All-Time Most Hated Mariners

1b. Pete O’Brien
2b. Scott Spiezio (If it’s good enough for Goose, it’s good enough for me. Not sure if he ‘qualifies’ at this position, but he really needs to be in this line-up)
SS. Yuni Betancourt
3B. Jeff Cirillo
LF:. Brian L. Hunter
CF. Jeremy Reed
RF. Al Martin
P. Andy Benes
P. Carlos Silva
P. Horacio Ramirez
P. Steve Trout
Cl. Bobby Ayala
RP. Heathcliff Slocumb
RP. Jose Mesa

UT/Bench: Jeff Manto
UT/Bench: Jeff Schaefer

Julio Mateo

“Mr. Double Play”

I hate Jolbert Cabrera with a flaming passion of the kind rarely found outside of works of literature or film. I hate Jolbert Cabrera and his stupid name and his stupid fucking face and his amazing magnitude of suck more than I could ever hate another human being. Take true love and invert it, that is what I feel for Jolbert Cabrera.

Fuck Jolbert Cabrera.

For being mediocre enough to keep Edgar from playing full time

There was some guy in the ’80’s that was pretty bad, couldn’t stay on top of his line up card and the like. My vote is for Lou, as time goes by I just blame him more and more for Gil Meche’ shoulder.

C: Ben Davis
1B: Jose Offerman (I think he fits here, not on the team for long, but couldn’t stand him before either)
2B: Miguel Cairo
SS: Yuni
3B: Scott Spiezio
OF: Eric Anthony
OF: Al Martin
OF: Carl Everett
DH: Jose Vidro
UT: Jeff Manto (I was severely disappointed at a young age when we gave up Arquimedez Pozo, one of the greatest names ever, for this guy)
SP: Carlos Silva, Horacio Ramirez, Joel Pineiro, Felipe Lira, Edwin Hurtado
RP: Bobby Ayala, Heathcliff Slocumb, Julio Mateo, Jose Mesa, Rich DeLucia (no idea why, I just remember disliking him when I was 5)

C: Rob Johnson
1B: Miguel Cairo
2B: Mike Morse (He played this position quite a bit in Tacoma after getting moved off of shortstop, right?)
SS:Yuniesky Betancourt
3B: Scott Spiezio (At least Cirillo was an amusing punching bag. Player A was just an ass)
LF: Al Martin
CF: Wladamir Balentien (What the fuck was he doing out in CF!?)
RF: Carl Everett
DH: Jose Vidro

Bench/Util: Willie Bloomquist
Bench/C: Waste of Space

SP: James Baldwin, John Halama, Spiroid, Jarrod Washburn, Carlos Silva
RP: Jose Mesa (the first Mariner I truly despised), Rick White, Jose Paniagua, Norm Charlton (2001)
CP: Eddie Guardado

Scott Bankhead
Jim Converse
Rich Delucia
John Cummings
Bobby Ayala
Edwin Hurtado
Rafael Carmona
Jeff Fassero
Derek Lowe
Omar Oliveras
Horacio Ramirez
Carlos Silva

Have a hard time with position players. There’s the Spiezio, Aurilia, Cirillo bunch. Then you’ve got all kinds of left-fielders: Eric Anthony, Kevin Mitchell, Mike Felder, Jeffrey Leonard, Al Martin. (Glad to not see Greg Briley or Henry Cotto on any lists – those guys were awesome.)

C: Ben Davis
1B: David Segui
2B: Harold Reynolds – pretty illogical hate
3B: Jeff Cirillo
SS: Fat Yuniesky Betancourt
LF: Al Martin
CF: Henry Cotto
RF: Carl Everett
Bench: Desi Relaford, Luis Ugueto
SP: James Baldwin
SP: Brett Tomko
SP: Paul Abbot
SP: John Halama
SP: Horacio Ramirez
RP: Bobby Ayala
RP: Julio Mateo
RP: Shigetoshi Hasagawa

C: Rob Johnson
1B: Pete O’Brien. He played on the horrible Mariner teams of the late-80s/early-90s and had the audacity to play Alvin Davis’s position while not being Alvin Davis. Also he sucked.
2B: Miguel Cairo…I guess. We’ve had a pretty good run at this position, from Lopez to Guillen briefly to Cora to Harold Reynolds.
3B: Jim Presley. This is a no-brainer. Is everyone on here really so young that they don’t remember the guy who blocked Edgar Martinez for 3 years?
SS: Yuni. God I hate Yuni. If Yuni hadn’t been in the system we wouldn’t have dealt Asdrubal Cabrera. Fuck Yuni.
LF: Kevin Mitchell. I’m dating myself here but man, when I was about 9 years old Kevin Mitchell and Will Clark was second only to Daryl and Dwight as far as exciting teams/player combos went. And he came to Seattle. He was only 30, though I didn’t pay attention to such things at the time. I was ridiculously excited. The Mariners had a superstar for the first time in my life (Griffey wasn’t quite there yet). He played the entire season and hit 9 home runs. Then he went to Cincinnatti and hit 19 and 30 the next 2 years (this was back when 20hr was still a big deal before the mid-90s power explosion). It was like he had deliberately sabotaged my favorite team. I didn’t know about OPS+. I wouldn’t have cared. I came into my baseball-loving life with the Alvin Davis Mariners, and Kevin Mitchell was just one more nail in the coffin of a team that seemed almost as futile as the 1984-2005 Seahawks. It was horrible.

CF: Jeremy Reed: Nothing like Mitchell, but also very disappointing.
RF: I’m torn. I really hate Al Martin, but he played a grand total of 1/3 an inning in RF. Let’s just go with Al Martin. Anyone who needs to beat women to feel better about himself justifies me stretching the rules to point out how much I hate him.
DH: Jose Vidro. Self Explanatory.

C: Rob Johnson
1B: Richie Sexson
2B: Jose Lopez (I don’t actually hate him that much, but we’ve had some good 2B)
3B: Russ Davis
SS: Yuni (More of a love/hate thing)
OF: Carl Everett, if he counts
OF: Willie Bloomquist
OF: Al Martin
DH: Jose Vidro

Jim Presley. Look at Edgar Martinez’s minor league numbers from his age 24-27 seasons, and then look at what the guy blocking him was doing at the major league level.

Jim Presley is my #1 hated mariner of all time.

Bret Boone
Yuniesky Betancourt, I did love him, so I think his down made me hate him.
Julio Mateo
Jose Vidro
Willie Bloomquist
Richie Sexson

There are more but these are my most hated.

and Yuniesky Betancourt

Roy Corcoran
Wladimir Balentien
Miguel Cairo/Luis Valbuena

C: Rene Rivera, Miguel Olivo, Ben Davis
1B: Scott Spiezio
2B: Luis Sojo, Felix Fermin,
SS: Yuniesky Betancourt, Rich Aurilia,
3B: Jeff Cirillo, Jim Presley
LF: Al Martin, Kevin Mitchell
CF:
RF:
DH: Vidro

SP’s: Carlos Silva, Horacio Ramirez, Ryan Franklin, Bob Wolcott
RP’S: Matt Thornton. Julio Mateo, Heathcliff Slocumb, Bobby Ayala,

Coach: Bill Plummer

I had expected that there would be a larger cross section of “old” fans who would chronicle the Mariner rosters prior to my birth. Instead, everyone seems to remember and hate the same players I do. With some differences:

Starters
1B: David Segui – Complete irrational hate here. He was an Ichiro-caliber offensive player (based on Fangraphs wOBA) and a pretty decent fielder. I just never liked him at all. The hair, the switch hitting, the wide open stance…
2B: Jose Vidro – He started seven games here in 2007, and played in an additional three for a total of 10 games and 57 innings. Not only was Turbo a fucking shitty hitter the rest of the games he wasn’t in the field, he sucked at defense, being a fat, worn out player about 5 years past his peak.
3B: Russ Davis – Not only did he suck, but he replaced Mike Blowers. Blowers wasn’t great by any means, but
he was actually a pretty productive 3B. Plus, at the time I was 7 and he had my name (Michael!). Woohoo, I loved Blowers. Fuck Russ Davis.
SS: Yunieskey Betancourt – Self-explanatory. He was awesome in his debut, then he sucked. And he didn’t work out of it. I wanted so much to like Yuni, to root for him, and I defended him for a long time. No more. I got burned out, tired of him letting down the team as well as me. Fuck him.
LF: Al Martin – He was about replacement level in 2001. The ridiculous blunders (August 5) aside, could a cheaper LF have taken us to 117? Martin was worthless. I think back to 2001 and I don’t even recall him. He’s blocked.
CF: Alex Diaz – He wasn’t very good. But he got a lot of highlights by taking horrendous roots to routine flyballs. Covering for Griffey in the middle of ‘95, I was impressed by this. I now look at people who have all sorts of irrational love for Diaz, and I want nothing to do with him.
RF: Jose Guillen – Bad teammate, bad player, complete asshole. He could really swing a bat. If only it ever made contact with the balls thrown to him.
C: Rob Johnson – Can’t catch, can’t throw, can’t hit. He’s apparently a swell guy, though, so the pitchers love him. Took a job from one of the better catchers in the AL (who still managed to post 3x his WAR in less game time, while suffering from injuries!). Fuck you, Rob Johnson.

SP (Rotation): Jeff Fassero, John Halama, Jeff Weaver, Jarrod Washburn, Miguel Batista
Bullpen Bobby Ayala, Jose Paniagua, Julio Mateo, Paul Spoljaric, Bob Wells, Heathcliff Slocumb, Jose Mesa

Bench:
OF: Jeremy Reed
OF: Raul Ibanez – Over the last several years I have spilled more ink and wasted more breath on Ibanez than he’s ever been worth. He was a horrible defender, and far too loved by the fanbase. He would be a valuable bench bat, sure, but I just hate him so much because he was loved for all the wrong reasons. Go to Hell, Raul.
C: Jamie Burke – A 35+ journeyman is not a big league starter, and his “game calling” is a cover for the fact that he can’t actually hit. He catches half-decent, but the coaching staff’s irrational love for him allowed him to side along with Rob fucking Johnson and Guillermo Quiroz and repeatedly hamper Kenji.
UTIL: Willie Bloomquist – Might be a valuable 25th man, but I want to choke Rizzs with his mic cord every time he says “Willie Boom Boom.”

everyone has favorites, good and bad for lots of reasons rational and otherwise. Hated, i’ve only truly hated two human beings in my life, some guy that used to beat me up when I was a little kid, and Jeff Cirillo, met him, worked for him, watched him play, watched him TRY to hit. Three words whiney, ass, punk, stupid piece of shit mother fu….. Oh! sorry that was more than three, nuff said!

“M’s Needed Sterling Pitching; Get Sterling Pitching”

Sterling Hitchcock cost us Tino, and if rumors are to be believed, we could have had Rivera over him instead.

That’s my most hated SPer. Chris Bosio is in a close second. I remember going to games as a teenager, knowing he was pitching, knowing we were thusly going to lose, and consistently being proven correct.
The rest of my roster:
C – Dave Valle (one time he handed me an autographed glossy of himself, which I did not ask for. The gall!)
1B – Richie Sexson, circa 2007-2008. That said, I also felt tremendously sorry for him.
2B – Jose Vidro
3B – Player A
SS – Carlos Guillen; I never minded him while he was here, but he bad-mouthed the team in 2004 after he left for Detroit. Did the M’s deserve it? Probably. Did that make it justifiable in my mind? Not at all.
OF – Al Martin, Greg Briley (long story that basically boils down to how little I knew about baseball when I was eight) and Mike Morse (The game in ‘08 where he made a handful of errors before injuring himself? So excruciating).
RP – I don’t even know where to begin – look at the talent the 1996 and 1997 teams had! Yet their bullpens were as expensive as they were terrible! – but I’ll go with Rick White, Bobby Ayala, and Julio Mateo.

C – Miguel Olivo
1B – Richie Sexson
2B – Willie Bloomquist
SS – Yuniesky Betancourt (though Rich Aurillia is close)
3B – Jeff Cirillo
LF – Al Martin
CF – Jeremy Reed
RF – Brad Wilkerson
DH – Jose Vidro

SP – Carlos Silva
SP – Miguel Batista
SP – Joel Pineiro
SP – Bob Wolcott
SP – Jarrod Washburn
RP – Jose Mesa
RP – Bobby Ayala
RP – Julio Mateo
RP – Paul Spoljaric
RP – Heathcliff Slocumb

Maybe somebody mentioned him and I missed it. I don’t necessarily hate him, but I figured he’d be a popular answer.