Mariners obituary

I've been holding off on writing this, but I see no reason not to right now, since I think the season is pretty much over, and there's really not much the Mariners can do to change it. I'm really glad I'm not an announcer, or a manager, or someone that has to go out and put a good face on the M's right now, because I'm afraid their race has been run, but it was a good race, full of much more excitement than I dreamed possible in April, so I'm happy for that, and thank the Mariners for a good year, but not a great one. I'd probably be more optimistic about the whole thing if I thought another good year awaited the M's next season, but I'm not sure that's true, and even if it was who'd care? They are going down right now and it's just painful to watch, like watching someone you love dying, and there's nothing you can do about it. They had a really good year, and I heard one writer call them 'unpredictable' and that's true. Trust me, I hope that this obituary is premature, and the M's bounce back, because there is still time, but very little, and every loss hurts. Tonight's debacle in Anaheim felt strangely predictable, because I'd say the M's fell out of the race for the wild card on Saturday Night, when they lost a game with a sold out crowd, a game that they had to win, for spiritual reasons. They almost foreshadowed the loss by calling it "Nite Court," a fly by night promotion, that failed, kind of like the game did, so let's talk about 'Nite Court,' before we go into anything else.

I'm a big fan (I think), and bought a ticket for the game against Oakland a couple of weeks in advance, when I read that it was 'Salute to Latin American Baseball Nite.' The Mariners do have a number of great Latin American players (Felix Hernandez, Robinson Cano, Fernando Rodney (ugh!), Kendry Morales, and Endy Chavez (maybe more)), but they come across as a very white team, and that may be the audience. I grew up in the Seventies in L.A., and my idea of baseball was 'Dodger Stadium,' and I remember an awful lot of 'Latin Americans' were going to the game, maybe as many as white people, and that it was almost a Mexican event, and maybe why my parents weren't that into it, preferring the nouveau riche sports like basketball and hockey. But I liked baseball, and was surprised how white the audience was up here, or as a great friend of mine once said about Seattle, from the perspective of a New Orleansian, a city where over %70 of the people were black; "Thinking about Seattle you have to take into account the honky factor." There's not much funk in the stands here, but I try to bring it with a certain recklessness as a commentator, that my girlfriend finds amusing, and that I think may be the best of me, but it's hidden most of the time.

Essentially, the PR men hijacked a 'salute to Latin American Beisbol night,' with 'Nite Court,' to celebrate the most important series for the M's in 13 years, and things were looking good because they won the first game of a three game stand, though not convincingly. I liked that they were giving T-Shirts out to the first 35,000 fans, but I was dubious they were really going to have 35,000 shirts, and who was going to hold them to it, because it was a freebie. Driving pizzas for money and listening on the radio, I thought that the idea was to 'black out' the stadium, meaning 35,000 black shirts, would black out the stadium, and create an optical effect, but the 'non' color black was a strange choice, and a play on the 'King's Court,' that is Felix's special section, where everyone dresses in bright yellow shirts, and waves 'K' cards, making quite a display, considering they go up three rows, to the very top of the bleachers. Well, on 'Nite Court' the 'King's Court' section of the park, decided to go with the 'Nite Court' vision, and not dress in yellow; this made no sense to me because I thought if 35,000 people were in black, and the Felix section was in bright yellow, that it would be a great contrast, almost like the Steelers, though a 'Midnight Blue' would've been a much better color to choose from, since it could be found in the Mariner's suits, and then the colors would be complementing each other, referencing the old school Mariners look with a sort of royal blue and bright yellow, and a Neptunean Trident. The 'King's Court' crowd ditched their yellow shirts and went for the black (maybe because of the A's yellow), but the black just didn't overwhelm the stadium in a 'Nite Court' kind of way, and what was up with the 'Nite Court' allusion anyway, a vaguely remembered show from the Eighties, that was a hit in its day, but pretty much forgotten, in favor of far bigger hits like "Cheers," that at least alluded to baseball with Sam Malone, the ex-Red Sox pitcher, turned sober bartender. As Jenny said, "whose going to remember Nite Court?" and she was right. The one time I heard Rick Rizzs (what spelling!) go nostalgic on it, not even his cohorts in the booth cared.

The shirts were horribly ugly and though I wanted one very badly when I was anxiously rushing to the park, I couldn't give a fuck when they ran out, with big empty boxes everywhere. I was twenty minutes early and I'm convinced that the Mariners organization didn't pump-out 35,000 shirts in the least, and some PR guy in the front office knowing it was the biggest series in over a decade was determined to get 35,000 people at SAFECO with a phony promotion, because I can guarantee you not even close to half the people had a shirt, if that. It was a hoax just like the Mariners, and the promotion cursed them, I'm sure. The Mariners can't come back from losing the biggest game in 13 years like cowards, and yet that's how they seemed, just cowards, with a manager making bad decisions. I hate to say all of this because they have given me a lot of entertainment this year, much more than I imagined, and I really believed in them, but they do have a pattern that makes them a big step away from being a great team - they go into hitting slumps, that last about two weeks; in the neverending season there is time to make up for this, but even the neverending season ends (like life), and you have to be on a winning streak at the end, to make a dent in the playoffs, and the Mariner's seem to be on the opposite course, like they always are this time of year, except when they are mathematically eliminated from playoff competition, then they come alive!

I'm sorry for being down on the Mariner's but this seems so predictable I didn't want to think it was going to happen. I really wasn't expecting them to go to the world series, but I thought that they could enter the wild card game a contender, and vying for a series win, but that's not these M's. These guys are down right now, and really look tired to me. I'm not sure if it's being talked about or not but even Felix looked tired on Friday night, even though he only let in 2 runs after 7 innings, but he was tagged pretty hard a bunch of times, and gave up a homer. He was alright, but not great by any stretch of the imagination, and it made me wonder if the Mariners just weren't ready to go this far, and in a way you couldn't blame them if that was the case, since they haven't been in contention for so long. My first thought was that Felix wasn't in good enough physical conditioning, but Jenny thought he looked good, so then I just started to wonder if the M's just weren't ready to get this far, because like the article dubbed them 'the unpredictable M's.' I took a lot of shit for liking this team early on, and they made it to the 3rd act in September, so I have no hard feelings if things don't work out, but losing in the 3rd act of the season, doesn't make losing any easier, and that's what Saturday night felt like, a real 'pivotal' game, like predicted, but pivotal in the wrong direction, and the season is ending, not with a thud but a whimper. I fear this season won't be remembered like fans were hoping it would when I saw the 'Revive '95' banner in the stands, but this isn't '95 by a long shot, because these guys are tired.

I know there's time for the M's to prove me wrong, but very little, and the window is closing fast. They have to play the Angels six times in two weeks, and they're the best team in baseball, beating the Mariners 8-1 tonight, with Iwakuma hitting some kind of wall in the stretch run, and I fear the same tomorrow, whoever is pitching. The M's are down, and I'm afraid for the count, but they've gone the distance, and that's all we could ask from them this year, so I'm not sad.