Out of it by mid-May

Well, this is definitely an end to the Bill Bavasi era.  And it can’t but be admitted that his tenure is ultimately disappointing, considering his father Buzzy’s legacy as churning out champions, and Bill’s handiwork in building the 2002 World Series champion Angels.  (You have to wonder why Los Angeles hasn’t made it back to the Fall Classic despite throwing money at Vladimir Guerrero, Bartolo Colon, and Gary Matthews Jr.  Maybe throwing a ton of money at Torii Hunter will be the ticket!)

While Bavasi should be given his pink slip, I don’t think its time to give up on McLaren yet.  How is a team possibly going to be able to win while recycling managers, and not allowing cohesion to be built?  And who would step in his place?  Would the M’s “brain trust”- I term I use loosely- want to hire a “name” manager in a PR move to draw the fans that are abandoning this team like rats on a sinking ship?  How’s Dusty Baker’s hiring in Cincinnati working out?  How would you rate Mike Hargrove’s term as Mariners skipper?  Dear god, can we just keep McLaren for no other reason than to avoid such disastrous- and expensive- hirings?

A manager can only go as far as the team that’s assembled.  The biggest mistake was believing this mediocre bunch would challenge for the division this year.  But we all knew this team was going to struggle.  Check out the Seth Kolloen post I linked to in this blog last December.  Bavasi thought the team was competitive despite raw numbers that showed being blown every two days by Weaver and HoRam- resulting in a hypothetical situation drawn up by Kolloen in which the M’s were 3-2 despite being outscored 20-3- indicated the need to focus on pitching in the off-season.  Such an egregious miscalculation indicates that Bavasi should never be allowed to evaluate, analyze, and make personnel decisions for a major league ball club ever again.

By playing half their games in a pitcher’s park, you don’t need to focus as much on building your staff.  The effects of Safeco will help make a good pitcher great, a mediocre pitcher good, and a lousy pitcher will be a lousy pitcher no matter what.  (The incredibly misjudgment of HoRam is another check against Bavasi’s GM abilities.)  Let’s not forget that despite his 6.20 ERA, Jeff Weaver led the league in shutouts (somehow the second time in his career he did that).  Only one was tossed at home- and that against Pittsburgh.  In the aggregate, the M’s pitching staff allowed a half-run lower at home (4.57) than on the road (4.98).  That’s saying something.

What’s that saying?  It’s pretty clear to anyone who’s been paying attention over the past decade: your home ballpark will depress your scoring.  Admittedly, the splits last season were slight- 4.8 runs cored at home versus 5 on the road- but all of the marks favor the offense on the road: batting average (.290 road, .283 at home), slugging (.432 road, .418 home), OPS (.769 road, .755 home), while on-base % stayed the same regardless of where the team played (.337).  So what does the front office do in the off-season to target improvements to the team’s line-up, helping to tailor the offense to overcome Safeco’s park factors?  Not a damn thing.  (And I’m including the signings of Wilkerson and Cairo, which only led to a violent slapping of my head when I heard the news.)  As I said after the Silva signing: “Oh, if only Silva can provide good defense in left field or was a slugging first baseman with 30-home run, .550-slugging percentage potential.”

One way to gauge the true test of a team’s ability is to look at the team’s Pythagorean Record, a won-loss record strictly weighted on runs scored vs. runs allowed and cancels out 10-0 blowouts versus 2-1 pitching gems (which have been on short supply this season thanks to the combination of allergic reactions to the strike zone and a sudden morphing of the team’s gloves from leather into cast iron).  Last year’s Pythagorean Record of 79-83 was nine wins off the actual total of 88 wins, and any decent GM should’ve realized that an offense being out scored by 22 runs simply can not compete in a division with the Angels and, as I suspected, the Athletics.  But the offense was neglected, and as a result we see the lousy resulting of having this season ended by mid-May.

The team was eleven games below .500 four years ago, the last season with Similin’ Bob Melvin in the dugout, and that team went on to lose 99 games.  It should be noted that Mevlin led an Arizona Diamondbacks team with a similar 79-83 Pythagorean Record to the NLCS last year, and is currently leading the best team in the majors.  I’m only slightly bitter.  Then again, going back to the point that a manager can only make do with what he’s given, the D-Back’s front office have made incredible assessments of young players and have developed a team made to win in their ball park.  (They have outscored the opposition by thirty runs at Chase Field, and fifty runs over all this season.)

So, let’s rid ourselves of Bavasi and take that yoke off around our neck.  Let’s keep McLaren and focusing on improving the on-field product to better gauge his abilities as a manager.  As for players, it makes sense to move as many as possible, but who could that be?  Richie’s performance and contract makes his value about nil- even if the Mariners ate his contract up, would it be worth it to move it for roster filler?  (No team in their right mind would get him in exchange for prospects or draft picks.  Too bad Bavasi is the Gm of Seattle and not other teams…)  Beltre has value- move him.  Raul has value- move him.  Even though the M’s signed Kenji to a three year contract for no other reason than to block Clement’s development, by signing him to a decent contract they’ve actually increased his trade value.  Move him.  And though it hurts, move JoLo and Yuni.

It’s time to trim the fat all the way to the bone.  And that means no signing Ken Griffey Jr. or Barry Bonds to offer any sort of “presence” in the line-up: that avenue would be exactly opposite of what the team needs to do.  There is no reason that a team with a $115-$120 million payroll should lose 100 games, so get rid of all those people and call up Adam Moore, Bryan LaHair, Carlos Triunfel, Greg Halman, etc. and have them play.  Sure they’ll be over-matched and the team will lose 100 games- but we’re going to reach that century mark anyway.  Plus, the best thing about slashing payroll is that ticket prices can be slashed as well, which should definitely be pursued by the front office priority number one as a PR mea culpa to their fans and curry favor with those who are offended by the stinking pile of poo that masquerades as the Mariners’ starting nine on a daily basis.

Speaking of playing like poo, the M’s-Rangers game is all ready under way, meaning that the team can get its daily loss out of the way earlier today….