From Opening Night to game 2

Last night was fun. Or funny. I still can’t decide which one. It isn’t every day let alone Opening Day that you see a team commit five errors, but hey, that’s baseball as they say. You have got to take what you get and the Mariners had no problem doing that. They knew what to do with the gifts they were given.

What’s great is that this game won’t be remembered for the five errors. It will be remembered for Felix’s performance. He didn’t have his best stuff, his strikeout ten and leave them with their heads shaking stuff. But he had the next best thing, which just about any pitcher in baseball would kill for and that was put the ball in play, specifically on the ground, head for first and then return to the dugout. He had the stuff that could keep him on the mound for nine innings and in so doing, became the first pitcher in Mariners history to throw a nine inning complete game on Opening Day. Nice going Felix.

Of course there was the possibility he may have needed to stay out there an extra hitter. Kind of like in his final game he pitched in Arizona, the minor league game on the back field when he struck out the last hitter then turned to the dugout and flashed two fingers signaling that he wanted two more hitters even though his day was done. I didn’t see him turn to the dugout and flash one after (I asked and he assured he didn’t with a laugh) DeJesus struck out to end the ballgame and Olivo fired the ball down to third. “Ask him why,” Felix said laughing. “I told him hey man, I don’t need 28 outs!”

Luckily Figgins was alert and caught the ball. In his post game interview, he too was laughing and said he was ready because with Olivo you have to be ready for anything. Just part of the fun. Or funny. For an Opening Night win it works.

Now it is back to the real baseball world. The Mariners have won five straight Opening Days, the A’s have lost seven straight. In a 162 game season the first game is indicative of absolutely nothing statistically. But it does help complete the picture a little. You don’t really know exactly what you have accomplished in spring training until you get them under the lights in a game that counts and there was good beyond Felix.

Something that wasn’t talked about this spring as it has been in the recent past was working the pitcher or trying to get the starter’s pitch count up early. What was talked about instead was having good at bats and the skipper was happy with what he saw despite the fact that the team struck out nine times in the first five innings. They also bounced a pitcher who was on the edge of the Cy Young talks last year very early.

We also saw aggressive baserunning. Smart baserunning for the most part. I wasn’t sure about Jeff Datz waving in Brendan Ryan with the tying run in the sixth, but Ryan can fly and apparently slide as he had a beautiful one just avoiding the Suzuki tag at the plate. Miguel Olivo still can run. He ran out what looked like a sure groundout in the seventh then made it first to third shortly after on the throwing error by Zeigler. He scored shortly thereafter with a good slide to the opposite side of where Suzuki received the ball. Good running, smart running. This is what Wedge expects.

What also jumped out at me was Jack Wilson at second. At times, he looked like a shortstop playing second, but in the seventh on the throw he made with DeJesus barreling into him he hung in there like a guy who had played the position for a very long time. The beautiful thing about this was what I saw before the game. I Twitpic’d it yesterday. If you don’t follow me on Twitter @shannondrayer, you really should. Moving on.

First off, Wilson is by no means comfortable at second base. He might as well be playing left handed right now. I talked to him about this the day before and he has made very little progress in the comfortability department.

When I was in the dugout doing the pre-game show, the Mariners were starting to wrap up batting practice with the hitting group just starting to hit. Wilson and Ryan came off the field as they were done hitting and they were talking. Wilson said that he was going to need more work with the double plays. He was asking that they do more before tomorrow’s game, incorporate more work into their daily work during batting practice. Ryan got a cup of Gatorade in the dugout, turned to him and said, “Let’s go back out there now dude.” Off they went for more work right then and there.

Ryan laughed when I relayed this to him in the clubhouse after the game. He had more work he wanted to do to. “I wanted to spin some and he was right there with me. We are going to go on and off the field together. It’s a matter of reps, it’s a partnership and hopefully it is going to be fun to watch.”

It has been so far.

Tonight we will not see five errors. Tonight there won’t be Opening Night butterflies. Tonight is just game 2. We will see Jason Vargas who had a strong spring and looks to build on last year’s performance. We most likely will see the bullpen. Chris Ray was up in the eighth last night but other than that it looked like the bullpen last night for the most part was enjoying a baseball game and dodging errant throws from Oakland pitchers.