Piniella Finds Jackson’s View Of M’S Laughable
Reggie Jackson made his debut as an ESPN analyst Friday, but his warmup act came in manager Lou Piniella’s office before the Angels-Mariners game - and it was dead on point.
Strolling into Piniella’s office 3 hours before game time, Jackson took off his coat and hung it in the manager’s cubicle and took stock of who was in the room with him.
Piniella. Four writers. Mariners director of baseball operations Lee Pelekoudas.
Reggie launched into an assessment of the 1997 Mariners.
“You need pitching help in the middle and at the end,” he said. “You could use another starter - you could have used Kenny Rogers.”
“We’d have taken him,” Piniella said, “but what’s his contract?”
When writers came up with the numbers - $15 million over the next three years - Piniella laughed.
“You got to take your owners out to dinner and sell them,” Jackson said. “You got a chance to go all the way, but you can’t need 60 home runs from (Ken Griffey) Junior just to compete. You get to the playoffs, the Yankees can’t score with you but they can throw a good pitcher out there every day.
“The Orioles can’t score with you, but they can throw a good pitcher out there every day.”
Jackson rolled on for more than 5 minutes, analyzing what the Mariners needed and expressing outrage that ownership was so short-sighted as to let budget considerations stand in the way of acquiring pitching help.
“The one thing you know is that if Baltimore needs it, they’ll get it. If the Yankees need it, they’ll get it. Cleveland, too,” Jackson said. “You’re going to tell me ownership here would let $2.5 million stand between them and a title?
“You got to tell them, ‘We’re drawing 35,000 a night, but if we win we can draw 45,000 a night, and at $30 a head for tickets and hot dogs and beer, those extra 10,000 butts in the stands means an extra $300,000 a night.’ They got a new stadium coming. Hang a banner in there.”
Notes
A night after Los Angeles right-hander Hideo Nomo beat them, the Angels spent part of their time before the game Friday watching the movie “Midway” on a large-screen clubhouse television - with Japanese right-hander Hasegawa Shigetoshi watching with some fascination. When a U.S. plane shot down a Japanese plane on-screen, Shigetoshi turned to his teammates and said: “You should have done that to Nomo last night.”
Mariners 7, Angels 3 Seattle AB R H BI BB SO Avg. Cora 2b 5 0 0 0 0 0 .332 ARodriguez ss 5 0 0 0 0 1 .313 Griffey Jr cf 5 1 2 0 0 1 .310 EMartinez dh 3 1 1 2 2 0 .345 Sorrento 1b 4 2 1 1 0 0 .282 Buhner rf 3 1 1 0 1 0 .238 RDavis 3b 2 0 0 1 1 1 .308 DaWilson c 4 1 2 1 0 0 .271 Cruz Jr lf 3 1 2 2 1 0 .252 Totals 34 7 9 7 5 3 Anaheim AB R H BI BB SO Avg. Phillips cf 4 0 1 1 1 0 .296 Alicea 2b 5 0 1 0 0 0 .291 Hollins 3b 4 0 1 0 0 0 .293 Salmon rf 4 1 1 1 0 2 .282 Leyritz dh 4 0 1 0 0 3 .286 Erstad 1b 3 1 1 1 1 1 .298 TdGreene c 4 0 1 0 0 1 .154 Grebeck lf 2 0 0 0 1 0 .307 a-GAnderson ph 1 1 1 0 0 0 .313 DiSarcina ss 2 0 0 0 1 0 .248 b-Howell ph 1 0 0 0 0 1 .278 Totals 34 3 8 3 4 8 Seattle 000 420 010 7 Anaheim 000 200 001 3 a-doubled for Grebeck in the 9th. b-struck out for DiSarcina in the 9th.
E-RDavis (14). LOB-Seattle 6, Anaheim 8. 2B-Cruz Jr (7), Phillips (16), GAnderson (13). HR-Sorrento (17) off Hasegawa; EMartinez (16) off DSpringer; Erstad (9) off RaJohnson; Salmon (13) off RaJohnson; Cruz Jr (9) off DSpringer. RBIs-EMartinez 2 (66), Sorrento (42), RDavis (38), DaWilson (38), Cruz Jr 2 (21), Phillips (25), Salmon (56), Erstad (41). SB-Griffey Jr (8). SF-RDavis. GIDP-Hollins, Salmon.
Runners left in scoring position-Seattle 3 (Cora, Griffey Jr, Sorrento); Anaheim 2 (Alicea, TdGreene).
Runners moved up-ARodriguez.
DP-Seattle 2 (Cora, ARodriguez and Sorrento), (ARodriguez and Sorrento); Anaheim 1 (Erstad).
Seattle IP H R ER BB SO NP ERA RaJohnson W,12-2 7 6 2 2 4 4 104 2.20 SSanders 2 2 1 1 0 4 35 6.60 Anaheim IP H R ER BB SO NP ERA DSpringer L,4-3 5 7 6 6 3 2 92 5.82 Hasegawa 4 2 1 1 2 1 63 4.21 T-2:50. A-34,839 (33,851).