
tRA is stored online?
I don't think I'm permitted to share the link
In a data ferry.
What he/she said. You gotta regress the walk and K rates a bit.

And again, while I agree that Dickey might be a tad better in the long run, they do need a 5 man rotation so the need to keep Batista stretched out in case Bedard goes down, while Dickey can start on 2 hours sleep with a wicked hangover and food poisoning.

Then what about RRS? And (while I know it would never happen) Morrow?

Having Batista in the rotation at this point is ridiculous.

If you follow the thread back far enough

the hope was that Washburn gets traded and RRS is the guy to fill his shoes. The disagreement then was whether Dickey or Batista get the last spot, and i was saying it’s about even between the two, though I’d lean more toward Batista.

Morrow will never start as long as Putz is out, I think. But since we’re talking about what ought to happen, not what will, I think Morrow should absolutely not have his first professional starts be in the majors.

Right, my mistake.

So anyway, I guess my question is what do we really have to gain by leaving Dickey in the bullpen and letting Batista resume starting?

I know what you mean about having Dickey as the emergency long man, but on only two occasions this year did he have to relieve for more than a couple innings, and Batista would be more than capable of soaking that up. It’s not like we’re playing for anything in 2008 anyway, so I don’t even think it’s that big of a deal. Seems like finding out if Dickey can start is of greater importance than protecting the bullpen from the occasional taxing (which wouldn’t be a factor for very long anyway since rosters expand in September).

I guess it seems like every time Batista starts Dickey ends up pitching 3-4 innings anyway.

I kid.

When you put it that way.. yeah there’s not much to gain. Some protection for the bullpen, maybe, but as you say rosters expand soon. Part of it is I do believe Batista is better than he has been pitching and having him show that this year may keep the team away from Garland and his ilk. But then, the real answer would lie in putting Tits on the DL for two weeks, then sending him to AA to find the zone before coming back up in mid-August to show that he’s still a ML starter. And yes, in that scenario Dickey starts in his stead.

Another thing is… you know, I’m tired of talking about Batista.

Sorry, I misspoke.

tRA is subject to the same small sample variation as any other stat, so a half-season’s worth of tRA is not all that predictive, though certainly more so than ERA, FIP, or whatever else is out there. tRA* is better, although I forgot what kind of regression Graham uses (I thought it was pretty basic), and perhaps given the injury complaints looking at his 3-year average might be the best thing.

Aw, but how can you say no to this face?

That's sort of what I'm hoping for

although I’d rather see RRS.

How nice would it be to have him in the rotation
We'd need to hire a team dentist
Hey does anyone know

Is Clint Nageotte(?) still alive?

Yep

He’s pitching in New York.

Somewhere, I hear a voice saying “There is no floor.”

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