Looming Roster Crunch

It is Lent right now, so the number 40 comes up.

Certainly, it's going around the M's front office too.

Picking the 25 players that open the season with the M's is going to be interesting enough, though most of the wide open battles are between relatively little-known players vying for relatively low impact positions. It's hard to get all that pumped up because of it.

However, the real interesting battle will be with the 40-man roster. There are going to be players cut, and some might grab headlines.

Here is the issue: the Mariners don't think many of their younger players are ready for the majors yet. So, stopgaps have been brought in as non-roster invitees. A handful of them are very strong candidates to make the roster. However, to be added, they have to also be on the 40-man roster - meaning someone has to get removed.

2011 Arbitration Eligibles

2011 Mariners week continues with a look at the arbitration eligible players. Arbitration functions as a process to transition players from the league minimum salary to whatever their value is on the open free agent market. As such, all arbitration eligible players are a good value in theory.

There is a catch in most cases though. Often, players are out of minor league option years by the time they hit arbitration. So, offering arbitration to a player is often attached to a commitment to keeping the player on the team.

While there is the occasional budding star mixed in arbitration, the majority of these players are in the serviceable to solid range. In other words, the majority are supporting pieces on a roster. Since the majority of arbitration deals come at good value, the real question is if the piece is worth keeping or not.

Here are the decisions the 2011 roster has to make. Current salary is in parentheses:

Disappointment #2

Kanekoa Texeira (Getty images)

I was disappointed when the Mariners fired Alan Cockrell, mostly because they made it clear they did it just because someone had to be the scapegoat. The organization seemed beyond such traditional, purely cosmetic moves.

I am disappointed again. The Mariners announced a pair of moves after last night's loss. Designated for assignment are Jesus Colome and Kanekoa Texeira. Up are Sean White and Garrett Olson.

First of all, I am happy to see Colome finally cut loose. I specifically mentioned that I would ditch him in my rant on the M's over the weekend. I also said I would let Wak call up whomever he wanted to take his place, and I figured that man would be Sean White.

So, White for Colome is a fine move in my book. I don't think it makes much of a difference, but Colome clearly was not an answer, short term or long term. He was a logical guy to make a change with, especially after such a wild outing in Anaheim.

Bringing up Garett Olson doesn't bother me much either. He was pitching fine in Tacoma's starting rotation, but shifted to the bullpen by the M's several weeks ago. As a reliever, he has looked quite good, albeit with a small sample size. Still, Olson has demonstrated better command and a better ability to miss bats in AAA than he did a year ago, and the team is yet to find a reliable left-handed reliever since Z and Wak have been in town (though they haven't exactly gone looking either).

What bothers me is DFAing Texeira. He is only 24 years old, and making the jump from AA to the major leagues. An adjustment period should have been expected. On top of that, he only got 16 appearances in the first two months of the season. Many established relievers would be inconsistent with such sparse work, so a youngster trying to make major adjustments on the fly is likely to have problems as well.

Sure enough, Kanekoa posted a 5.30 ERA out of the bullpen this year in his appearances. However, even that number is misleading. His FIP is 3.39, and BABIP a remarkably high .363. Both numbers suggest that Texeira should have more success moving forward, and that doesn't count any development that could occur as he matures and adjusts to major league hitters.

As a brief aside, Colome also projects to be better moving forward, but not as good as Texeira...and Colome is eight years older, and teams have been trying to improve his command for a decade now (with no success).

I doubt the Mariners just gave up on the next Robb Nen or Trevor Hoffman, but they never took the time to find out what they had with Texeira. To me, it is eerily reminiscent to what Bill Bavasi did with guys like Scott Podsednik and Greg Dobbs. Neither are stars, but the Mariners could have used them, and had to burn through resources to find replacements.

Kanekoa Texeira should have been in Colome's role all season. Based on what I saw, he was good enough to handle the mop-up role just fine. I wonder if this team would have cut him if he had been given the opportunities to pitch that should have been his in the first place.

Based on what I have seen, the Mariners are not good enough to justify giving up on a guy like Texeira, especially in a season like this. It wreaks of another short-sighted, mostly cosmetic fix. However, unlike firing the hitting coach, this move has a chance to come back and bite them.

2009 M's: Good To The Last Drop

Football is here, so it is easy to forget about the baseball season. It is especially easy since the Mariners likely aren't on their way to the postseason. However, the Mariners are almost as interesting to watch as ever. Here are some reasons to keep a close eye on the team in the midst of all the pigskin coverage:

1. I'll give you three reasons why in one fell swoop. After tonight's victory against Tampa Bay, the Mariners are 79-72 on the year. Three more wins secures a winning record. They have 11 games remaining. At this point, a winning season is a highly attainable goal, but no less remarkable. This team is looking at improving by more than 20 wins, which teams just don't do. A winning record, even if it's just 82-80, would be a big deal.
2. There is no guarantee Ken Griffey Jr. is coming back. He has been better than his .218 batting average suggests, even if his clubhouse contributions aren't considered. However, he isn't getting any younger. The M's face a challenging decision with him if he wants to come back. Enjoy him while he lasts, which may be only another week.
3. Felix Hernandez is in the thick of the AL Cy Young discussion. Today, the M's announced that he will get an extra start on the last day of the season. A separate post on Felix's chances may be warranted in the near future, but it's pretty clear him, Zack Grienke, or CC Sabathia will take home the honors. A few more wins would really help Felix's chances.
4. Matt Tuiasosopo's performance in the next week could have a profound impact on the offseason. If he earns some trust from Don Wakamatsu, he will be a more viable option to start somewhere on the infield. That could mean that the M's don't re-sign Beltre or Russell Branyan. Or (what I think is more likely), if they get both of those players back, Jose Lopez could be shopped around. He should have trade value, especially with the season he has put together at the plate. No matter what, Tui's performance in the next week will have an impact on the team's offseason plans.
5. Every start matters. What will the 2010 rotation look like, outside of Felix Hernandez, and probably also Ryan Rowland-Smith? It's anybody's guess. The competition is already underway. Brandon Morrow and Ian Snell both have the stuff, but lack control. Fister lacks stuff, but has the control. Guys like Jason Vargas, Luke French, and Garrett Olson are somewhere in between. They all will be in the conversation in spring training, but strong finishes from any of them won't be forgotten.

Of course, the end of the season would be more excited if a playoff berth was on the line. There is no way around that. Still, the 2009 Mariners will be interesting to watch until the final pitch. There is a reason to watch every game the rest of the way, and not just to imagine what the future might look like. Besides, I know I need something to forget those Frank Gore runs from last Sunday...

Heilman Gone, Cedeno and Olson In

The rebuilding continues. Today, Jack Z traded away Aaron Heilman to the Cubs for INF Ronny Cedeno and LHP Garrett Olson. To make room on the 40-man roster, the M's also released RHP Randy Messenger. Heilman was acquired in the J.J. Putz megadeal, so he will end up never throwing one pitch in a Mariners uniform. As a brief sidenote, this deal may end any chance of the Cubs acquiring Jake Peavy, which is certainly noteworthy.

This is another move from Jack Zduriencik that makes so much sense on so many levels. His mantra is to acquire talent, and that's what he keeps doing. Heilman was quite redundant on this roster, and frankly I am pretty sure he was always more of a throw-in that the Mets wanted to get rid of than a person the Mariners were very interested in acquiring. Heilman, like Washburn, Silva, and Rowland-Smith, would have been competing for a job at the back end of the rotation. Additionally, with the acquisitions of Tyler Walker and David Aardsma, he was not exactly essential to the back end of the bullpen either. Simply put, Heilman did not look like a great fit for this team.

On the other hand, Ronny Cedeno and Garrett Olson both are great fits. Olson can compete for a starting spot, just like a Heilman was going to. However, Olson is younger, cheaper, under team control for several more years, and has stuff better suited for starting right now anyway. On top of that, Ronny Cedeno provides needed depth in the middle of the diamond, and can push either Yuni Betancourt or Jose Lopez for playing time immediately. Even though both Olson and Cedeno are yet to have great major league success, their minor league track records indicate that they have the potential to develop into valuable contributors at the major league level.

The ultimate beauty of this deal though is that it is still good for the Mariners even if they do not progress. As I already said, Olson is already at least as well suited for the rotation as Heilman. Cedeno is already good enough to be a solid reserve infielder too. I am not real sure why this trade appealed to the Cubs, because it has a chance to make them look pretty bad....Wow, when was the last time anyone could say that about another team in an M's trade?

I am pretty excited to see the 2009 Mariners take the field. Off the top of my head, here is the list of M's that are candidates to take big steps forward (or return to form) in 2009:

• Kenji Johjima
• Jeff Clement
• Chris Shelton
• Yuniesky Betancourt
• Ronny Cedeno
• Bryan LaHair
• Franklin Gutierrez
• Erik Bedard
• Brandon Morrow
• Carlos Silva
• Garrett Olson
• Jason Vargas
• Mark Lowe

The odds are better for some players than others, but the odds of none of those players progressing are virtually non-existent. It is not a question of if, but rather how many and how much. Granted, many of those players Jack Zduriencik inherited. But, he has breathed life into a stagnant 101-loss roster with every deal he has made. This team is back on the rise.