Fitting

Does anyone other than me think Pat Gillick accidentally assembled an amazing defense?

To do this on purpose is so very awesome.

Seattle Mariners Executive Vice President & General Manager of Baseball Operations Bill Bavasi today announced that the Mariners have agreed to terms on a four-year contract with left-handed starting pitcher Jarrod Washburn. The contract will cover the 2006-2009 seasons.

“At the start of this offseason, our goals were to acquire a high-quality starting pitcher, add offense, re-sign Jamie Moyer and, ideally, upgrade our catching,” Bavasi said. “Today’s announcement marks the final, and perhaps most important, in that offseason list of goals.”

“Jarrod is a proven Major League winner who immediately makes us better in the starting rotation,” Bavasi continued. “He has pitched in big games, including in the postseason, and helped a team to a World Series championship. He was a pitcher we had targeted from the beginning of the offseason and we are very excited to have him on the club for the next four years.”

“Jarrod should be a great fit for our rotation,” Mariners Manager Mike Hargrove said. “With the left-handed hitting in the AL West and in our ballpark, it’s nice to have another lefty.”

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With two months to go before training camp, Silva joins a rotation that, at this point, includes right-handers Felix Hernandez and Miguel Batista, and left-hander Jarrod Washburn.

“He is an innings-eater and strike thrower, and that’s a good combination,” manager John McLaren said. “We always preach to our starters to pitch as deep into the game as they can, and he likes to go deep into the game. If we do that, our bullpen would be better because we wouldn’t have to overwork them. He’s a good competitor, a veteran, and he’ll complement Washburn and Batista and help Felix out.”

“In this market, we really felt this was the No. 1 guy out there,” he said. “We think this is a big add for us.”

“Silva is a ground-ball, sinker-ball pitcher and will have an excellent teacher in [new pitching coach] Mel Stottlemyre, who was a sinker-ball pitcher,” McLaren added. “I think that’s a great fit. Having him pitch on grass instead of turf and having a little cooler weather in the summer will allow him to stay strong, so we’re really excited about Carlos.”

Silva and Stottlemyre are/were sinker-ball pitchers? That’s should’ve been worth about 0.7 WAR……

Someone tells me that the M’s made a signing/trade, now a days, I’m excited to read about it!
The last few years, I would have been terrified.

I remember the Vidro trade like it was yesterday. The catalyst that started me reading LL for the first time.

I know how hard it’s sometimes been for him over the last year, what with our unrepentant awfulness. But things really seem to be looking up now, if only on a conceptual level. Even if these moves don’t pay off the way we hope, they’re SMART moves at the very least. And it’s been oh-so-long since anyone could say that. It makes me feel a lot better, personally.

Pitching at Safeco Field will help Washburn’s numbers for the duration of the contract, but the Mariners will be lucky to get 700 innings from him. He’s thrown 740 over the last four years, but only 326 2/3 innings came during the last two. At a rumored $36 million-$38 million, this is another Bill Bavasi signing that doesn’t impress us one bit. Dec. 19 – 8:23 pm et

Needs 170 innings to reach 700 and no, SafeCo hasn’t really helped his overall numbers out much.

JP started out like this too in Toronto. The wins don’t come easy in the AL East, so everyone starts ripping him whenever he even takes a flyer on a player. GMZ better hopes he can turn the team around quickly enough to not be axed like DePodesta was.