-Does it seem to anyone else that the Mariners are stranding a lot of runners? Well, they're not, even though it seemed that way to me. The Mariners are hitting quite well in so-called "clutch" situations. As a team overall, the Mariners have a .318 OBP. With runners on, it jumps to .352, and with runners in scoring posn., it goes up to .404. If you don't believe "clutch hitting" is a skill, this is yet another ominous sign, since they've actually been lucky to score as many runs as they have (M's are 26th in the majors in OPS, but 20th in Runs scored). If you do believe in "clutch hitting," then this isn't an area likey to improve. As many in the blogosphere have pointed out, the biggest problem has been preventing runs. Of course, if the Mariners had guys who could hit it out more, situational hitting wouldn't matter quite as much.
-The M's have allowed 10 stolen bases this year, and caught 1. That's ugly. The guys at USS Mariner have done a series of posts about how many extra base hits we've allowed so far (a whole heck of a lot). That's the equivalent of allowing opponents to turn 10 walks or singles into doubles, or 1 in 10 (the M's have allowed 99 singles + walks). Put another way, if we adjust the M's current SLG allowed by adding stolen bases to total bases (turning 10 singles into doubles), the SLG allowed increases from .474 to .500. Having Ben Davis find his swing again might be helpful in this regard, since he's had better success throwing runners out than Wilson in the recent past. But Davis won't get playing time unless he starts doing something at the plate.
The semester ends in three weeks, at which point we'll have a better idea about how much this abyssmal start is an accurate reflection of the Mariners' true ability, and at which point I'll be able to pay a little better attention to their games and this blog.
Update:Thanks to Steve at Wheelhouse for reading my little observation and refining and correcting it, showing his customary thoroughness and reason.
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