So the Mariners have a winning record one month into the season, and everyone is asking if they're for real. Pardon me while I restrain a giggle and pinch myself a little -- I just reread that first sentence.
Well, for the disbelievers, here's this nugget: the M's are in first place, but so are the Kansas City Royals.
For the believers: Felix Hernandez, Erik Bedard and Jarrod Washburn are a combined 9-2 with a combined ERA in the mid-twos.
Naysayers: Junior and Adrian Beltre are at the Mendoza line. Beltre hasn't hit a homer yet. Washburn's success won't last. Morrow's hurt, who knows for how long. Carlos Silva and Miguel Batista have pulses and are drawing obscene paychecks. There's no proven lefty in the pen.
Ayesayers: Griffey and Beltre are about to heat up. Russell Branyan is a stud, .320 with 6 HR through Sunday. Have you heard of a little guy we like to call I-chi-RO? The bullpen is deep. In fact, the team in general is deeper than any time since 2002.
I'm a fan, so I have the fog of bias clouding up my lens. But I know this team will get shut out fairly often, it will lost plenty of games 3-2, and the bullpen will walk its way to more than a few losses.
This club also won't lose eight in a row all year. The starting pitching talent won't allow it. And the West is woefully weak this year.
It's not impossible to spend a glorious summer watching the M's get as lucky as the 2006 Cardinals, who scraped together a forgettable 83-78 record, won a crummy division, and then rode an unexpected hot streak to a perfectly valid World Series title. Hey, stop laughing! It's baseball. I'm told anything can happen.
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