Great Article From Baker

[NWinAZ]

I am not the biggest fan of Geoff Baker, but this is a must read. It is a behind the scene look at how bad GMZ, Chuck, and Howie are....and they are actually worse than we all thought.

Dysfunction at the top: Eric Wedge, others point to trouble in Mariners’ front office | Mariners | The Seattle Times

 

[blstoker]

This is the type of stuff that has me concerned about the Cano deal. Not that Cano isn't solid, just that the leadership of the team isn't up to the task of doing much of anything right. I would love to have more faith in the team, but the only positives I hear about Lincoln and Armstrong are from Lincoln and Armstrong.

What I take away from this is that Hyun-jin Ryu could've been with the Mariners instead of the Dodgers (as it was our former foreign head of scouting that signed him). So instead of Ryu we get Saunders (Which would have been a 2.26 difference in ERA). Oh, and Saunders costed us $3 million last season than Ryu would have.

Also, if Lincoln and Armstrong were insisting that Felix throw live batting practice between starts, it could explain why he's tailed off at the end of the last two seasons. This is the most moronic idea about how to handle a pitching staff I've heard in a long time.

 

[Destroydacre]

It's obvious where the giant cancerous tumor is in this organization. Fortunately a big chunk of it is gone, but the heart still remains. It will be a day worth celebrating in Seattle when Howard Lincoln is gone from the Mariners. If Chuck Armstrong wants to see something truly "sickening" he needs to go stare in a mirror.

 

[HaroldSeattle]

Wow. This story is disturbing to say the least. I'm going to go on record as saying this Cano signing isn't going to work out. It could if it was just step one of many steps, but I just can not bring myself to believe that is the case. Hope I'm wrong.

In some ways the Mariners needed to sign someone like Cano, it should have been Fielder a couple of seasons ago instead of trading for Montero.

 

[cezero]

Dear lord, "dysfunctional" barely seems adequate.

I still firmly believe that any successful club has to have an evenly distributed 3-pronged approach to building with free agents signings, trades, and farm building.

After reading all of this dirty laundry surfacing from dysfunction at the top, it's even more transparent why the M's have been HISTORICALLY BAD at all 3.

Hopefully the special assistant who replaces Blengino knows something about sabermetrics, and can help Z out with that...wow, is Z acting completely alone right now without any insight from real team builders? God.

With incompetence like this at the top, it's a miracle that we got Cano at all. I'm terrified of any trades these idiots might attempt to make, now that I see this.

One thing is for certain: unless Chuckie's replacement is excellent and comes in with a deep understanding of the game, a desire to get things done the right way, and a take-charge attitude that renders a feckless fucktard like Lincoln inert, we're pretty much doomed.

Looks like Blengino portrayed Z as Billy Beane 2.0. LOL.

 

[SeattleCoug]

Well i admit, it was weird having confidence in this organization for 48 hours. I didn't know how to handle it. I feel alot easier that things are back to normal and I can go back to thinking the same about management.

 

[SeattleCoug]

One thing is for certain: unless Chuckie's replacement is excellent and comes in with a deep understanding of the game, a desire to get things done the right way, and a take-charge attitude that renders a feckless fucktard like Lincoln inert, we're pretty much doomed.

Considering who is likely in charge of finding Chuckie's replacement, I wouldnt hold out a lot of hope for that.

 

[FirebreathingMonkey]

Holy Shit!!!

I knew it was bad but wow ....

I'm going to have to sleep on this before I post my thoughts because I don't want to say anything that could get me removed but Wow.

Holy Shit!!

 

[unlvmariners]

This is disgusting. Makes me sick.

Jack Z is a turd but he is clearly not the entire reason for the Mariners organization being a failure. He still has a job because of Chuck and Howard. All three of them should be kicked to the curb.

Sounds like we would be better off with Blengino running this team.

Unfortunately none of this is likely to change until we get an owner who gives a shit.

PS- Thanks for the read AZ

 

[cezero]

this story is turning heads around baseball

my buddies on angelswin.com are talking about it right now

surely the nyc area will pick it up, too, since they're trying to find reasons to trash cano for coming here

 

[seahawksfan234]

Unfortunately I have reached my limit for free Seattle Times articles. I will be sure to bookmark it and read it later though.

 

[SeattleCoug]

Timing of this article from him makes sense because if I'm not mistaken he's no longer the Mariner beat writer anymore.

 

[cezero]

Timing of this article from him makes sense because if I'm not mistaken he's no longer the Mariner beat writer anymore.

Yep. His title is now "sports enterprise and investigative reporter" since November.

 

[dude82]

This is a pretty damning article for the front office. Even though I think most people suspected that this kind of environment had taken hold behind the scenes, it needed to be written if there's to be any hope of a change now that all of the dirty laundry has been aired out. It probably wouldn't have made a huge difference if this article came out before we signed Cano and like I said, it needed to be written, but as Coug alluded to, it was nice to feel like this franchise might finally be headed in the right direction for the first time in a long time.

This article, as a reinforcement of just how far the organization has fallen and how far it still needs to go to get back to where it was more than a decade ago (and to go even further than that) was both a reality check and a complete mood killer. The Cano signing provided hope that maybe, just maybe, things were finally going right for the Mariners (and they still might even with this article out there), but not even two days later we're back to talking about the dysfunction that has been suspected (and now, apparently, confirmed) for years.

Someone desperately needed to write this article, that much is true... I just wish that it hadn't come on the heels of the biggest free agent signing in the history of the franchise (and the third biggest contract in league history). It's like getting your kid, whose belief in Santa is already waning, a Christmas present from Santa that they really wanted, letting them enjoy it for a couple of days, and then telling them that there is no Santa. They eventually needed to know the truth about Santa's existence, but they didn't necessarily need to know it a few days after getting the best gift ever.

 

[YourFriendGannon]

Entertaining read anyway, parts of that seem like something out of the Onion. I always did think from day 1 Blenigo would be the successor, and by about this point in time too. I guess the Figgins deal torpedoed him.

 

[RegentDenali]

Takes guts to write articles like this because it usually means your black balled from gaining access to the team compared to the lazy reporters who just say mostly positive things and write articles at a 3rd grade reading comprehension.

This article just confirms what what was Capt Obvious. A team cannot suck this bad, for this long, without world class bad leadership from the top and a bunch of incompetent yes men doing their bidding.

That's the Mariners.

 

[Podunkparte]

God, just reading that my heart rate has climbed and I'm clenching my jaw. The imbeciles at the top just piss me off so much.

Good for Wedge for standing up to those morons and quitting. Would any of you want to stay in such a dysfunctional organization? I hope the new owner gets to read this and has more interest in the organization than his father.

 

[seahawksfan234]

Wow.

I saw a few things on MLBTR about the article and decided I would just read it on my phone since on my computer I have reached my limit for Seattle times articles.

This article is... Eye opening. It confirms our worst fears and things that many of us assumed but never had any tangible proof of. Before this I had no problem with retaining Jack Z but this article honestly makes me feel that he is in fact incompetent.

None of this should surprise me but seeing it really blows me away. Amazing article. It has got to take a TON of guts for Baker to post that. This is probably the most exposing thing I have ever seen written about the organization and he will likely be shunned by the Mariners FO at every chance. I've only read the first 1/4 of the article but I am already shocked.

I had imagined Chuck and Howie to be incompetent but not complete douche bags as well. Same goes for Jack Z, I had the opportunity to meet him a few times and was always shocked over how polite he always was. This is eye opening. This is honestly the part that blew me away the most:

In an episode that's perhaps representative of the criticisms in the article, Blengino recounts a presentation he gave to baseball operations officials in 2012 on how the Mariners could make use of computerized hitting data. Sitting in on the presentation, Zduriencik "nitpicked about font sizes and column widths," according to Blengino. "He did what he always does and made fun of something he couldn’t understand."

It is a bit long but no doubt worth the read.

After learning how incompetent Zduriencik actually seems to be, I think he needs to be replaced.

 

[Podunkparte]

After learning how incompetent Zduriencik actually seems to be, I think he needs to be replaced.

The problem though, is it seems they all need to be replaced at once, and for that you need an owner who is actually involved in his product and not trusting it to the morons who are part of the problem.

It's like the M's are a team circling the hole in the toilet and it's fucking sad.

I really like the commentary spots by the sports guy on Q13. He also seems to have the same views of ownership as we do. Hopefully he reads through this and is able to open more eyes to the incompetence in the M's FO.

 

[wazzu31]

Takes guts to write articles like this because it usually means your black balled from gaining access to the team compared to the lazy reporters who just say mostly positive things and write articles at a 3rd grade reading comprehension.

This article just confirms what what was Capt Obvious. A team cannot suck this bad, for this long, without world class bad leadership from the top and a bunch of incompetent yes men doing their bidding.

That's the Mariners.

But Baker has been negative on the leadership for years now and like a lot of us called Jack incompetent as a GM. I didn't realize he threw people under the bus to keep his job. But throwing people under the bus is still better than the Lee and Fister deals.

But also you can't take everything he says at full face value as he reported the Mariners were selling the team two years ago. Like that he is negative on the M's and doesn't apologize like LaRue and McGrath have but he does seem to embellish a touch with his distain for not covering a better team.