Mariners Correspondent Report: «§ea‡‡£e®Mariner§» 09/16 - 09/21

«§ea‡‡£e®Mariner§» 09/16 - 09/21

September 24, 2002

CORRESPONDENT REPORT

Game Date Team Decision Record Win Loss Save

150 09/16 TEX W 6-5{11} 86-64 Hasegawa Kolb
151 09/17 TEX W 3-2{10} 87-64 Rhodes Rodriguez
152 09/18 TEX W 3-2{10} 88-64 Sasaki Reyes
153 09/19 TEX L 7-12{10} 88-65 Powell Hasegawa
154 09/20 ANA L 1-8 88-66 Ortiz Pineiro
155 09/21 ANA W 6-4 89-66 Garcia Lackey Sasaki

£A‡ES‡ ‡EAM INƒO

• Ichiro Suzuki Collected his 200th hit of the season Sunday Against Anaheim. Mariners Right Fielder is only the seventh player in major league history to collect 200 or More Hits in The First Two Seasons Of Major League Competition. Ichiro Suzuki Became the Seventh Player In Major League History to Accumulate 200 or More Hits In his 1st 2 Seasons Sunday September, 22 2002. Suzuki Also Ranks First In Most Total Hits Over the First 2 Seasons of Major League Competition. The Most Recent Player to Accomplish the Feat Was Harvey Kuenn for the 1953 Detroit Tigers. Kuenn Was Traded Following the 53 Season for Rocky Colavito and Completed the Feat Amidst Boos and Fan Animosity in Cleveland. In June Of 1982 Kuenn Took Over the Fifth-Place Brewers and Led Heavy Hitting “Harvey's Wallbangers” to the World Series Where the Team Eventually Lost in 7 Games to St. Louis. Kuenn Won Manager of the Year Honors and Another Entry In The BaseBall History Book.

£ºCA£ PER§PEC‡IVE

• Ichiro Suzuki leads the American League in Intentional Walks with 26. Alfonso Soriano, Possible American League MVP, Probable 50/40/40 Man Currently One Double Short of 50 and One Home Run Short of 40, Has one Intentional Walk On the Season. I Imagine Soriano Will See a Vast Increase In Intentional Walks in 2003, which Will Only Increase His Value, as Soriano Could See 60+ Stolen Bases With an Increase in On Base Percentage. Soriano Has Walked Only 22 Times in 2002 and Has Struck Out 149 for a 1/6.7 Walk to StrikeOut Ratio, One of the Worst in the Game. While The Aforementioned Ratio Could Be Cause for Concern For Mere Mortal Players, Hitters Like Soriano - Kirby Puckett Before Him - Seem to Excel In Spite of their Impatience. Alex Rodriguez , In Comparison, Has 11 Intentional Walks to Date in 2002. Obviously a Teams Overall Standing in the Division Affects the Overall Attention Given with Regard the Intentional Walk, and a Players Position in the Order Can Also Affect How an Opposing Pitcher Decides to Work, However, a 26 to 11 to 1 Discreptancy is SomeWhat Rediculous Considering Ichiro Is a Leadoff Hitter With Only Occasional Extra Base Power. Suzuki Started the Season With a .474 Average with Runners In Scoring Position, and Reached a Season High For Overall Average June 4th at .378 Before Slowly Fading In Power and Production Departments. Suzuki’s Early Season Tear Obviously Affected the Manner In Which American League Pitchers and Managers Decided to Approach the Mariner Catalyst. However, Suzuki Has Only Managed a .275 Average Since the All-Star Break and His .377 Slugging Percentage After the Break Is 84 Points Off His First Half Numbers. I Guess It Could Be Argued that the Impatience Shown By Suzuki May Have Been Directly Attributable to the Fact that He Was Seeing Fewer Pitches to Hit with Runners In Scoring Position. However, It Seems as If Similar Results May Have Been Attainable Without the Use of the Intentional Walk, Especially Given Suzuki's Extremely Low Number of Extra Base Hits { 42 }.

ƒªn‡ª§¥ ® ßª§eßª££ ® 101

EVO£U‡ION®OF®ƒAN‡A§¥®‡HEORY

• A Fantasy Manager Must Remember a Few Simple Rules to Dominate the Competition. These Rules Are Not Finite, they Evolve with each successive Season of Fantasy Managerial Experience, and The Rules Often Reside in the Realm of Instinct, Intuition, and SuperNatural Prophecy. However, There Are Also Some Rules That Reside in the Realm of Common Sense. Some of the Rules May Be More Comical than Scientifically Verifiable, However, You May not Be Able to Convince a Recently Spurned Fantasy Manager Of the Validity of Any Such Finding.

1 Offer a Player in Trade And His Performance Will Almost Immediately, and SomeTimes Dramatically Improve. This Rule is Closely Related to the Drop Phenomenon. The Drop Phenomenon States that any UnderAchieving Fantasy Player Will Perform At a Level Above and Beyond His Historical Production for the First Few Games After Hitting the Free Agent Scrap Pile.

2 Learn to Use the DL To House Future Assets. I Won an Ultra Competitive 18 Team League with Lowe and Garcia as My Co-Aces By Adding Jason Schmidt Early in the Season. While Players Like Nomo and Schmidt Cost Points In ERA and WHIP, the Corresponding Addition In Strikeouts Adds an Invaluable Prize in Weekly Head to Head Battles, Especially When Facing R.J. Schill, Or Pedro, Who Can Dominate an Entire Fantasy Pitching Line.

3 The StockMarket Can Teach a Fantasy Player a Great Deal. Buy Low, Sell High, and Laugh all the Way to the Top of the Fantasy Mountain. For Every Jacque Jones or Roy Halladay, there is a Johnny Damon or a Vicente Padilla. Pay Close Attention to UnderAchieving Teams, as Overall Team Performance Can Adversely Affect Wins, Holds, Saves, RBI, Stolen Base, and Run Production. Evaluate a Players Full Season Potential Within the Context of the Overall Team Direction. If a Team is Dumping Middle Men for Young Talent, a Pitchers Future Wins Could be the Immediate Result { Insert Any Florida Pitcher Here }.

4 Deep Leagues Demand Forgiveness. A Manager Needs a Closers Mentality to Successfully Navigate the Difficult Demands of an Extremely Thin Free Agent Pool. David Ortiz, Carlos Pena, Kevin Millar, John Burkett, Jason Schmidt, and Numerous Others Have Had Nice Stretches of Production Immediately Following Long Stetches of Ineffectiveness. Some of Those Draft-Day Mistakes Can Be Erased With an Astute Waiver Claim Early in the Season. Always Check the Daily TransAction List to Determine Possible UpGrades to Improve a Teams Long Term Competitive Prospects. If a Manager Is Able to Overlook Even Months of Poor Performance, Streaking Stars Like Cory Lidle Can Light Up the Weekly Fantasy Scoring Sheet for a Month of Hall of Fame Production.

5 Do Your HomeWork Before Dropping a Player. I Personally Scouted Octavio Dotel to Determine if the Sporting News Injury Update Was Indeed Accurate. I Watched Dotel Hit 95 MPH in an UnEventful Outing, Determined He Had Not Lost 3-5 MPH on his FastBall, and Grabbed Him off the Waiver Wire. I Kept the Dynamic Flame Thrower In My LineUp for a Solid Three Month Stretch of Brilliant Fantasy BaseBall Dominance. Rhodes Had Been My One and Only Option In the Hold Category, and With the Addition of Dotel, My Pitching Hit a Hot Spell with Weekly Dominance In ERA, WHIP, and Hold Categories. Always Check the Facts Before Dropping a Possible Asset. Joe Crede Was Written Off By a Sporting News Fantasy Writer after a Few Weeks of UnInspired Play.
* Sporting News Updates Are Extremely UseFul, Informative, and Often Correct. Simply Use Caution WhenEver Using Any Single Report as the Basis for Dropping a Potentially Valuable Commodity.

6 Draft Speed/Power Players at Numerous Positions. Many Fantasy Managers Completely Ignore the Need For Speed Until the Middle Rounds and Find One Dimentional Singles Hitters Like Luis Castilla as the Only Option in the Speed Department. Speed and Power Should Almost Always Come in Tandem, As Players with Incredible Value In One Category Rarely Ascend the Ranking Mountain. Speed Power Players Like Winn, Abreu, Green, Beltre, Klesko, Hunter, Beltran, Soriano, Durham, Ordonez, Berkman, and Encarnacion Provide Stolen Bases, Home Runs, Average & On Base Numbers, to go with Extra Base Damage which Offers Offensive Support in 6 Or More Categories. And Given the Increased Propensity for Injury Among Base Stealers, Risking an Entire Category on a Singles Hitter With Questionable Plate Discipline and Flawed BaseBall Instinct Could Lead a Fantasy Team Into a Deep DirtRunners Hole.

7 PlayOff Champions Do Not Always Finish First. Often Injuries, Ineffectiveness, or DisJointed Pitching and Offensive Play Can Lead to Fantasy Ineffectiveness, Sliding an OtherWise AweSome Array of Talent into the Middle of League Standings. Often Astute Fantasy Managers Will Walk into One of the top 6 PlayOff Positions with a Relaxed Full Season Gate That Turns Into an Impressive Sprint as Health, Attention to Detail, and Increased Roster Manipulation Leads to a New Level Of Competitive Action and Success. Utilize All the Aforementioned Strategies: Add Quality Disabled Free Agents, Forgive Early and Often, Correct Draft Mistakes with Diamonds In the Bush, Sell High When In Need of Quality and Quantity, And Remember the Majority of Major League Ball Players Accumulate a Vast Amount of Production in a Reasonable Small Window of Actual Game Play. David Ortiz Exemplified That Painfully Obvious Rule In 2002 as he Accumulated 12 of his 20 Home Runs and 35 of His 75 RBI In a Two Month Stretch in July and August. Track Past Monthly Performance to Try and Gain an Edge On Possible Early Season Bargains. Conversely, Track Past Performance to Gain an Edge on Notoriously Slow Starters, As Too Many of the Aformentioned Can Lead to an Early Fantasy Exit.

8 Coming Soon

* Refrain From OverSpending On 2B, 3B, Closers, and Catchers. Never, Ever Draft the Highest Rated Player on the Board to Strengthen a Fantasy Roster. There May Be a Good Reason a Player is Available Later Than Rankings Would Indicate Should Be the Case. Daryl Ward, Moises Alou, Roger Cedeno, Brad Radke, Brad Penny, Ben Sheets Were All Available Later Than Ranking Would Have Dictated On Draft Day and All Disappointed all But the Most Forgiving Fantasy Loser. Always Draft the Player You Want Regardless of Draft Position. If Gurrero Just Went off the Board and Your Next Power/Speed Guy is Beltran, Ordonez Or Berkman; Draft That Player Without Hesitation, as Maggs, Beltran, and Berkman May Again OutPerform More Heralded Fantasy Studs Like Sosa, Suzuki, Pujols and Helton. Defense may Not Count in Your League, But the Mets Showed that an Awful Defense Can Cost a Quality Fantasy Pitcher Wins and Fantasy Ranking. Lack of a Front or Back of the Rotation Depth { Seattle } is Also Something that Tends to Wear On a Pitching Staff As the Season Wastes Away. Early Starting Exits Lead to an Increased WorkLoad On Quality Middle Relievers, Which can Eventually Lead to an Increase In the Overall Use of the Valuable 7th, 8th, & 9th Inning Closers, and an August Fade That Leads to an Increased Number of Blown Leads and Saves. Extremely Difficult Divisional MatchUps Can Also Have an Impact on a Players Overall Fantasy Value. Anyone Riding Garcia and Pineiro into the Fantasy PlayOffs Race Knows the Pain of a 5 Run Blow Up Against a Quality Offensive Opponent, and conversely the Misery of a 0-2 Shutout at the Fingers of a Cy Young MoundsMan. Follow These Simple rules, Practice a Methodical Routine, Learn to Accept The Inevitable Mistake, and Victory May Grace Your Closet with the Costume of Padre, Pirate, Oriole, or October Angel. Remember to Drop that ChampionChip Bomb on those League Goblins, and Let Them Know Your Coming Back for a Little More Abuse in 2003. Defending a Title Means the Odds Are With the Many Managers That Suffered a Little Aluminum Upside the Head. Please Feel Free to Add Your Favorit Rule as Quality Submissions Will Find Their Way into the 101 Lexicon.

AMBIGUOUS®ßA§EßA££®HI§‡OR¥

• Smith Has Been the Most Common Name ThroughOut the History of Major League History.

• The Longest Recorded Throw During a Regulation BaseBall Game Is 445 Feet By Glen Gorbous.

• Jackie Robinson is the Only Player to Have His Number Retired For a Team That He Has Not Played on.

• ‘ShoeLess’ Joe Jackson Is the Only Player to Record a .400 Average In a Rookie Season During the 20th Century.

• John Montgomery Ward Is the Only Pitcher to Win 150 Games As a MoundsMan and Collect 2000 Hits as a BatsMan.

• Ed Rommel Was the First Major League Umpire to Wear Corrective EyeWear During a Regulation Game. One Would Hope More Umpires Follow His Lead and Visit the Eye Doctor on a Regular Basis.

• Jim Abbott Is the Only BaseBall Player to Have Won the James E. Sullivan Award. The Award Has Been an Annual Event Since It’s Innagural Presentation in 1930, and Has Been Given to the Outstanding Amateur Athlete of the Year For Over 70 Years.

• Garry Tenpleton Was A Long Time Record Holder for Most Career Intentional Walks With 144 During a 16 Year Career. Barry Bonds Has Long Since Surpassed Templetons’s Mark with 420 Intentional Passes, the Majority of those Coming After Joining San Francisco In 1993.

• Nomar Garciaparra Became the 13th Player In Modern BaseBall History to Accumulate 200 Hits in his Rookie Season. Ichiro Suzuki Became the 14th to Accomplish the Feat with a Rookie of the Year Campaign in 2001 as He Torched American League Pitchers and Became the 1st Player to Have 2 Twenty Game Hit Streaks In the Same Season Since Juan Gozalez in 1996. Tony Oliva and Richie Allen are the Only Rookies to Collect 200 Hits in the Same Season – 1964 – and only 3 Players Have Done it Since: Kevin Seitzer { 1987 ROY / 207 Hits }, Nomar Garciaparra { 1997 ROY / 209 Hits }, Ichiro Suzuki { 2001 ROY / 242 Hits }. A Total of 14 Rookies have Collected 200 Hits in their Rookie Campaign.

• José Hernández Remains One StrikeOut Short Of the Major League Record of 189 Set By Bobby Bonds In 1970. Hernandez Faced StrikeOut Specialist Octavio Dotel Late In the Game and Was In Position to Tie Bonds with 2 Strikes and a Nasty 97 MPH FastBall On the Inside Half. Hernandez Managed to Get Some Wood on the Ball and Hit a Weak Fly to Right Field. The Milwaukee Fans Erupted In Boo As Hernandez ‘Failed’ to Produce a Record for the Bleacher Creatures. Hernandez Is a Marginal Player On a Bad Team Who Happens to Have a Long Swing that Produces Long Fly Balls. Hernandez Could Regress Considerably In 2003. Bump Him Down the Depth Chart, Especially if He Finds a Platoon Role In the Brewer Infield, as Serious StrikeOut Artists { Cory Snyder, Pete Incaviglia } Can Slide Down HIll In a Hurry. Hernandez Will Also Kill In OB%, Average, and Team Moral.

MINOR £EAGUE PLA¥ER PRO§PEC‡U§

COMING §OON

ÅR‡I£ER¥

• £ºNG GºNE £UMßER