Tony Overman/The Olympian
DOES IT ALL: Bret Boone (center) offers outstanding defense at second base -- plus, he led the team in home runs and RBIs.

Tony Overman/The Olympian
FROM THE RIGHT: Washington native Aaron Sele is 15-5.

Tony Overman/The Olympian
FROM THE LEFT: Jamie Moyer won his 20th game Friday.

The Associated Press
NOT SHAKY: Kazuhiro Sasaki (left), shaking hands with catcher Dan Wilson, is one of baseball's top relief pitchers.

They can pitch, field and hit--what's left?

Seattle leads AL in all the major categories

JIM COUR, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

SEATTLE -- Because the Seattle Mariners don't have a dominant starting pitcher like Randy Johnson anymore, their critics believe they might be susceptible in a short series.

Nonsense, the Mariners say. They've been winning all kinds of short series all season long; 42 of them to be exact.

"I think we've proved that pretty much all year long," catcher Dan Wilson said. "We've won a lot of short series, and we've won a lot of series."

The Mariners, who are 43-6-4 in series, think they have what it takes to get through the postseason, and they have the statistics to back that up.

As the regular season wound down, the Mariners statistically had the best pitching, the best hitting and the best fielding in the AL. The team that was supposed to have trouble scoring this season averaged near six runs per game this season.

Even conservative general manager Pat Gillick thinks the Mariners have what it takes to win the franchise's first World Series.

"You never know what will happen in a short series," Gillick said. "But usually in a short series, most of the games come down to pitching and defense. So I think that's going to bode well for us because that's the type of game we play."

Four stalwart starters

The Mariners don't have the best pitcher in the AL, but they have four starters who rank right behind Roger Clemens of the New York Yankees, record wise, in the AL in Paul Abbott, Jamie Moyer, Freddy Garcia and Aaron Sele. And Abbott might not get to start a game in Seattle's division series that gets under way today in Seattle because manager Lou Piniella could go with a three-man rotation instead of four.

Garcia, who won two games against the Yankees in the 2000 ALCS, will start Game 1 followed by Moyer in Game 2 Thursday and Sele in Game 3.

Then there's Seattle's bullpen, which has the best ERA in the AL. Kazuhiro Sasaki is second in the AL with more than 40 saves, while left-hander Arthur Rhodes and right-hander Jeff Nelson have been premier setup relievers.

The Mariners, wire-to-wire winners in the AL West, knew they were going to have outstanding pitching with one of the best bullpens in baseball this season. And they knew they had a solid defense. But they weren't so sure about their offense following the loss of Alex Rodriguez.

As it turns out, they didn't have anything to worry about.

Major acquisitions

Signed by the Mariners as free agents with the money it would have taken to retain Rodriguez, rookie right fielder Ichiro Suzuki, from Japan, and second baseman Bret Boone each have provided Seattle's offense with more than 200 hits this season.

Starting shortstop Carlos Guillen is expected to miss the playoffs because of tuberculosis, but the Mariners have versatile Mark McLemore to play there.

Offensively, they might even be better suited for the playoffs than they were in previous postseason years 1995, 1997 and 2000.

With Ken Griffey Jr. and Rodriguez, the Mariners used to be a power team in the Kingdome. That all changed when Mariners moved across the street to Safeco Field in July 1999. Griffey left for Cincinnati and Rodriguez went to Texas, making room for Suzuki as the team's premier leadoff hitter this season. Nobody in baseball has a leadoff hitter as good as Suzuki.

New dimensions

The Mariners still have plenty of power in the bats of Boone, Cameron, Edgar Martinez and John Olerud, but, with the speed of Suzuki to go along with the speed of McLemore and Cameron, they have a new dimension in their offense that they haven't had before.

Instead of waiting for the three-run homer as he did in the Kingdome, Piniella plays a different game now.

"The Dome was like playing on a billiard table at times," Piniella said. "You rack that 9 ball and hope it goes in. It was a different game. Really, what you wanted over there was to give your big boppers five at-bats every game and give them a chance to do what they do best."

The Mariners set an AL record with 59 road victories this season, and Safeco Field, their $517.6 million home for the past 2.5 seasons, deserves a lot of the credit.

"Safeco Field makes you play baseball," Piniella said.

"You've got to play. You've got to be on all cylinders to win here. You hit the ball out of the ballpark at times, but you need to go from first to third, you need to have speed to steal bases and create opportunities. You need to hit and run. You've got to get good defense, you've got to get good pitching. When we go on the road, we hit for a little more power. The parks are smaller. And we play the same game."

The Olympian Copyright 2001

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