Archive for February, 2005

Gonzaga vs Utah Valley State
Originally uploaded by The Fan.

That college baseball begins so %$#!@# early can be the best or worst thing about it. When it’s 60+ degrees in the Tri-Cities (home of The Fan) and Gonzaga baseball has scheduled a game in our backyard, and there’s nothing else to do outside at the end of February, it’s one of the best.

What a perfect day for baseball!

I’ve put about 10 pictures in The Fan’s Flickr Group, so feel free to have a look if you’re interested.

Heck, feel free to put your own N’west sports pictures on Flickr and share them in our group.

That invite is especially open to anyone heading to see the Mariners at spring training!

Oh, I have no idea who won the game. Had both kids with me and didn’t stay for the end. UVS was winning 11-4 (I think) when we left in the 5th-6th inning.

You may have noticed that I have not yet mentioned the kid by name yet on The Fan, and that’s solely due to my unwillingness to jump on the “King Felix” bandwagon like everyone else has and proclaim him the greatest thing since sliced bread when we haven’t seen him pitch to a big leaguer yet.

Well, we still haven’t, but the folks whose opinions mean a lot more than mine or anyone else with the time to write a blog have jumped on the bandwagon, and now it seems a necessity to talk about him. Because it’s starting to sound like Felix Hernandez will be a Mariner on opening day.

Hargrove:

“Very rarely when people tell you about someone special does that person live up to or exceed the talk. This kid exceeds.”

If everything goes well, he’s a consideration to start in the major leagues. I don’t know how strong a consideration yet.”

Price:

“I don’t think you can say no to Hernandez having a chance at starting the season in Seattle.”

Just watched “The Village” on DirecTV PPV so my head’s a little scattered at the moment. Good movie, but after The Sixth Sense I think I was hoping for a little more from M.N.S. (I never saw SIGNS….)

Anyway, on to sports and just a couple quick hits.

If you’re reading this, and I suspect you are, and you or someone you know is going down to spring training to watch the Mariners, we would love to have some new photos for our Flickr group. You can setup your own Flickr account and upload them, or just email your pix to me and I’ll deal with it. Email address is in the box at upper right.

And let’s wrap it up with a couple quick hits from around the blogosphere (I hate that term; there must be something better):

Trident Fever ponders Jamie Moyer’s 2004 and what to expect in 2005, optimistically concluding that “there is no overarching reason why we can’t expect Jamie to regress back to his pre-2004 self.”

And coincidentally, just three hours after TF’s post, Jeff at Lookout Landing ponders the same exact thing, but sends somewhat mixed signals in conclusion, saying first “I don’t think that Jamie Moyer is going to rebound to what he used to be as a Mariner,” and later adding that Jamie “should be … a much more useful pitcher in 2005 than he was last season.”

My take: Nothing Jamie does at this point will surprise me. Nothing can surprise me. It’s quite possible he’ll bounce back and we can all be sure he’s worked as hard as anyone this off-season to figure out what happened and make it right. But to me, Jamie’s success has always been depending on fooling two people: the batter and the home plate umpire. He had to get them both to buy in to his “craftiness” and believe that 1) his stuff was hard to hit, and 2) his stuff was pitched with pinpoint accuracy.

I didn’t see either of those two people buying in to Jamie’s stuff last year. Hitters sat back and waited for something they could clobber, and ended up hitting an absurd amount of home runs off him. And umpires stopped giving him that 4-inches-off-the-plate strike, forcing him to throw over the plate more. If they didn’t buy into it last year, what makes you think they’ll buy into it this year?

Here’s what I was able to scribble while listening to the Hasselbeck presser that just ended. I’m assuming this’ll be archived on Seahawks.com if you want to listen yourself. Speakers were Tod Leiweke, Mike Reinfeldt, Matt Hass, and his agent Dave Dunn.

——

TOD LEIWEKE

- 6-year deal

MATT

- very happy, but tired — stayed up all night talking with agent and Mike Reinfeldt
- very excited about playing with Walter Jones for a long time
- Holmgren was very convincing — put the pressure on a bit
- heard from Tod early on — “it may seem we have a lot of different things going on, but there is a plan and you’re part of the plan”

- it’s not just the Big 3 — the guys that are still out there, it’d be nice to have those guys back, too

- gave a “little bit” of consideration to leaving, but not ever expecting it would happen; we’ve put so much effort into getting to this point

DAVE DUNN (agent)

- franchise tag “always looming”, but not something Mike raised a great deal; it wasn’t a big issue, we were both focused on getting a deal done

MATT

- Patriots have this team concept, and look at the Detroit Pistons who played a team with more talent, but still won it; the message is to play with that kind of teamwork
- I can tell you this now that I’ve signed the contract, but I really would do this job for free (great laughter)

TOD

- came here 1.5 years ago because of what the owner said about building a championship, and we’ve taken steps this week, and the week’s not even halfway over
- there is a plan, and it will unfold over the next couple weeks
- we were not gonna let Matt go, he’s critical to this franchise

MIKE REINFELDT

- the team wanted these players back, and the players want to be here
- we’ve got some momentum as we deal with more free agents

MATT

- it means the unknowns are gone; I know I’m gonna be here a while, and you forget about all those little things that sometimes get in the back of your mind
- I feel like it’s my team

TOD

- we’ll talk about president search some other day, maybe tomorrow

MIKE

- we want Shaun to be here

TOD

- we told him he’s been franchised (left a voicemail); we like the idea of 37 carrying the ball for us

MIKE

- we’ve had discussions with Shaun, but haven’t exchanged proposals
- we have the cap room and flexibility to do the things we need to do to keep the team together

MATT

- (Holmgren) it was nice to talk to him about this, he gave me a pep talk about his vision for the future, where we can improve; He’s a great coach and we have a great staff. I had good conversations with him, good conversations with Tod, nice talk with Mike. Everything felt good, like this was the place to be, and with Walter signing — he’s a big domino.

TOD

- absolutely, Paul Allen got involved — “absolutely” (in terms of direct conversations)
- we all knew this guy (Hass) had to come back for us to be effective
- Walter, Matt, Shaun … we’re on a roll

We may have a lot of Seahawks news to chew on today.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is reporting that the Seahawks are bringing on Tim Ruskell as their new president Ruskell most recently spent a year as Assistant GM of the Falcons, and prior to that that was with Tampa Bay for 17 years. He comes with a strong pedigree in scouting and talent evaluation, and would instantly become a key part of the Hawks’ draft prep team. He fits the bill as a guy with a great “football background” that Paul Allen said he was looking for.

Oh, wow – just found this: Pete Prisco is saying on CBS Sportsline that the Hawks have canned GM Bob Ferguson. Jaysus. What on earth is going on in Kirkland? Prisco also has more on Ruskell.

Okay, time for The Fan to eat crow. Just three posts ago I strutted my stuff about knowing first that Dick Bennett would be retiring from WSU hoops after this season.

As Lee Corso would say, “Not so fast my friend!”

Spokesman-Review: Bennett will coach Cougs next season

D’oh! I’ll shutup now….and I’ll find a more reliable Cougar insider. Sheesh.

The Seahawks have until 1:00 pm today to designate a franchise player, and it’ll be Hasselbeck if they can’t reach a long-term deal with him. Mike Sando says in today’s News-Tribune that they’re moving closer to a deal, while over in the Times, Jose M. Romero says they did reach a deal last night. We’ll know who’s right in a matter of hours… remember, if they have to franchise Hasselbeck, the bad news is NOT that Alexander will leave, it’s that the size of Hass’ contract would really kill the Hawks payroll situation.

According to today’s NY Post, the Mets are looking to trade Mike Cameron, which is not newsworthy in and of itself, but one “source” tells the Post he’ll definitely be dealt before opening day.

The Mariners, of course, are one of his rumored destinations.

Do the Mariners want him, even with an OF logjam at the moment? You bet. He’s a known entity, a fan and city favorite (which is important as the M’s try to rebuild their ticket sales base), and a 2-time Gold Glove winner. The M’s pitching staff is largely a group of fly-ball pitchers, and you don’t get much better in CF than Cameron.

Salary and space would seem to be the stumbling block. He’s got $12.5 million left over the next two years, which is more than a Randy Winn makes, and more than Ibanez makes. The M’s would need to add in another player to offset the salary, and the Mets are looking to add bullpen arms. Conveniently, the Mariners have some bullpen depth at the moment, particularly with lefties. Would a combo of Winn or Ibanez plus Villone, Sherrill or Thornton be enough to get Cameron? Might be, if the numbers make sense for all involved.

Jeremy Reed would be the biggest loser in such a deal. Would the M’s want to move him to LF? They could, esp. if Winn gets dealt. If it’s Ibanez, Reed might slide into his DH role. In the end, they’ll figure out a way to get Reed on the field and in the lineup if he’s part of the best 9 guys available.

As for Cameron, he’d be a much-needed upgrade in the OF. He and Ichiro are plenty familiar with one another. And he’s coming off a year with a low batting average, but 30 HRs and 22 SBs. You can overlook the average given everything else he brings to the table. I was one who thought the M’s were smart to let him go when he wanted $7=8 million a year, but considering the salary market we just went through this off-season, that number has to be considered a bargain for a guy of Cameron’s overall skills.

The media keeps making a huge deal out of the news this week that Cougar hoops coach Dick Bennett plans to retire this year or next. Fair play, but if they had been reading The Fan, they could’ve reported it back in December. C’mon gang….

Oh, Jayson Stark – you so funny sometimes!

In naming the Mariners the most improved team in the AL, Stark heaps praises on the addition of the big bats and good gloves of Beltre, Sexson, and Reese (well, the glove at least), then adds a quick and funny reality check, saying

“…all that just makes these Mariners better in a Tigers kind of way, as opposed to a win-the-World Series kind of way.”

So true!

And the rest of the column is worth the read, too, esp. if you like lists. Great stuff, Mr. Stark….