Remind Me Why I Root For This Team Again?

It seems that the Seattle Mariners have traded Adam Jones and others to Baltimore for Erik Bedard.
Bedard is a good pitcher. Him and Felix give the Mariners a pretty good rotation. But players like Adam Jones come along for a team maybe twice in ten years if you are lucky. He is the best prospect the Mariners have had since Alex Rodriguez. He is going to be a special player for a very long time.

So why trade him? Bill Bavasi is desperate. He knows that he is still working for his job. Now that the Mariners luckily had a good season last year, despite a terrible run-scoring differential, expectations are high. If they suck again this year, he will be gone. So he makes the trade to save his job. Which it probably will do for a year or two. But that's all. Not only does Seattle have to resign Bedard, but he is several years older than Jones. His peak time is already here. In 3 years, Jones is going to be a monster. But Bavasi is an old-time baseball guy. He holds to the adage that you can't have enough pitching. This is absurd as you can find functional pitching far easier than consistent hitting. They may not have the next Bedard in their system but they sure as hell don't have the next Adam Jones.

Plus, the Mariners are not going to be a good offensive or defensive team this year. It's Ichiro, Beltre, and a whole lot of question marks. With AJ and some sketchy pitching, they are probably an 81 win team. Now they might win 86. But they still aren't going to the playoffs. And they still don't have any kind of sensible long-term plan for winning.

Sigh.