Honestly, this team scares me a little

Not in the good way, either. But also—we haven’t seen much yet.

Will the Mariners be above .500 again this year?

That was a bit of game I’d play with some cursed Mariners teams from a couple eras ago. You could do it pretty early, too—on damp and chilly April nights like last night. Félix would win on Opening Day but it could and often would turn quickly after that.

The 2025 Mariners will be above .500 again. Almost certainly. Like for sure. I think.

I definitely feel more confident in saying that now than when I got a simple “Dawg” text on my phone last night, quickly recognized it as a spoiler and looked up to see that grounder rip through Dylan Moore for two runs.

That felt like it could’ve been it. Like that could break them.

It of course didn’t. It’s tough to get “broken” a mere week into April. It’s probably impossible.

Certainly, opinions on this club shouldn’t change much on a sample of only 11 games. Yeah, sure, definitely.

I’ll say, 4-7 feels a hell of a lot better than 3-8 after that loss would’ve felt like. Nevertheless, it’s all probably a lesson in abstaining from overreaction.

Still, I owe you some words and most words on this publication are going to be some form of a reaction. Over, under, neither—that’s up to you, I guess.

Had they lost the game, you probably would’ve seen something like “If things were going to go bad, this is what it would look like” and, if we’re being candid, Jorge Polanco’s line drive doinking Bryan Abreu’s thigh instead of one-hopping into Jeremy Peña’s glove shouldn’t change that much. It does change some, though.

On that theoretical thesis, if things were going to go real poorly for the 2025 Mariners, it would probably include rookie mistakes and misfires from Dan Wilson managing a baseball team for the first time. And yeah, it’s been a little spotty there.

It’s cliché for a millennial baseball blogger to say it but I will: I do not care for the bunting. Not my thing.

Last night, with runners on first and second, it worked. And it was absolutely harrowing every step of the way.

The thing with the bunt is that people often jump to the part where the bunt is down and the runners have each moved up a base. The math says you’ve actually reduced your run expectancy for the inning but hey, two runs are closer and one doesn’t even need a hit.

That part is pretty good. You still need a guy to not strike out or pop out or line out or hit a grounder right at someone and if they do any of those things, the next guy to get a base hit…but in the moment, that moment after the successful bunt, it’s somewhat nice.

It’s less good when the attempting bunter falls in in a quick 0-2 and kills their AB. Or they pop up the bunt. Or, god forbid, they bunt a third strike foul.

Yeah, I didn’t like the bunt at 2-1, even with J.P.’s struggles. I liked it even less after Julio struck out. Polanco’s two-run single was nice, though. Liked that.

There’s stuff I worry about with Wilson. Some of it’s this stuff and some of it’s other stuff but it’s all part of having a rookie manager who didn’t take this job to not do it the way they wanted.

I remember being in the press box in 2016 wondering why Scott Servais was letting Adam Lind face a lefty or Ketel Marte bat from whatever his much weaker side was. It’s part of the process.

Whether this team should be manned by an untested manager is a different debate—but it is led by one and sometimes we will see what that looks like.

The reason why the manager’s chair in Seattle is such a focal point for fans is that it’s really an essential part of this operation. For the Mariners to get to the places we want them to go, the places they’ve never been, they must be more than the sum of their parts.

That isn’t only on the manager, far from it. But it does often mean lining up the bullpen exactly right, playing the matchups to constantly put guys in position to succeed and, if you can, conjuring the right voodoo to pull out the close games.

The reason the Mariners need to be more than the sum of their parts is that the sum of the parts isn’t good enough. There’s not enough talent.

Now they’re down Victor Robles, one of their best bets to over-perform projections, until about the All-Star Break. Jorge Polanco supposedly had a sore knee, then it was actually his side—but not an oblique strain—and now skip isn’t saying what it is.

So you get lineups like this:

Mike Carp would be at home in that lineup. Rob Johnson could be on that graphic. Jason Bay, things of that nature.

Of course, before we got 2025 underway, there was the injury to George Kirby.

I know it isn’t saying much to say this is what it would look like were this going to go bad, but it is.

And at the same time? We don’t know anything. Like not at all.

The first two weeks of the 2019 Mariners were what it would like like if that team were to turn water into bat-flipped dingers and miraculously exceed expectations after the sell-off.

They, of course, did not do that.

All I’m saying though is what I think right now. I should do that more. The blogger’s constant promise.

For one, what the guys have done thus far is not significantly predictive toward what they’ll do the rest of the year. The bigger part—some of these guys won’t even be the guys. I’d be so bad at Player Dev because I’d panic-promote Cole Young so fast right now. Rowdy Tellez would feel Tyler Locklear’s hot breath on the back of his neck.

On top of that, it’s pretty simple: if you hover around .500 or a little above, you’re gonna be there in the end. In this American League, with this playoff format—mediocre gets you in the mix.

The challenge with Mariners ownership’s team- and business-building philosophy—only trying to win just enough to be in the mix all year because it’s more profitable than spending to only maybe win big—is that it puts a lower bound of outcomes in play.

Right now, as a Mariners fan, you can look down and see the floor. A monkey’s paw is probably curling in the old LL comments as I reject the testament of “There is no floor,” but these Mariners have played at least to what a realistic floor would look like.

It’s not everything, but it’s concerning.

I’m concerned, but I’m an anxious person by nature.

You know what would help that? The Mariners winning a series before mid-April. That’d rock.

Go M’s.