Lost at Sea

Well, I’ve been waiting since early July for the Mariners to come back to earth in light of their pitiable starting pitching, batting average-dependent offense, and mismatch between their record and their runs scored and allowed (also noted here), and their 8-game losing streak seems to have done the trick. One thing I will grant Seattle is incredible durability. 133 games into the season (entering today), 7 regulars have played 120 or more games, all 9 on pace for 500 at bats. As I discussed after the 2002 Angels won the World Series, if you can pull that off, you can paper over less-than stellar offensive talent simply by not having to use much in terms of bench players, who tend to be offensive weak links. The downside is that when you have 6 regulars 31 or older and nobody takes days off, that’s not a recipe for a strong September.