Seattle Without Its Scapegoats Seems Lacking

The following is a public service announcement from The Helpful Institute to Save Seattle’s Scapegoats, Underachievers, Crybabies and Klutzes, a non-profit organization:

Hello, I’m John Blanchette, sports columnist for The Spokesman-Review.

Normally, I’d be skewering some sad-sack coach, ridiculing another inept relief pitcher or blistering some rich boob of an owner.

It’s what you expect of me. It’s what I do.

But today, I’m here to discuss an epidemic which threatens to unravel the very fabric of sports spectating here in the Northwest as it pertains to the state’s four professional franchises - the Mariners, Sonics, Seahawks and Huskies, in no particular order of profit margin.

Friends, we are running out of fall guys.

With the news this week that the Sonics were able to unload center Jim McIlvaine on the unconscious saps who run the New Jersey Nets, the Seattle sports scapegoat has officially become an endangered species.

Once we were a region teeming with easy targets.

Just as the mighty tyrannosaurs slogged through our Jurassic ooze, so more recently have great, blameful beasts paraded past our bleacher seats and sofas - ideal vents for our pent-up vitriol, perfect foils for our dashed expectations.

Suddenly, they are almost all gone.

And yet expectations remain achingly unfulfilled, the needle on our frustration meter straining into the red.

Think about it.

The Seahawks, since we must start somewhere, have the richest owner money can anoint and, now, the most heralded coach that owner can buy - to go with many talented players he has already bought. No, they have not been to the playoffs in a decade, but now Paul Allen has made a down payment on still one more year of grace with his hire of Mike Holmgren.

Gone are all the convenient scapegoats. Ken Behring, the reptilian ex-owner - gone. Dave Arnold, the Edgar Kennedy of special-teams coaching - gone. Rick Mirer, the poster child for incapability - gone. Warren Moon, who is just plain old - gone, or soon to be. Even coach Dennis Erickson, who by the end seemed more victim than villain - gone.

And if it still goes wrong, whose fault will it be now?

Likewise, the perceived source of what ails the University of Washington football program has been excised. Not only have the Huskies rid themselves of coach Jim Lambright - loyal soldier that he was - they have also run fresh out of Huards, who while serving as Huskies quarterbacks conducted themselves with grace and dignity but committed the unpardonable sin of not living up to the hype that accompanied their enrollment.

Without Lambo playing hopscotch through his own personal public-relations minefield, who can you take it out on? New coach Rick Neuheisel is the obvious candidate - and already he’s reneged on a scholarship offer to one recruit - but he seems far too slick to let much stick to him.

Whose fault will it be now?

The Sonics, as we’ve mentioned, have somehow managed to disown McIlvaine, the $33 million center with the moves of Herman Munster. To do this, they had to rehire a too-small, too-old center they gave up on years ago (Michael Cage) and a forward (Don MacLean) with NBA potential but HMO performance. No matter. No alimony was too steep in this divorce, in which general manager Wally Walker managed to undo the single worst transaction of his tenure - and remove the lightning rod for all public sniping at the Sonics, other than any lockout-related residue.

Gone, as well, is coach George Karl, whose ability to thrive on dysfunction gave him a kind of sitcom lovability - yet also made him kind of a human sacrifice for all the Sonics’ playoff failures. And, of course, Sonics life goes on without Shawn Kemp, who could be blamed for almost anything, including the recent spike in the birth rate.

Whose fault will it be now?

Even the Mariners, who had seemingly stockpiled targets of reproach like no other team in memory, are getting a little thin.

The infamous Seattle bullpen has been dismantled through planned neglect. Mike Timlin, who could save any game once the club was out of pennant contention, signed a $16 million deal with Baltimore, which decided it had to have a matched set and snatched up Heathcliff Slocumb, too. All things considered, Paul Spoljaric would rather be in Philadelphia - and he is. Tony Fossas, Norm Charlton, Bob Wells - all have found work elsewhere. Joey Cora, who was sort of the Heathcliff Slocumb of second base, has taken his waterworks to Toronto.

No doubt they will all thrive in their new environs. All ex-Mariners do.

But you know what this means: only Bobby Ayala remains to slumpingly shoulder the burden for the next Mariners collapse, along with third baseman Russ Davis. And fresh from the rumor mill is word that the M’s are trying to package these two in a deal with San Diego for reliever Randy Myers, or possibly just a season pass to Sea World.

And just whose fault will it be then?

Well, enough hand-wringing. It’s time for action.

Without suitable scapegoats, Seattle - and by extension, the entire Northwest - will assume a sort of faceless mediocrity which plagues count less other major league markets. Toronto. Kansas City. Cincinnati. Sure, without the McIlvaines, the Moons, the Slocumbs, there is the possibility that Seattle’s teams will actually succeed.

But what are the odds of that?

Only you can help.

Your cards, letters and e-mail can help convince Mike Holmgren that only he can make chicken salad out of, well, surely there must be another Mirer out there somewhere. Your nickels and dimes can encourage the Sonics to sign Shawn Bradley and ensure the franchise a stiff for years to come. You can give up your tee times to Mariners general manager Woody Woodward and keep him out of the office where the phone is no doubt ringing off the hook with offers for Bobby Ayala.

Save our scapegoats.

Because what fun is blame when there’s no one to pin it on?