The carnage continues.

Quoted: As Dave noted earlier, the reason to keep McLaren around would be to let an incoming GM pick their own candidate: if Riggleman does better the rest of the season, which should happen, then the thought is it’s harder to fire him. I’m not sure that’ll deter whoever takes over, of course.

Yuni makes the Onion.

Quoted: Betancourt said of McLaren and not Castro. "He calls team meetings, but he's just doing them to make it seem like he's doing a good job managing. For Christ's sake, he starts Miguel Cairo at first base sometimes.

I agree. We need a GM who a) understands stats/sabermetrics and b) knows how to use these to make decisions given a budget (of $117M in the M's case). This is how baseball works nowadays. If we had such a GM, we wouldn't have signed Washburn and Silva to long term contracts.

Quoted: Whoever comes in cannot continue to suggest in public that the Mariners have one of the top defenses in baseball. They don't. There are too many stats out there suggesting they don't. A new GM has to be able to look at those stats, know what they mean and proceed accordingly. We've all seen what a great defense looks like. And while I didn't think Seattle's defense would make or break this team's playoff chances, you'd never catch me -- in public or private -- calling it one of the top units in the AL.

Sadly, I actually wanted Washburn to get lit up tonight for blaming his poor pitching performances on Kenji. He started this game with Burke instead and has <sarcasm>only</sarcasm> given up 8 runs in 2 ⅓ innings. UPDATE: Make that 9 runs in 2 1/3 innings.

Quoted: Jarrod Washburn sucks. He’s a replacement level starting pitcher, not much better than guys sitting in Triple-A riding buses from Toledo to Durham. Jarrod Washburn doesn’t like pitching to Kenji Johjima, who the team is committed to as their starting catcher through 2011. A real manager, one with some semblance of authority and a willingness to do whats best for his team’s record, would tell the replacement level starting pitcher to learn how to like throwing to Kenji or sit in the bullpen and not pitch.

I don't understand the front office's decision making...

Quoted: # Jeff Clement was called up from Tacoma on April 30th to serve as the team's fairly regular DH, because Jose Vidro wasn't producing. Since that point, Vidro has gone 5-25 with zero walks and zero extra-base hits. Vidro has now reclaimed his role as the regular DH, with Clement's demotion. Because he's clearly earned it. Look, assholes, nothing's changed. Vidro is still the same pile of crap that just three weeks ago you thought was worth replacing. Don't give me the back injury excuse - that's new, and it's not why he's been bad. He's been bad because he's bad. Do you honestly think that giving him his job back is better for the team than putting Reed in left field and sliding Raul to DH? Or just putting Reed at DH and leaving Raul alone? Did you even consider these options? By calling up Jeremy Reed, you obviously think he has something to offer to the team, but by sitting him in the dugout, you obviously think he has less to offer than Jose Vidro, whose sorry ass you benched for a rookie earlier this very month. I don't get it. What are you going for?

The upside of this is that I am only following maybe 1/5 of the games now....which means I have time to do other stuff.

Quoted: We’re over a quarter done with the year now, and the team is 15-26, the worst team in the majors.

An accurate comparison imho...

Quoted: Should we be worried the Mariners are baseball’s equivalent of the Bush Administration? Fiscally undisciplined with negligible positive returns? Check. Marketed as veteran leadership despite any veterans with leadership experience? Check. Sloppy management reinforced with sloppy execution on the ground? Check.

If J.J. is not 100%, this season is over.

Quoted: J.J.'s clearly not healthy. Fuck this season.
I even thought this just felt like a win. I smiled knowingly when Richie hit it out in the 10th. I had felt confident the entire later innings. I was confident with J.J. I was sure he was going to come up and put the fears instilled in that Oakland game to rest. And for one batter he did. Kudos to Batista, Rhodes, Morrow, Richie and Ichiro.

Yay, especially re: Clement...although I wish they had waited 7 days in order to get the extra arbitration year.

Quoted: There is official confirmation, finally - catcher Jeff Clement and outifelder Wladimir Balentien are joining the Seattle Mariners in Cleveland on Wednesday.