Hot Sexy Seattle Mariners Pregame News Update

There is news about the Seattle Mariners afoot, and it's my job to present that news to you in a readable, consumable fashion, so allow me to do my job! Please, stop getting in between me and my job. If you don't let me do my job, I will lose my job, and I will die. I'm much too young to die. Think of my mother!

(All news comes courtesy of Matt Pitman and Kirby Arnold.)

• If you liked what you saw from Anthony Vasquez the other day, then good news! There's going to be more of it in the future! With but a single off day remaining in the season, the Mariners are shifting to a six-man rotation to ease the strain a little on Michael Pineda, Charlie Furbush and everyone else. It's not going to make a huge difference for the guys who've been starting, but it can't hurt, and this'll also give the organization a chance to see what Vasquez can do over a bigger sample. I can guess what Vasquez can do over a bigger sample but I probably shouldn't spoil the surprise.
  
  (Fun fact: an Anthony Vasquez fastball reaches home plate in the time it took me to write that paragraph.)
  
  
• Chone Figgins hasn't played since August 1st, but he's just about ready to begin a minor league rehab assignment. The hands-down money quote:
  

  
  "We’ll see how he recovers from [running] tomorrow," Wedge said. "A hip flexor is something you’ve really got to be careful with."
  
  

  You can almost taste the indifference. I don't mean to speculate about the severity of Figgins' injury. It's possible he strained his hip flexor real bad. But it's worth noting that, after Hunter Pence strained his hip flexor last September, he missed one game. When Shaun Marcum strained his hip flexor in June, he made his next start. When Cameron Maybin strained his hip flexor in July, he missed one game. When Tommy Hunter strained his hip flexor last June, he made his next start. Figgins is going to miss more than a month.
  
  I think the likelihood here is that the Mariners are milking this. And they're milking this because Figgins has nowhere to play, and nobody's in any rush to have him back. The more I think about it, the less I think Figgins is a member of this team next April. Why? Just, why?
  
  
• Justin Smoak is very close to returning, and could conceivably play Sunday. That's the good news. Now that Smoak has had time to heal up, I'm very interested in seeing how he finishes out the season. It would come as a great comfort if he smacked a few dingers from both sides of the plate.
  
  But at the same time, the bad news is that Smoak's return creates something of a roster crunch, and the probable loser there is Wily Mo Pena. The Mariners will want to see a lot of Smoak, Mike Carp, Casper Wells and Trayvon Robinson, and that doesn't leave a lot of time for Pena to mash. Which, I get it, the other guys might be a part of the future so they should get the bulk of the at bats, but there's no denying that less Pena is a sad thing for the present. Wily Mo brings joy in a way that few others can.