Perfection

There's nothing I could say about how it feels to be a Mariner fan right now that you couldn't either read or infer from this post. I can't describe the transformation that has occurred in the last year, from seeing a bad team with a lot of talent that might be moving in a good direction, which felt all right, to being an OK team with a little less talent that you have no faith will chart a positive direction for itself under any circumstances. It's been painful and yet somehow extremely boring.

At least we bought low on Guillen and let him walk, that was smart. Should have offered him arbitration and gotten that draft pick, but if they want to let their extremely selective goody-goody-streak come out over the steroids thing, I'm not really complaining. I don't really believe that Bavasi will trade Jones for anyone not named Santana or Bedard (and no that doesn't include Ervin), so I'm not terrified this offseason (though remembering the Soriano trade does worry me). Mostly I just don't see any plan to take us from here to there; I can't see how it's going to happen.

And so the failure of the last 4 or 5 years or whatever has finally set in. I just don't believe we can really fix this situation. The talent is there, kind of. The front office isn't that stupid, really. At least they're good at drafting and otherwise bringing in minor league talent. We didn't lose Ichiro, who is now an awesome CFer. Beltre is a much better player and a much better deal than the national media is willing to acknowledge. And Felix is still one of the youngest pitchers of all time to do the kinds of things he's done.

There are reasons for hope, but I don't have any (quite unlike last year). Part of that is how much better the Indians and Red Sox and Tigers have gotten, but most of it is just about the Mariners. I just don't see it and I don't see how that's going to change. Why should I believe that there won't be an endless series of new Soriano-for-Ramirez-like-trades and Washburn-like signings? I don't. And so I can't see how the Mariners will ever be legit contenders again. It'll probably happen in the next 10-20 years (we have a big enough payroll and enough organizational talent, after all), and I hope to god it's while we still have Ichiro and Felix. But I'm having trouble imagining it.

So that's why these trades for Ho-Ram and Turbo were so utterly deflating. It's not that they were so horrible, although they were pretty durn bad. It's more that they erased any sense that we were moving in the right direction, which for (admittedly not that many) years of sucking was all we had. And now, none of us believe it. It's hard to see Bavasi being good enough to get this team to a World Series (though I still don't think he's that bad, in the end), and it's hard to imagine this ownership hiring someone much better than Bavasi. So what's the point in any of it?