Mariner mystery solved!

Alrighty, baseball fans. The Hot Stove is already heating up in other cities, what with the availability of real talent at manager (Joe Torre, Tony LaRussa, Joe Girardi...whoops, they're already gone), and in the infield (Pay-Rod) and outfield (Aaron Rowand, Andruw Jones, Toriiiii Hunter).

We need pitching, as it turns out. Damn, couldn't have seen that one coming (what? we did?? Or here? Oh, well, carp!)

The venerable USS Mariner has already endorsed Bartolo Colon as a $10M reclamation project, practically guaranteeing that Bavasi WON'T go after the tub of goo. There are some other marginally interesting names on the FA pitchers list (Curt Schilling? Randy Wolf? Carlos Silva? Odalis Perez?--no thanks, all). But in general, we're hosed, yet again, if we're hoping to have a decent 2008 season.

Wait! Has Bill Bavasi ever been seen in the same cartoon frame as Charlie Brown? I mean, he's probably not ACTIVELY trying to sabotage the team, right? He's just really really bad at his job? Yeah?

That would explain quite a number of things in Mr. Bavasi's career--after all, many of the truly important decisions for major league franchises are made during football season, a time of year that generally completely baffles young Mr. Brown.

I'll leave it up to the reader to decide....