More photos » by Ted S. Warren - AP

Based on the angle, it appears that Ichiro is pointing toward Mt. Rainier AND THE BLOODY MOON BECAUSE HE IS TOO AWESOME FOR THIS PLANET

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That's all.

Brandon Morrow tonight in Tacoma

28 batters faced
89 pitches (3.17 per BF)
According to Divish, 36 (40.4%) were offspeed.
62 strikes (70%)
10 swinging strikes (11.2%)
5 strikeouts, 4 swinging
1 walk
1 home run

Against Fresno, which boasts a not awful line up.

Baby steps, but some good ones.

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Larry LaRue:

On the disabled list since undergoing surgery to remove a bone spur in his left shoulder on June 30, Beltre is pushing the expectations for his return. Initially, the prognosis was he’d miss six to eight weeks.

"I’d play today, if they’d let me," he said. "That’s how good I feel."

He won’t, but he may make it back by next week.
...
When the team goes to Kansas City a week from today, Beltre will be with it – and he might play in that series against the Royals.

So much for Beltre potentially being done as a Mariner. He won't be back in time to make a difference, but he should be back in time to receive a proper send-off.

I don't get why so many Mariner fans still don't like him. I really don't. He's an above-average hitter. He's strong. He's quirky. He's personable. He's funny. He's a magnificent defender. He runs well. He always plays at maximum effort. He's durable. And he's maybe the hardest-working player the team's ever had. The worst thing he's ever done is hit 48 homers for someone else. It's absurd. Beltre's five-year tenure with Seattle is nearly complete, and it's likely he'll move on to play somewhere more favorable to re-establish his value, but because they can't help but evaluate players by their potential peaks, so many people will have missed out on enjoying easily the greatest third baseman this franchise has ever known.

By pretty much all indications, Adrian Beltre should have about two months left in his Mariner career. Cherish them.

You always want them to suck. You always want the bad players to be bad people. It's why so many of us (myself included) love to discuss the unpleasant things we hear about Carlos Silva while by and large ignoring his more agreeable qualities. People love to rip on professional athletes, but it goes against our nature to believe that good people can fail or that bad people can succeed, so when a player becomes a problem, our inclination is to picture him in a negative light that extends beyond the lines of the field. We would feel guilty about bashing a bad player who's a good person. Ergo, bad players need to be bad people.

We've seen it happen with Yuni. At first, he was disappointing. He wasn't living up to his potential. Then fans started calling him lazy. Unmotivated. Fat. Unprofessional. And once the Vanity Fair article came out a year ago, people used the information therein to justify calling him all kinds of names and renouncing him as an asshole. Yuni used to be a guy who simply wasn't playing near his ceiling, but as more time passed and his play on the field kept slipping, he became a target for all kinds of abuse. Some of it was warranted, but some of it was not.

The truth of the matter is that we don't know anything for certain. Not as far as Yuni the person is concerned. The only window into his personality that we get to look through is the one provided by journalists like Shannon Drayer, and their accounts seem to paint the picture of a kind-hearted young man who just doesn't get it. A guy who's in over his head, a guy who cares a lot about a lot of things but who doesn't understand how to make himself better, or even that he needs to be better in the first place. Were someone to ask me to describe Yuniesky Betancourt in just a couple words, I'd probably call him a well-meaning idiot.

I don't mean to suggest that he's actually stupid. For all I know, he could spend his free time normalizing Heisenberg integrals. In baseball terms, though, he isn't smart. And ultimately, that's good enough for me to be happy he's gone. I'm sad that he has to leave the only team he's ever known, but for one thing, the Royals might be more Mariner than the Mariners, and for another, baseball trumps everything else. For me, anyway. Though this whole thing would be easier if Yuni were a total dick on top of being a lousy player, I'm not broken up about a polite and seemingly genuine person getting shipped away, because this is a deal that helps the Mariners, and that's all we ever want. This isn't a blog devoted to individual players. This is a blog devoted to a baseball team, and while some might wish otherwise, good teams don't have room for bad players, no matter how cordial.

That we were able to get two young pitchers back for a shortstop who can't hit, walk, or field is a nice surprise. I wasn't sure if a market for Yuni even existed anymore, although I guess it makes sense that the one team who'd want him is the Royals. Remember how Jose Guillen got all upset about a few Mariners who he didn't think were playing hard enough? This could be fun to watch. Neither of the arms we got back count as can't-miss prospects, but landing someone like Cortes - a power righty who profiles as a potential late-inning reliever even if he doesn't improve his change - is a bigger return than I would've expected, and he instantly becomes one of the system's better talents on the mound. That says a lot about the system, but it also says a lot about Cortes. Big 22 year olds with good velocity and a plus breaking ball are the definition of projectable.

For Yuni, this is going to be a difficult adjustment, and I'm glad that he's going to have a few familiar faces to ease him into a new clubhouse. I don't know why the Royals made this trade. Yuni's gotten steadily worse from the moment he arrived in the big leagues, and he doesn't seem to possess the motivation or cognizance to make himself better. Right now, he sucks. He sucks at pretty much everything. But change-of-scenery trades have their own name for a reason, and it's not without the realm of possibility that he puts himself back together with another ballclub. Stranger things have happened, and while the Mariners have disciplined him in a lot of ways, getting traded for a couple minor leaguers might finally be the wake-up call that gets him out of bed. We've seen flashes of his old defense from time to time this year. We know the ability is in there somewhere. It's just now become the Royals' problem to try and get it out. I'm skeptical, but interested.

All in all, it's a bittersweet afternoon. Bitter, because a young infielder once deemed untouchable has seen his stock fall so far that all he's worth now is a couple live arms, but - more importantly - sweet, because this concludes one troublesome era and ushers in another, hopefully more positive one. Yuni isn't our problem. Not anymore. Not now, and not in the future. Yeah, this team is still without a Major League-caliber shortstop, but Yuni wasn't a realistic solution, so it feels good to ship him off and wipe our hands clean. Whether we go forward now with Ronny :(edeno or someone like Jack Wilson, we'll see, but it most definitely won't be with Yuni, and I think that's reason enough to be pleased.

A list of current Mariners who are free agents at the end of the season:

David Aardsma: Currently lighting it up in the closing role. Legit sale piece. (Update: Aardsma is not a free agent at year's end. He is, however, still possible trade bait.)

Miguel Batista: Owed money and been merely average out of the pen.

Erik Bedard: Started off excellent, petered out a bit and currently is about to hit the one month mark on the disabled list.

Adrian Beltre: Even with his offense as horrid as it has been, his defense was still stellar and on pace for about 2.5 to 3 wins. He might have still fetched some interest at the deadline. And now he's on the shelf for two months.

Russell Branyan: Awesome. Legit sale piece.

Endy Chavez: Outstanding defense and expected level of offense would have made him a possible package piece to a team valuing outfield defense. Out for the year.

Ken Griffey Jr.: hahaha.

Mike Sweeney: hahaha.

Jarrod Washburn: Shiny ERA! Shiny ERA! Get him quick, other teams. Seriously, he's owed quite a bit of money still and his numbers are starting to slip. Compounding that are some balky back and knee issues. Fantastic.

Losing Beltre and the extended absence of Bedard makes this team much more unlikely to contend, even in the weak AL West. And if this team tanks over this difficult stretch of schedule and the front office decides to sell off their short term assets, they are now left with just a few pieces, Aardsma and Branyan, that might fetch much of anything somewhat valuable back in return.

Buy or sell was an interesting discussion a few weeks ago. Now it looks like the team is unlikely to be in position to do either. Well played, Scrappy. Well played.

LA Times:

Ervin Santana is on the disabled list again, an inflamed triceps...

Santana sat out the first six weeks of the season because of an elbow ligament sprain and was scratched from last Tuesday's start in San Francisco because of tightness on the outside of his forearm, just below the elbow.

I think my favorite part of the article comes a little later:

"Ervin made a lot of progress, but we're going to give him eight to 10 days to throw a couple more power bullpens," Scioscia said.

Santana's fastball, first start: 91.1mph average, 93.2 top
Santana's fastball, last start: 90.7mph average, 94.0 top
Santana's fastball, 2008: 94.8mph average

Santana's Strike%, first three starts: 59.2%
Santana's Strike%, last three starts: 58.6%
Santana's Strike%, 2008: 66.1%

Santana's Swinging Strike%, first three starts: 6.6%
Santana's Swinging Strike%, last three starts: 6.3%
Santana's Swinging Strike%, 2008: 10.7%

Actually, Mike, it seems Ervin didn't make any progress at all. We even lit him up the second time around and we got owned by Matt Palmer.

The Angels lost last night. Playoff odds up to 18.8%, and that's including some rather optimistic PECOTA projections of the LAnaheim pitching staff. Geoff Baker's latest post is right on the money - the Angels are in no more shallow a pool of shit than we are. This division is unthinkably winnable.

So by now you've probably heard about Yuni's benching. The organization is upset with his poor work ethic and lack of drive, and they're prepared to sit him or demote him until things get better. I just want to focus on one quote in particular. From LaRue's piece:

Betancourt, who has had meetings with his manager and coaches all season, insists he's doing nothing different now than ever.

"I've been doing the same routine for years," Betancourt said. "I can't control the lineup. I'm doing whatever I've done in the past."

Read that quote. Now read it again. In the first sentence alone, two things are made clear:

• Yuni's been meeting with his unhappy superiors all year
• Yuni isn't doing anything differently

Betancourt...insists he's doing nothing different now than ever.

Self-awareness this bad should send people to prison. I can barely fathom the levels of arrogance and obliviousness necessary for one one to believe that, despite countless meetings with bosses who want you to change, you've been doing things right all along. Jeff Weaver made adjustments. Horacio Ramirez made adjustments. Carlos Silva made adjustments. Yuniesky Betancourt hasn't made adjustments. He has consciously and deliberately eluded change, and by remaining the same player he's always been, he's turned into a worse one.

Not that he knows it. If you ask Yuni, he's still the same guy. After all, if he's not preparing differently, then he shouldn't be playing differently, right? Fleeting flirtation with patience aside, Yuni doesn't think anything's changed, and it can be a million times more difficult to convince a player with that mindset that something is wrong and needs to be fixed.

Player X: You wanted to see me, coach?
Coach: Hey. Yeah. I wanted to talk to you about your plate discipline.
Player X: What about it, coach?
Coach: It's not where I'd like it to be. I think a little improvement in your eye could really elevate your game to the next level.
Player X: I know what you mean, coach. I've been swinging at too many bad pitches. I really need to get better.
Coach: Glad to hear it.
Player X: I'll spend extra time in the cages. Hope that pitching machine doesn't throw any Pedro changeups! Ha ha!
Coach: Ha ha!

Player Y: what
Coach: Hey. Yeah. I wanted to talk to you about your plate discipline.
Player Y: what I'm fine
Coach: No, you're not.
Player Y: yes I am
Coach: No, you're really not.
Player Y: look we can sit here and argue until the cows come home but I don't see the point because I'm right and you're wrong
Coach: You're wrong and you're benched.
Player Y: you can't bench a superstar
Coach: I wouldn't dream of it.
Player Y:
Coach:
Player Y: hey look over there a giant spider! look out it's gonna get you!
Coach: What? I don't see a-
Coach:
Coach: Hello?

Yuni's broken. That much has been obvious for at least a calendar year. Yuni's broken, and the team is now punishing him for his lack of growth. Yuni, though, doesn't understand why this is happening all of a sudden, which can't bode well for how this whole episode turns out. The team will hope that a benching or demotion finally wakes him up and gets him to put forth a little more effort, but if Yuni can sit through dozens of face-to-face meetings and not figure out that something is wrong, I'm not sure anything'll be accomplished by taking discipline to the next step. Some people just don't get it. Though I occasionally feel guilty for writing off most professional athletes as complete idiots, Yuni's done nothing to shed the label.

Betancourt...insists he's doing nothing different now than ever.

Unbelievable.

Hit it, LaRue.

The back-and forth career of Seattle right-hander Brandon Morrow – he’s a starter, no a reliever, no a starter – is about to take another turn.

It will land him, probably by the end of this week, in the starting rotation of the Tacoma Rainiers.

Morrow, the 24-year-old first-round draft pick in 2005, approached the team last month and told them he’d changed his mind about being a reliever. He wanted to be a starting pitcher.

Later on:

Morrow doesn’t doubt he can start regularly and wants the chance to prove it.

I'll repeat that in case you missed it:

Morrow doesn’t doubt he can start regularly and wants the chance to prove it.

This is the angriest I've ever been at good news.