Randall on Baseball

Rick Randall is a Stanwood resident whose passions include his wife and children... and baseball. Beginning with his first Little League baseball game, Randall has been immersed in the sport on all levels. He shares his thoughts with other fan-atics on his blog and in his column in North County Outlook.

In the midst of a disappointing season which has seen most of their expected top offensive contributors struggle all season long, seen the depressing struggles, incidents and sudden retirement of franchise icon Ken Griffey, Jr., and seen perhaps the best starter in baseball this season, Cliff Lee, traded away, the Mariners made a move that puzzles and aggravates me as an avid Mariners fan: They blamed it all on the manager.

Don Wakamatsu and his staff were let go with the team sitting 28 games under .500 and 22-1/2 games out of the AL West lead after 112 games. That record is hard to swallow, for sure, especially when many pundits around the game suggested that the team would likely complete in what was thought to be a weak AL West. No one saw Texas coming out and doing what they're doing, and the Angels and A's have struggled as predicted, so it's conceivable to say that the Mariners should have been in the thick of the race for second place in the division and not 13-1/2 back of third place.

It appears true that Wakamatsu did lose the clubhouse, and lost the respect of at least a few of the players. But I am here to tell you that the struggles the Mariners have experienced this season are not Don Wakamatsu's fault. I am here to tell you that firing Wakamatsu was the wrong move.

True, the team unity seems to have healed a bit and the Mariners are playing better baseball right now under interim manager Daren Brown. At the time of writing this, they had won six of their first nine games heading into the Yankees series, but that isn't the basis of my argument. Firing your manager, who was hired for a rebuild job, in the middle of rebuilding is akin to firing your foundation contractor before the concrete is poured. It just doesn't make sense.

A revolving door is a sure sign of a franchise that doesn't have firm footing--a team that is grasping for answers. Take a look at the baseball teams with the most turnover: Baltimore, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and Seattle. Telling, isn't it?

Everyone who looks at the situation from the outside can see that door spinning around and around, casualties being strewn across the baseball landscape. Potential managerial replacements, potential coaching candidates, potential free agent signings, potential draftees--all of the important pieces that the Seattle Mariners need to add to become a successful franchise--are being pushed away from Seattle by the constant shuffling of managers, players and coaches.

The writing was certainly on the wall for Wak's fate this season. From the Griffey situation to Chone Figgins' childish complaints and insubordination to the team's struggles, you knew it was going to end this way. It always does in sports.

Accountability is one of the key terms that Zduriencik used during his press conference the day that Wak was let go. The accountability for a team's struggles always lands - right or wrong - in the lap of the manager. But accountability has to start at the top. And Wakamatsu is not the top. The right thing for the Mariners to do would have been for Jack to come out and announce, again, that this is a project and that Wakamatsu was the manager that the Mariners were trusting in to lead this project to the next level.

But instead, the Mariners decided to blame it all on the manager. Wrong move.