Mariners Misery and the Humbling of Ichiro Suzuki

We can try to focus on the positives from the 2011 Mariners: we saw some exciting young talent take the field at Safeco for the first time, the team made some forward-thinking trades, and for much of the year, the M's were nowhere near as awful as the historically bad season some were predicting. No baseball season is completely without charm, but those were silver linings on a year in which the Mariners were, by many measures, one of the worst teams in the Majors, and endured a club-record losing streak. Even perennial bright spot Ichiro faded a bit- ending the season with a career-low batting average, and failing to make the All-Star team for the first time.

Earlier this week, we added another chapter to the Humbling of Ichiro Suzuki: the winner of 10 consecutive Gold Gloves is not even among the three finalists at his position for this year's award. The question on the lips of Mariners fans, is: in the name of all that's decent, why, baseball? The presentation of Ichiro's Golden Glove as a belated, inadequate, consolation prize after an unfulfilling season has become a cherished tradition for Mariners fans. Now we're to be denied even that cold comfort? It's nothing short of adding insult to injury.

You often hear sportswriters joke that rooting for hard-luck teams like the Mets, the Cubs or the Mariners involves an element of masochism. They're right. I think next season, I'm just going to embrace the pain- I'll watch each game curled up in a ball, sipping cheap gin out of the bottle in the dark while Mozart's Requiem plays in the background. Maybe I'll put on Schindler's List during commercials, in case the ads for erectile dysfunction pills are too uplifting.