Hey everybody, so I've been lurking on this site since the trade that brought us Guti and finally decided to make an account recently and even more recently decided to use it.  I know this season has barely started and I love our shot at competing this year, but I also want to see the M's be a constant competitor.  I was looking at Cot's Baseball Contracts (www.mlbcontracts.blogspot.com) to see what the team will look like next year with what is currently in ink.  I don't know much about minor league development or anything and haven't seen anything that has given a confident timeline for Dustin Ackley to show up in the majors and was just wondering what anyone here thought. Do we expect him at 2nd, Chone at 3rd, and Lopez to be traded by 2011?  From what the M's have locked down for next year the team looks pretty much the same as it does now from my perspective... with the exception of the rotation, which is in serious peril of being awful.

From what I put together the team might look like this (* = arbitration year)

Lineup:

Michael Saunders (LF)

Franklin Gutierrez (CF)

Ichiro Suzuki (RF)

Jose Lopez/Chone Figgins (3B)

Jack Wilson (SS)

Chone Figgins/Dustin Ackley (2B)

Casey Kotchman* (1B)

Rob Johnson/Adam Moore (C)

Milton Bradley (DH)

Bench:

Jack Hannahan* (INF)

Matt Tuiasosopo (INF, OF)

Ryan Langerhans* (OF)

Rob Johnson/Adam Moore (C)

Rotation:

Felix Hernandez (RHP)

Ryan Rowland-Smith* (LHP)

Jason Vargas* (LHP)

Doug Fister (RHP)

Luke French (LHP)

(Erik Bedard and Ian Snell both have contract options (our rotation needs some serious help if those options don't get picked up))

Bullpen

David Aardsma* (RHP)
Mark Lowe* (RHP)
Brandon League* (RHP)
Shawn Kelley (RHP)

Sean White* (RHP)

Kanekoa Texeira (RHP)

Garrett Olson* (LHP)

I don't know about you guys, but I think the position player side of things looks pretty good without the mascots taking up space. Maybe it's cause I'm a Mariner fan, but I always enjoy looking at the future and dreaming about what the team could be someday.