Author Archives: Matthew

I was looking through Baseball America’s Top 100 Prospects list the other day, and sitting at #11 was one Seattle Mariner, Mr. Dustin Ackley.  Number 11 is the highest I remember seeing a Mariner since probably Felix, but truth be told, I was hoping he’d be even a little higher.  The reason for my optimism: Ackley’s hitting, which I had heard the BA guys discuss beforehand on a podcast.  Ackley was their choice for college player of the decade and is touted as maybe the purest hitter to come out of college in quite some time.

For those unfamiliar with baseball scouting, skills are assigned a rating from 20-80, 80 being the top.  I have no idea where they came up with that range.  Skills that are generally rated: hitting (meaning for average), power, speed, defense, arm.  Those are the famous five tools that athletic young Venezuelan outfielders seem to unanimously possess.  Pitchers work a little differently, with grades for individual pitches along with some other areas.  A 50, as you might guess, is considered average.  A player with all 50s is likely a serviceable starter, maybe a utility guy.  As a tool gets closer to 65 or so, a player would approach all-star level, at least with that one tool. The more above average tools, the better.  Some tools stand on their own better while others are more dependent on another tool to help them shine.  80 power with 20 hitting isn’t going to do much, since power needs contact to be effective.  Similarly, 80 speed makes nothing more than a good pinch-runner, if he can’t get on base or catch anything.

BA gave a grade for each player’s best tool in the Top 100 list.  These grades came from the writers’ scouting but was heavily influenced by scouts and coaches they talked to.  There were a handful of 80s awarded, but only two for hitting.  The first was to the player in the #1 slot, Braves mega-prospect Jason Heyward.  The other? Dustin Ackley.  An 80 hit grade for a Mariner prospect is a beautiful number.  There aren’t many players at that level in all of baseball at any time.  We just counted only two in the minors.  The Mariners happen to have another in Ichiro.  You’d add Pujols, Mauer, and maybe a few more:  A-Rod, undoubtedly a few others I’m not thinking of.  The point is, if a player gets an 80 hit grade, scouts see potential batting titles and line-up anchors. An 80 hitter has an elite ability to make contact and translate that contact into production.

Does this mean Ackley, the number two overall pick last year, is destined for MVP awards and the hall of fame?  Certainly not.  Plenty of elite prospects never reach their full potential.  Ackley in particular has concerns about whether he can hit the ball hard enough to be a star, although 22 home runs and a .763 slugging percentage his last year of college, along with a frame that looks like it could add some weight and muscle, seem to indicate at least some power potential.  Some pessimists see Jeremy Reed, a great college and minor league hitter who couldn’t quite cut it in the bigs.  I’m not buying it and think Ackley is on a different level than Reed ever was, but that type of career is possible.  He also grades as a 65 or 70 for speed and is athletic enough to likely end up at second or centerfield, positions where a left handed .330 hitter becomes one of the top players in the league, no matter how much power he has.  By all accounts, Ackley is an extremely hard worker, has great baseball instincts, and an all-around Good Guy (kind of like some other people I know!).

What really excites me about Dustin Ackley is the potential for the Mariners to finally have one of those players who rockets through the minors, comes to the big leagues sooner than expected, and takes the league by storm.  It seems like it’s been years since they’ve had a minor league hitter come up and not struggle in his initial time in the majors.  Ackley is likely to start his first full professional season at AA, maybe AAA if he really impresses this spring, and I think the team would tell you they expect him to be in the bigs in 2011 or later.  I, and I think Mariners’ management, wouldn’t be at all surprised if he comes up not long after the all star break and is one of the Mariners best hitters the rest of the year.  I’m a big fan of having an elite skill in sports (not that I’m unique in this preference).  A player with 55 tools across the board can fill a hole and help a team, but an 80 hitter is someone who can carry you to a pennant.  I haven’t been so excited to see a Mariner minor league hitter reach the majors in a long, long time.

-Matthew

It’s been a long time since Omar Vizquel was a Mariner.  Traded after the 1993 season to Cleveland, Omar was, at the time and up until a few years ago, the best defensive shortstop in baseball, the best since Ozzie Smith and on the very short list for the best in the history of baseball.  I’ll always remember a story on him, I believe in Sports Illustrated, where he and the writer played catch and Omar never once caught the ball in his glove.  With each throw, he would let the ball hit the heel of his mitt and deflect it directly into his throwing hand.  I tried this many times, with much less success.  He did things every game that no one could believe.  His bat eventually became a minor asset, but even before that, he would have started for all but a small handful of teams any given year.  After he retires in the next few years, it shouldn’t be long before he’s in the hall of fame.

Yuniesky Betancourt at first showed similar glove skills to Vizquel, and looked like he would hit more as well.  And everyone knows what happened from there.  He got slow, or fat or lazy or some combination thereof, started making lazy throwing mistakes, and deteriorated with the bat.  His 2009 line in 60ish games before being traded: .250/.278/.330.  No one was sad to see him go.

Jack Wilson came to the Mariners in July 2009 and promptly went on the disabled list for the rest of the year.  In the 30 or so games he played, he looked Yuni-ish with the bat and Omar-like with the glove, and that’s about what we should expect this year.  When on the field, Wilson is probably the top defensive shortstop in baseball, or close to it.  Acrobatic but steady, he’ll be a joy to watch, as long as he can stay on the field.  With the bat, I think the best we could really hope for is something like .265/.325/.400, and that’s probably best case scenario, except for maybe the batting average.

So why am I happy he’s on the team?  For one, there are no other options.  Shortstops are at a premium in baseball right now.  The team surely searched hard for a replacement, and the extension Wilson signed shows how few options there are.  When Jack Wilson can get 2 years and $10 million, it’s clear the days of an A-Rod, Jeter, or Garciaparra arriving seemingly every year have ended.  Those three skewed our view of shortstops significantly.  It used to be a shortstop was the heart of the defense, stopping everything within 50 feet of him, and any offense he provided was a bonus.  This formula worked for years.  Those of us who grew up with the A-Rod generation expect our shortstops to hit like MVPs and still win Gold Gloves, and it’s just not going to happen much.  On a potentially offense-starved team like the Mariners, it’s hard seeing a regular who offers so little with the bat.  Shortstop is the one position, though, where if I can’t have Hanley Ramirez, I would much rather take Jack Wilson over a guy who hits more but defends less.  He’ll make Jose Lopez look better, he’ll make the pitchers look better, and he’ll captain the defense like Adrian Beltre did the last few years.  As long as he can stay on the field fairly regularly, Jack Wilson is the least of the Mariners’ problems and one the better reasons to watch them play.

-Matthew

There’s not much more to be said about Ichiro, so we’re going to play a little game, called the “If that athlete were a band which one would he be?” (I first heard about this game in a Bill Simmons ESPN.com column, but just made up the name, if you couldn’t tell.)  After much thought:

Ichiro is Wilco.

The similarities are astounding.  Both came from fabled beginnings: Ichiro’s time in Japan had gained him a near mythic quality, and Jeff Tweedy formed Wilco after splitting with Jay Farrar and breaking up Uncle Tupelo.  Ichiro’s debut was much more explosive.  He awakened the imagination of all of baseball while leading the Mariners to 116 wins and was both Rookie of the Year and MVP.  Wilco’s debut, A. M., is considered by most the weakest effort of their career, but their next album, Being There, is an alt-country masterpiece, showing early signs of the old-time country sound, Beatles melodies, and bursts of surprising sonicality they would later perfect.

From that point on, both have been remarkably consistent. There have been some years and albums slightly better (2001 & 2004, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot) and worse (2003 & ’06?, maybe Wilco (the album)), but they both consistently perform on a level of which most others only dream.  Both have a clear identity. Wilco is one of the best rock bands playing, capable of having both your dad and wife singing along while still headlining for the cool kids. Ichiro is one of the top two or three bat-men of the decade, capable of placing the ball where he wants and providing all-league defense to boot.  But both are also surprisingly versatile.  Wilco mixes Radiohead-worthy bursts of noise with old country melodies and might be the most talented and accomplished collection of musicians playing together; Ichiro’s BP power is legendary, and his quotes, appearances in GQ, and stories of All Star Game pep talks mark show a cool rarely seen in sports.  Ichiro says he wants to play another ten years, and it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if he does, changing his game as his legs go and his bat slows a fraction, no different than Wilco rotating band members, different but still perfect.

More than anything, both Wilco and Ichiro have brought great joy to my life. I remember listening to Misunderstood in the car with Lisa before we were even dating, and singing California Stars beneath the sky during maybe the best concert I’ve ever seen.  I once went a whole month listening to the live version of Ashes of American Flags every drive home from work; you will probably never convince me there are better guitar lines than Nels Cline’s in that song.  No one who watched the 2001 season will forget the look on every shortstop’s face after Ichiro first beat their throw on an easy two-hopper.  He came out of nowhere to change the game, and brought with him countless “Did you see that?” moments.  As much as I loved Griffey and so many others, Ichiro’s my favorite: mysteriously cool, unlike anyone I’ve ever watched before.

-Matthew

I have a lengthy plan for a series of posts to prepare us for the upcoming Mariners season.  It’ll actually probably carry well into the season, given the rate at which I’m posting so far.  And one of these days I will write about something other than the Mariners.

Anyway, the plan: I, or one of my fellow Good Guys, will write a post for every Mariner, not limited to just the big league roster.  We’ll hit minor leaguers as we see fit, especially the ones who might contribute, but also the ones with cool names and no talent, as the urge strikes.  The other bloggers can then jump in to add their own thoughts, either by editing the original or in the comments.  And if we have readers outside of the four of us, please comment away! We’ll try to keep updating them throughout the season as noteworthy things happen for each player.

We’ll title each entry: Y2010M!, followed by the player name, so they’re easy to search for as reference later. (The Y2010M! is for Your 2010 Mariners!  Get it?  I just abbreviated everything.) 

First up:  Y2010M! Ichiro!  Just as soon as I get a chance to write it.

-Matthew