It’s 1995 deja vu in Mariners dugout

PEORIA, Ariz. – It feels a little like 1995 again around the Seattle Mariners.

Manager John McLaren has the first chair in the dugout, where he aided Lou Piniella as bench coach with the Refuse to Lose Mariners.

Sam Perlozzo is back as third-base coach, waving runners home just as he did Ken Griffey Jr. with the winning run to beat the Yankees in the 1995 Division Series.

There’s new bullpen coach Norm Charlton, bringing the same swagger to the relief corps that brought life to the bullpen in ‘95. Lee Elia, the hitting coach then, is back as a special assistant. Jay Buhner, Dan Wilson and Rich Amaral have been here lending their expertise to the current M’s, and Edgar Martinez may return late this month, after a brief appearance Friday, to talk about hitting.

To some, it’s a much-needed reconnection with the best years the Mariners had, not only in 1995 but the playoff teams of 1997, 2000 and 2001.

To others, any mention of those days is a turnoff.

“To be honest, I think everybody’s tired of hearing about the ‘95 team,” closer J.J. Putz said.

He means no disrespect.

Putz was 18 when the Mariners made their miracle September surge to overcome the Angels’ huge lead in the American League West. He remembers the one-game playoff to beat the Angels for the division title, and he’s seen dozens of replays of Martinez’s double to score Griffey from first base to beat the Yankees.

“I think everybody knows that without the ‘95 season taking place, we probably would be playing somewhere other than Seattle,” Putz said. “But that’s 13 years ago. Nobody is worried about what happened 13 years ago.

“We’re all worried about what happens starting March 31.”

Fair enough.

But among the flak the Mariners have absorbed since they last went to the playoffs was that they’d become disconnected with their best teams and biggest stars.

Oh, there are banners at Safeco Field signifying the 1995, 1997, 2000 and 2001 teams. Occasionally, there’s a video flashback to those seasons.

On a daily basis, however, the only connections with those teams were Dave Niehaus and Rick Rizzs in the broadcast booth. Buhner, Martinez and Wilson had their feel-good ceremonies after they retired and were rarely seen again, outside the times they’d drop in at spring training.

This year it’s different.

McLaren has brought back some old friends to the coaching staff in Perlozzo, Charlton and Elia, and he’s put Buhner, Wilson and Amaral to work during the time they’ve been at spring training.

Wilson said it felt like a homecoming during his week with the Mariners because it reunited him with so many who coached and played with him.

“These are the guys I grew up with in the game,” he said. “These are the guys who shaped me in this game.”

Buhner didn’t hesitate bringing up the playoff years when he talked with players. If they didn’t like it, too bad. In Buhner’s view, it’s about maintaining tradition, which the Mariners teams since 2001 haven’t done.

“Granted, we don’t have a World Series, but what we do have is something special – 1995,” he said. “A lot of the coaching staff comes back to that, a lot of the faces you see around here.

“The guys who are new don’t realize how special that was and what it did for the city and the organization. They don’t have that close-knit tie. What people who’ve been here do remember is that it saved baseball in the Northwest.”

McLaren has heard players grumble about too much talk of the playoff years, but he believes it’s a part of the Mariner tradition that needs to remain alive within the clubhouse.

“I think tradition is great,” he said. “You go play the Yankees, you’re talking about tradition. There’s nothing but Hall of Famers walking around there. I’ve heard comments here, ‘I get tired of hearing about the 1995, 2000 and 2001 teams.’ That’s when I walk away.

“That was a special group of guys and I was real proud to be a part of it. It’s part of our tradition, and we’re trying to make 2008 that way.”