NorthWest Sports Blog brings you daily features on Oregon, Washington State, and BC amateur and pro sports teams.
NWSB Insider and Seattle Mariners blogger Jonathan Irwin reports on the first game of the series versus the Oakland Athletics. As is the ongoing trend with these “love ‘em/hate ‘ems” I must make a note that Seattle’s lineup was absolutely horrendous tonight. Oakland’s offense had just as hard a time tonight as Seattle’s, and it’s all because of starting pitcher Kevin Millwood. An incredibly boring game.
NWSB Insider and Seattle Mariners blogger Insider Steve says the Mariners lineup needs to score in the top of the first. Put the game in motion early on and give Justin Smoak and Jesus Montero early opportunities with runners in scoring position. Early success will create a trickle down effect for the rest of the lineup.
NWSB Insider and Seattle Mariners blogger Danny Ferguson reports on the opening day clash North American clash between the M’s and the A’s, this time in Oakland. The 2 teams split their series in Japan and Danny predicts Felix Hernandez to prevail with the win while Jason Vargas might not escape Oakland with a win. The Mariners are hoping Dustin Ackley carries his game 2 performance into Oakland.
NWSB insider Jonathan Irwin brings us his 5 reasons why fans should already fear for the Seattle Mariners bullpen. While Tom Wilhelmsen and Brandon League preformed well in the season opener. Shawn Kelley, Steve Delabar and George Sherrill did the opposite in game 2. The team has no set up man, no swing man and didn’t exactly wow fans with the bullpen performance this Spring.
NWSB Insider and Seattle Mariners blogger Danny Ferguson reports on the opening two games in Tokyo between the M’s and the A’s. He says some things to look foward to include Taking in Ichiro Suzuki Fever. Ichiro is bigger than cheeseburgers are in America, the Mariners are guilty by association, meaning we will see cheering like the 1995 playoffs. That will be a nice change.
NWSB Insider and Seattle Mariners baseball blogger Danny Ferguson tells us to go from 30 down to 28, Carlos Peguero and Chance Ruffin were optioned to Tacoma, and Guillermo Quiroz was re-assigned to minor league camp. To get down to 25, the team deactivated Kevin Millwood, Hector Noesi, and Hisashi Iwakuma for the two games in Japan. The M’s front office and Eric Wedge could still change their minds before next week.
