So here it is everyone. We’ve got 121 days until opening day. We’ve got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it’s dark and we’re wearing sunglasses.

Hit it.

Roy Oswalt played with Roger Clemens AND Andy Pettitte from the seasons of 2004-2006. In those three years, the Clemens/Pettitte pair went 75-44. The Roger Clemens/Roy Oswalt 1-2 punch (god, it even hurts to type that after last year) led the Astros into the playoffs, ultimately losing to the Cardinals. One could make the case that the Astros front office wanted to keep the Clemens/Oswalt tandem together so much that they gave Oswalt the 2 yr/$16.9 mil contract that they did after the 2004 season. Prior to that, the most he had ever made was $3.25 mil for one year (given, that was also the first time that Oswalt was that dominant). How is it that Oswalt doesn’t want to comment on how steroids have contributed to his contract? I would say that Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte had more of a direct relationship to Roy Oswalt than A-Rod did in Texas (they probably only played a few times, if that).

I hope that every time that Roy Oswalt drives his bulldozer gift from the Astros, he thinks of (and thanks) Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, and steroids. (Seriously though, the Astros reworked Oswalt’s contract after the 2005 NCLS to give him a bulldozer for winning game 6).

• The MLBPA will never, ever allow for there to be a salary cap in the MLB. It infringes on the size of players paychecks, and it is the MLBPA’s job to make sure those paychecks are as large as possible. And they are very good at their job. Does anyone remember what happened last time that a salary cap was seriously considered? Maybe we should ask Vlad Guerrero, Pedro Martinez and the rest of the 1994 Montreal Expos. (Speaking of which: does anyone want to lose another World Series? Or, even worse, pull an NHL and lose an entire season? Show of hands…..that’s what I thought).
• There is also the fact of the matter that the product is the most “fair” out of all major sports leagues. I’m going to throw it to Peter Gammons here (hey, when he’s not busy kissing some Sox ass, he can make pretty good points):

              ”In those 30 years, 20 different teams have won World Series titles, and it would likely be 21 without the 1994 strike that cost the sport’s best team — the Montreal Expos — a chance to win it all. In those 30 years, 14 different teams have won the Super Bowl, 13 have won the Stanley Cup, nine have won the NBA championship.”

So you see, MLB hasn’t had a problem since baseball has seen it’s ballooning contracts/team salaries. It’s the most diverse product in terms of championships, which is ultimately the biggest sign of a potential problem. Even with the Yankee dynasty, 20 different teams have won a World Series in the last 30 years. That’s impressive. And it can be accomplished because baseball is a team sport. You can spend as much as you want on individual players, but they still have to play together to win.

• This brings me to my next point. The top ten individual contracts in MLB are the following: A-Rod (Yankees, 10 years/$275 million), A-Rod (Rangers, 10 years/$250 million), Derek Jeter (Yankees, 10 years/$189 million), Mark Teixeira (Yankees, 8 years/$180 million), CC Sabathia (Yankees, 7 years/$161 million), Manny Ramirez (Red Sox, 8 years/$160 million), Miguel Cabrera (Tigers, 8 years/$152.3 million), Todd Helton (Rockies, 11 years/$141.5 million), Johan Santana (Mets, 6 years/$137.5 million) and Alfonso Soriano (Cubs, 8 years/$136 million).

Now, you might have realized that the Yankees dominate this list (partially the reason that there is all of this hoorah about a salary cap). However, out of those ten players, only one of them has made a World Series (Manny Ramirez, 2004 and 2007). Only three of those players have made it to the World Series since signing their deals (disclaimer: Johan and Cabrera deals were signed last year, Teixeira and Sabathia have yet to play for their deals). There is no evidence that anyone is “buying” championships. In fact, if you look back at the Yankees of the late 1990s, they won championships because of the years that Steinbrenner wasn’t allowed near the team. The team built up its farm system, and that farm system is what won them those championships. In all honesty, the only championship that I can see as being “bought” is the 2007 Red Sox championship, and even then it’s a pretty weak case for it. In other words, the concept of buying championships is bullshit.

• I’m going to focus on the Marlins for this next section, because they’re the smallest team payroll wise, and they seem to flap their gums the most. I hate when the Marlins brass  comes out and attacks the higher payroll teams and claim that it’s unfair for teams like the Yankees and Red Sox to sign all of the best free agents. I cannot think of a time when the Florida Marlins were even in talks with a top free agent. This is how they run their team, and nothing is wrong with that. They build up young talent, win a championship, then sell the young talent they have for even younger talent and wait a few years. Like I said, there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s actually pretty smart. But when they start to talk about other teams spending “unfairly”, the spotlight needs to be put on them. They spend close to nothing to field their team, as to make the highest profit margins. They take their luxury tax checks and put them in their pockets, instead of even trying to spend it on their team. As you can probably tell, I have a real problem with teams in the lower bracket of payroll complaining about not being able to compete. All MLB teams rake in enough cash, some spend the money more (better?) than others. This is the reason I don’t really have a problem with the Yankees: they charge more for seats than anyone else in the league. It’s not even close. They spend the money that they’re asking from their fans to try and put the best product they can on the field.
• Last point I’m going to make is about the actual cap itself. If you have a cap, you need a salary floor. It’s as easy as that. So, where do we start the floor? Where is the ceiling? Take a look at each team’s payroll from 2008. Now, where do we put the floor and ceiling? Put the ceiling at 100 million? Put the floor at 50 or 60 million? For all the fuss they’ve made, the Marlins would have to start spending 30 or 40 million more a year in order to be within the rules. I kind of like this idea, because it’s the ultimate “fuck you” to the Marlins. But imagine the chaos in the league if 11teams had to cut large chunks of their payroll off, while another five teams would have to start spending like they’ve never spent before. It’s an unrealistic idea, and I think that it would cheapen a lot of baseball. We would start seeing trades like the NBA, where you would have dead weight going from team to team because of cap consideration.

There is no problem with baseball payrolls. The game is alive and healthy, and the competition will never change that. The MLBPA is never going to let this happen, and I hope they stay strong. It’ll be horrible for baseball. It’s a bad idea. Now shut up.

I had heard your name in trade rumors for awhile now, and was all for trading you. It wasn’t because I lost that loving feeling for you or anything, it was because of what I thought we could get for you. But, I will admit that it was a little weird reading the news that you were actually gone.

I’ll keep this short, because I’ll be the first to admit that I’m no trade analyst (although, for whatever it’s worth, this trade looks awesome in my eyes). I’ll just leave you with this, JJ:

When I look back on the summer of 2007- when baseball shifted in my mind from fun summer pastime to “ohmygodineedtowatchnow”- I’ll forever think of the energy and fun you singlehandedly brought to Safeco. Every time that door to the bullpen opened and we heard that opening guitar riff, we knew what time it was. It was time for Alex Rios to break his bat over his leg. Alongside Felix and Jose Guillen, you will be what I remember most about the summer of 2007.

Thanks for everything you’ve done, JJ. I hope you take K-Rod’s job out from under him.

I’m personally conflicted about Griffey. I’ve gone back and forth on the issue for a long while now. This probably is the cause of being too young to really remember the “Griffey as an elite player” days. I live in the highlights of the past, and that’s just kinda how it is. I mean, sure, I went to M’s games back then. But I don’t really remember them. I was ten when he left, and I didn’t even start really paying attention to baseball until 2003 or so.

But in the last season, I’ve come to a stance on Griffey: we don’t need him. At any cost. It will do nothing good for the team or the fans. Why can’t we just remember Jr. as the great player he was? He’s going into the HOF as a Mariner already, so what is this rush to get him back into town for one year when he’s old and broken down? Why do Mariners fans want to diminish the quality of Griffey highlights by remembering that horrible season when he came back? Imagine having to sit there and try to convince your kids that the old guy who can’t even run anymore used to be one of the best players in baseball. Imagine your kids laughing in your face, because they wouldn’t think that that was possible. This isn’t even acknowledging the distinct possibility that he gets hurt and all the fans get to see in his victory lap of Seattle is his career-ending injury. It’s also not even acknowledging that he has little to nothing to contribute to this team besides “veteran presence” (which I’m hoping dies out with the extermination of Bavasi).

Griffey isn’t the same player. It doesn’t hurt anybody to just let him go to another team and let us keep the memories of when he was good. We wouldn’t want Edgar back, would we? We wouldn’t want Buhner back, would we? Shit, we didn’t even want Joey Cora back! So why is Griffey any different?

Gabe Gross: Raul Ibanez (They don’t look alike, but only Ibanez can properly showcase the horrible fielding skills of Gross. It’s like when they got Babe Ruth to play Babe Ruth in Pride of the Yankees)

Chad Bradford: Sam Elliott

Rocco Baldelli: Luke Wilson

Akinori Iwamura: Terrence Howard

Dioner Navarro: That “How Bizarre” OMC guy

B.J. Upton: Willie Mays Hayes

Joe Maddon: Drew Carey

As you can already guess, there weren’t many Mariners highlights that were recognized. I was surprised that the “accomplishments” section didn’t include Ichiro getting to 200 hits for an eighth consecutive year, but the three moments that did make it were far more worthy.
The first was Ichiro’s highlight-reel catch against the Red Sox in May. You know, the one where his hat fell off because he hit the wall so hard. Good choice of a moment.

The second was John McLaren’s EPIC FAIL at rallying the team in a post-game press conference. It was from that moment on that we knew Squinty’s time as manager was coming to an end. When you can’t even muster real anger at a team that underperformed to that degree, there’s no room for you at the top.

The final Mariners moment was what, I think, a lot of fans will remember most from the M’s 2008 campaign: The image of our too-tall, too-soft, too-sucktastic first baseman running towards the pitching mound and attacking Kason Gabbard of the Texas Rangers. It’s not just about Richie’s awkward gallop to the mound, or his subsequent use of his helmet as a weapon — It’s also memorable because of the “OH, OH MY!” call of Dave Simms. In his own way, he was totally right when he yelled “Well, that’ll get something started!” during the ensuing fracas. It certainly was the beginning of something, but not a Mariners rally. Instead, it was the beginning of the end for Richie Sexson’s career and the Mariners’ chances of competing in the next four or five seasons.

When I first came to this blog on January 4^th, I presented myself as the “resident optimist” of Late Summer Swoon. I feel like a lot has changed in this last year. I feel like the 2008 Mariners have changed my outlook on baseball. They have turned me into a skeptical person, always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I started out this season with high hopes, not caring what the naysayers said about my optimism. “No, Carlos Silva will be good for us”, I said. MAN was I wrong. It’s interesting to look back to that January post, where I talked so much about moves the Mariners had made, and ones I thought they should make (Cliff Lee? Remember when the Indians were supposedly shopping him around for cheap? Man, that’s crazy).

Nonetheless, I went on with my optimism. We went through our “Awesome Predictions” (personal favorite: Wladimir Balentien: AAAwesome), and we were all looking up. Not even thinking the team would be good, necessarily, just that we had baseball again. Then the season started, and spring was upon us (even if we were being hailed/snowed on in the left field bleachers). We won on opening day, and then shit hit the fan. J.J. went down first. That was the first bad omen. The bullpen collapsed shortly after, and before you could say “Sit baby, sit!”, the season was gone. The season was slipping away only a few games into the season. Some people (myself included) said that we could get out of it, but deep down in everyone’s hearts, we knew it was done.

The postings around this site became few and far between not too long after, with our “end of the game” posts seemingly turning into “end of the week” recaps. Then, on May 8th, I pronounced the time of death of the Seattle Mariners 2008 season. I couldn’t bring myself to keep writing about all the games. It was too hard for me in this inaugural season of the blog. We all kind of got wrapped up in other things, and the blog took a backseat. To the best of my knowledge, I think it can be said that between the three of us, we saw at least half of every single game this season. We just couldn’t keep up the pace that we once had at the beginning of the year. But there’s always 2009.

For as bad as the 2008 season was, it served a lot of purpose for me. There were a lot of things that happened from the end of 2007 to the beginning of 2008. A few personal crises to work through, and the feeling of knowing that life was about to change forever (high school ending, going off the college, my brother getting married). I needed baseball, and baseball was more than willing to be there for me. It was the first fully involved season of baseball for me. We had had a sixteen game package for years, but it was always more time i spent with my family than anything else. This year changed that. It turned more into a part of me, not just something I went to a couple times a month. I kept an attachment to this team, for better or for worse. And It’s that attachment that will bring us back in 2009.

It’s like my brother said in one of the first posts here:

“We’ll still be there next year, back in our home-away-from-home green seats, bowing to the massive Jumbotron as stats and facts are spewed from above. October has never been a totally happy time to be a Mariners fan, but April certainly is.”

We will always come back for more, because the Mariners are our team. For better or worse, these are our guys, and we are behind them. And with this upcoming offseason, we can look forward to the Mariners (hopefully) going in a new direction. If they do, we will bathe in the glory of victories. But if they don’t next year, we’ll be there thinking about the next. There’s always another spring on the horizon. Mariners fans know this better than most.

Me: “He can’t hear you, Shef. He’s on TV.”

Shef: “There’s my buddy BJ! Hitting another homer.”

Me: “Heh, yeah. Good times.”

Shef: “Nice play, Coco!”

Me: “No way, Shef. Red Sox suck!”

(Long pause)

Shef: “Hey, where’s all the other black folk?”

…