Fans focusing in on Ichiro Watch

SEATTLE – As Sunday morning’s clouds fell out of formation and Cougars hereabouts nursed both their hangovers and their psyches, at least there was a Seahawks game being piped in from another time zone to keep Seattle’s collective mind off what was really troubling it:

Is Ichiro Suzuki ever going to get another hit?

You think they don’t care about baseball here just because the Mariners are steaming toward 100 losses for the first time since Pat Putnam wore the trusty trident? You think they’ve given up, rediscovered their lives – or football – and now find the baseball team useful only as a punch line?

You’re right.

And yet 43,742 wandered into Safeco Field on Sunday afternoon even with the Hawks on the tube, and not all of them were displaced New Englanders with Bambino complexes trying to will their beloved Boston Red Sox further up George Steinbrenner’s ample backside.

In truth, most of them were there for the Ichiro Watch.

Or was it a vigil?

The M’s hit maker had gone 0 for 8 Friday and Saturday against the Sox, and while a number like that might actually inflate Scott Spiezio’s self-esteem – if not his batting average – Seattle Ichirophiles found it devastating, like a city ordinance outlawing the umbrella or cosmopolitan smugness.

“It’s just a couple of games,” reasoned manager Bob Melvin. “Oh-for-8 isn’t like oh-for-a-month.”

Boy, is this guy out of touch.

When you’re chasing one of baseball’s most hallowed – and heretofore untouchable records – and September starts to shrink, a day is an eternity, or at least an opportunity you never get back.

In 1920, George Sisler of the St. Louis Browns banged out 257 hits in a single season, a record that has held up for 83 years – as long as you don’t count some funny business in 1887, when baseball’s lords decided that a walk wasn’t just as good as a hit, but actually was a hit. If that silliness had lasted, Barry Bonds’ batting average would be over .600 now, and there wouldn’t be any Mendoza Line.

But by hitting at an incredible .453 clip since the All-Star Game, Suzuki has Sisler’s record in his sights – and make no mistake, it is as important to him as maintaining that not-completely-sincere Zen-like air of mystery.

That was clear on Thursday night when, with the M’s leading 1-0 and Jose Lopez on second with a two-out double, Suzuki tried to lay down a bunt for a hit rather than swing away to drive in a run. Same thing happened Wednesday night against Cleveland.

Think a Bonds or an A-Rod would have taken some static for such me-firstism?

If it wasn’t strictly playing to win, it wasn’t going to torpedo anybody’s pennant fantasies, either – and, in fairness, Suzuki may only come this way once, so probably he’s owed every selfish at-bat he cares to take.

But maybe the 0 for 8 was karma payback.

Or maybe it was simply a by-product of Boston’s pitching and deployment. If the old way to attack Suzuki was to bust him hard and inside, the latest fad seems to be clogging the left side of the infield.

“Different clubs try different things and I’m sure their advance scouts are seeing that he’s been threading the ball through the left side of the infield,” said Seattle hitting coach Paul Molitor. “The last couple of clubs we saw, Cleveland and Boston, really had that shortstop shading over and placed the third baseman off the line. They tried to take away that space.

“And they pitch him inside some because they know he tries to inside-out the ball, and then they pitch away to keep him honest. And yet he’s still finding ways to get hits.”

That’s the spoiler for the fact that Suzuki’s brief “slump” ended with two hits on Sunday, including one of his patented 65-foot singles in which his speed played a bigger role than his bat. Two other dribblers failed to get out of the infield, but against Keith Foulke in the eighth inning Suzuki managed to sting a flat 88-mph fastball into center field.

He now has 231 hits with 20 games to play, a pace that equates to 263 hits. But that presumes no more 0 for 8s, and that isn’t baseball.

Of course, to go 2 for 4 and only hit one ball beyond the dirt doesn’t seem much like baseball either, but more like the 30-yard dash. The beauty of Ichiro Suzuki is that he has somehow transformed this scratch game into high drama. Of his 231, 49 are infield hits – far and away the most in the majors, and maybe that makes his whole shtick more impressive and not less.

He insisted Sunday he will not be daunted – or even influenced – by infield shifts subtle and otherwise.

“You shouldn’t think about (being pitched differently),” he said. “They had the shift on, but perhaps they’re doing that just to get in your head – they want you to think that. Sometimes you just get a feel for what they’re trying to do and you have to go with what you feel.”

In addition to being the most prolific hitter in history in the course of his first four seasons in Major League Baseball, Suzuki has also been creator and caretaker of his own mythology – the stretching, the twitching, the odd stance and the trademark fall out of the batter’s box, exercises, foot rubs and especially the cryptic answers he has refined to art. The release of an English version of the book “Ichiro on Ichiro” will add to this aura, as will the record chase.

Just last week, Suzuki told Larry Larue of the Tacoma News Tribune that adjustments that challenge the notion of minute go into his batting approach.

“I might be thinking which finger of my hand will cradle the bat, which one will apply more pressure during the next swing,” he said.

Either it’s wisdom or it’s bunkum. But the fact is, only one player in the Top 10 on the all-time single-season hits list accomplished the feat after 1930: Ichiro Suzuki, who slapped out 242 hits in 2001.

Maybe more guys should be thinking about their fingers.

“He has a style that’s unique and can spread out the defense, and he doesn’t always have to hit the ball crisply to do what he wants to do,” said Molitor. “He has a way of guiding the ball toward open spaces.”

And the pressure of a record chase?

“It’s just been the last couple of days maybe where we’ve seen anything,” Molitor said, “but when he goes 0 for 7 or 0 for 8, he’s more aware of it than anybody else. Every once in a while you’ll see some urgency to his approach, but he’s also remarkable for being able to shut things out. I know this – it’s going to be fun to watch.”

Or to stand vigil.