seattle (0-0) @ oakland (0-0)

[TTown]

2012 stats

felix hernandez (13-9, 3.06) vs. brett anderson (4-2, 2.57)
hisashi iwakuma (9-5, 3.16) vs. jarrod parker (13-8, 3.47)
joe saunders (9-13, 4.07) vs. tommy milone (13-10, 3.74)
brandon maurer (0-0, 0.00) vs. aj griffin (7-1, 3.06)

a little bit of guesswork on oakland's rotation. i went to high school with dan straily so i hope we see him, but i don't think we will.

we've started each of the last three seasons with oakland (3-0 in openers), it's starting to feel like tradition.

[BayAreaMadSkill]

Parker? Griffin? Who? Well, they are A's pitchers, so ofcourse they will dominate. Probably on deer antler.

I like our chances to win the series, so long as Morse/Montero/Morales mash!

[TTown]

kind of off topic, but i checked lookout landing for the first time in awhile and noticed jeff and matthew were both gone, and a bajillion new people were suddenly there. what in the world happened?

[Sweezo]

I so badly want to see this team remain relevant all season, so why not start now? Maybe Morales and Morse can each hit a dinger and get people into a tizzy.

kind of off topic, but i checked lookout landing for the first time in awhile and noticed jeff and matthew were both gone, and a bajillion new people were suddenly there. what in the world happened?

Both Jeff and Matthew have now suddenly popped up on U.S.S. Mariner, and Matthew's post today mentioned something about "SBN being SBN" or something to that effect. I noticed the new writers on Lookout Landing explained the reason for having so many writers/articles now is due to network requirements or something to that effect.

One thing that worries me about SB Nation is seeing great writers like Jeff Sullivan and John Morgan who seem burnt out and stepped away. I don't know why that is...

When Morgan left, Field Gulls suddenly started churning out tons of content. Some of what they've done is great but there's also a flood of information and stuff to sift through. That may seem strange since I'm a mod on a message board where all I do is sift. I liked Morgan alot because I liked his tone and his ability to explain a football concept to me that I didn't previously understand very well. Rob Staton tends to do the same thing.

LL seems to be doing the same thing. I like Jon Shields and think he's a great choice to man the helm, but there's also suddenly way more articles on there than there used to be. Are they doing that right now to allow the new writers a chance to introduce themselves/build familiarity before the season starts, or this is going to be par for the course? I'm of the type where I prefer 1-2 articles a day [or none if there's nothing to write about] as opposed to 4-5 per day.

Speaking of SB Nation I just noticed Sonics Rising [previously Sonics Central] has migrated over there. Which is great. It's good to see them get a more prominent forum.

[TTown]

1. guti, cf
2. saunders, rf
3. morales, dh
4. morse, lf
5. smoak, 1b
6. seager, 3b
7. montero, c
8. ackley, 2b
9. ryan, ss

// shrug

[Sweezo]

That win looked eerily similar to the wins we eked out last year. Very little offense, lots of swing/misses, and Felix hanging on for dear life. There will be better days ahead but Brett Anderson looked dominant at the beginning.

[BayAreaMadSkill]

Our offense didn't produce a whole ton, but I still thought Morales and Morse had a couple of good swings each. Hard hit balls, just right at people. Other than that, yeah, it was pretty rough.

King Felix is a beast.

I'm not going to overreact about our offense since people have been saying Oakland has the best rotation in baseball.

[Slats]

Morse power!

[BayAreaMadSkill]

Sweezo; Let me know when you're ready to become a prominent member of the Michael Morse Fanclub. How could you try to say this guy wasn't a HUGE acqusition because of his "suspect defense".

MORSE FOR MVP!

[Sweezo]

Well, that's two fun wins in a row. Morse is hitting the **** out of the ball, Seager's on fire, Smoak's an OBP machine, etc. etc. The team's patience at the plate so far is encouraging. Iwakuma looks good as does the bullpen. Capps may have seemed like he struggled based on the results but that's only because Angel Hernandez is horrible. Maybe it's just me, but a pitch thrown down the middle of the plate should probably be called a strike...

Tomorrow's where things get interesting. Oakland has a deep if untested SP rotation, while we get into the bigger question marks of our rotation.

Sweezo; Let me know when you're ready to become a prominent member of the Michael Morse Fanclub. How could you try to say this guy wasn't a HUGE acqusition because of his "suspect defense".

MORSE FOR MVP!

Oh I'm a stubborn jackass so I'll never admit it...

I'm ecstatic that he's doing well. That first home run was a flick of the wrists that years of training told me would die on the warning track [it didn't] and that second shot...well, as soon as I heard it I wasn't so jealous of Cespedes any more. The guy has a ton of power and it's awesome when he connects.

Do I still think his defense is an issue? Yep. He's better than he was when he was first here but on the two running catches he's made [which weren't bad] you can tell his range is very limited, and there will be times he cannot get to a ball that someone else could have. Take the catch he made on a flyball hit by Coco Crisp tonight. At full speed and his arm fully extended, he just barely able to get under the ball and make the catch. If he misses that ball, it caroms off the wall with his momentum going one way while the ball goes the other. Crisp likely gets to 3rd base and you've got a runner in scoring position who probably scores on the ground ball/FC that Reddick hit a couple seconds later.

Nothing he can do with the bat will change that, and it will drive me nuts when it happens. If there was room for Morse at 1B/DH it wouldn't be an issue, but since there isn't room for him it is. Run prevention is just as important as run scoring. It's why I can live with Ryan hitting .200 since he can make plays [he had two last night] that create outs where others will not. It's why I couldn't live with Miguel Olivo and his parade of passed balls.

Do I still wish we hadn't traded Jaso since he had three years of team control left and Morse is maybe only here for a year? Well...yeah. But on the bright side Montero looks better defensively, Zunino's on his way, and John Hicks may become something down the road.

But whatever. The season's started, trade's done, and I already scared my dog twice tonight yelling with glee when he hit a home run.

[BayAreaMadSkill]

I'm unsure of why you over-value Jason so much. I understand he's a good clubhouse presence and had some nice clutch hitting for us last year, but he has a horrible arm behind the plate and didn't do much to power our pathetic offense.

Jaso for Morse was a brilliant trade. It addressed a serious need. And please; Morse loves Seattle. He'll play with us beyond.

Saunders as our #3 scares me a little, but we will see. The A's offense isn't very appealing, so hopefully he can put up 6 solid innings.

[The Emcee]

How about Seager going 3-3 with 2 walks? Daaaamn.

[Sweezo]

I'm unsure of why you over-value Jason so much. I understand he's a good clubhouse presence and had some nice clutch hitting for us last year, but he has a horrible arm behind the plate and didn't do much to power our pathetic offense.

Jaso put up a .394 OBP last year. As far as I can tell the two catchers with higher OBP last season were Mauer [.416 OBP] and Buster Posey [.408 OBP]. Posey just agreed to a 9 year/$167 million extention. Mauer's in the middle of an 8 year/$184 million extension. The reason I beleive Jaso is UNDER-rated is because I can point at statistics like that and tell you that Jaso put up elite level production at a limited offensive position in 2013.

How is it you argue that it doesn't matter that Morse is terrible defensively but then argue Jaso's overrated due to his "horrible arm behind the plate" [i.e. Jaso's defense is lacking]? Granted, catcher defensive stats are very tough to use correctly. Jaso's rSB [i.e. how many “runs” a catcher contributes to their team by throwing out runners/preventing steals] number last season was a zero. Not a positive number, not a negative number. In other words : Average. However, he was below average in RPP [i.e. runs saved by blocking pitches/limited passed balls] at -4.0. So last year his defense, if you trust the metrics, may have cost the M's about 4 runs.

Meanwhile, Michael Morse sits at a -10.0 fielding rating last season, which means his defense was 10 runs saved below the average at his position. That matters.

Jaso for Morse was a brilliant trade. It addressed a serious need. And please; Morse loves Seattle. He'll play with us beyond.

He'll play with us beyond if we offer him an extension he likes. But he's a 31 year old power hitter on a one year deal making $7 million this season. Do we want to sign him to a 3-4 year extension? His last shot to really cash in as a free agent? Similar players have seen their production take a nose dive at the same age.

Meanwhile, Jaso's 29 years old and relies less on power to provide offense. He's 1st year arbitration eligible and is making $1.8 million this season, meaning you could pay him peanuts for two more years and potentially get above average production where that's difficult to achieve.

In summary...

JASO: Elite level offensive production in '13 from his position, under team control for three years, in his late 20's, either average or below average defensively at his position

MORSE: Power bat. Under team control for one year only. In his early 30's. Severely below average defensively.

[TTown]

jaso was my favorite mariner last year. that said, i'm a proponent of the trade because desperate times/desperate actions, and so forth. our situation got so bad luxuries like player control got thrown out the window. and as sweezo mentioned, zunino's presence made it pretty easy to part with any catcher in the system.

and i get morse's limited range in left, that's not lost on me. but we've had a historically awesome defense for as long as we've had a historically awful offense, and, well. results, and so forth. i'm hoping i nod in appreciation of morse's bat more than i cringe over a misplaced attempt in the field.

[TTown]

guti and morse go yard in the 1st inning of game 3. offense!

[Sweezo]

Great relay by Brendan Ryan! Turns out there is one player slower than Jesus Montero, and his name is Nate Freiman!

and i get morse's limited range in left, that's not lost on me. but we've had a historically awesome defense for as long as we've had a historically awful offense, and, well. results, and so forth. i'm hoping i nod in appreciation of morse's bat more than i cringe over a misplaced attempt in the field.

So far, so good.

I don't want to come across as hating Morse, as that's not the problem at all. Nor do I want to keeping flogging a horse that's been dead for about three months. But if the M's had signed Morse to a 1 year/$7 million deal in FA and said "we're going to stick him in the OF" I'd be pretty damned pleased. Trade a guy like Pryor/Furbush/Wells/etc. for him and I don't worry about the losing a guy due to diminished expectations/role/etc. But trading Jaso was a high price. Oakland isn't known for coming out on the short end on trades and they moved a well regarded prospect in A.J. Cole for him.

[BayAreaMadSkill]

Too much effort to try and continue this Morse/Jaso "debate" for much longer. Fact is, Morse will win more games for the Mariners this season than Jaso would have. FACT. And why did you even bring up the contracts for Mauer and Posey whe discussing frikkin jaso? Come on. You act like he's a top 50 player in this league. Jaso is a good complimentary player. BUT do you remember we are the Seattle Mariners? HE COMPLIMENTED LOSERS. We had to get power hitters who could hit. Let Jaso go. Its a good price to pay.

Anyways, as for this game; I'm already tired of Saunders. Never liked the pickup very much, and his soft-tossing ass can be cut. Bring up one of the young arms. Oh, and the umpires this series have been awful.

[Sweezo]

I may stick to my guns on the Jaso/Morse thing but after three innings I'm willing to admit I was wrong about bringing Joe Saunders in to replace Vargas. Not because of how he's doing right now but because he's apparently the slowest damn pitcher on the planet. Tug the cap, toe the rubber, step off the rubber, etc. I've watched him casually in the past and thought his results were in line with Vargas' as middle-to-back of the rotation guy, but hadn't noticed the pacing issue. This type of baseball is damn near unwatchable.

[Sweezo]

Too much effort to try and continue this Morse/Jaso "debate" for much longer.

I agree!

Fact is, Morse will win more games for the Mariners this season than Jaso would have. FACT.

I disagree but respect your opinion!

Jaso is a good complimentary player. BUT do you remember we are the Seattle Mariners? HE COMPLIMENTED LOSERS. We had to get power hitters who could hit. Let Jaso go. Its a good price to pay.

I disagree!

Anyways, as for this game; I'm already tired of Saunders.

I agree completely!

[TTown]

yeah, not a good sign when the a's can threaten to, if not outright, score every inning on you.

offense seemed to go into a shell after the 1st, too.