No Beltre, big problem

So the M's got swept over the weekend by the hottest team in baseball, the Nationals. Its funny what back to back series with the Mariners and Oakland can do for a hot streak. Remember when the Yankees were the hottest team? I can see managers all over saying, "We've got 6 coming up with the A's and M's! If we can just win these next two games, we're staring at an 8 game win streak!"

The much bigger news was Adrian Beltre "tweaking" his hamstring. Hargrove reportedly said it would be "3 or 4 days" but also maybe longer. As bad as Beltre has been, the possible replacements are much, much worse:

Player AVG OBP SLG
Beltre 244 279 361
Dobbs 176 194 265
Hansen 154 133 154

I would expect to see a heavy helping of the Dobber over the next week or so, with a sprinkling of Hansen. Hansen at least has been a productive major league hitter before, so I would get him the majority of the at-bats, but I cannot explain the M's infatuation with Dobbs and Bloomquist. Bloomquist at least is fast and versatile. Dobbs is, well, he's, um, left-handed?

Spiezio has been playing well at Tacoma but had a setback as he rehabs his strained oblique. He didn't play over the weekend at all. Justin Leone is also hurt and Hunter Brown, is,well, right-handed.

So as bad as a 650 OPS from the hot corner has been, its about to get a lot worse. Lets hope it really is onl 3 or 4 days.