The 2009 Seattle Mariners seem to have quite the knack for pulling out improbable wins.

They’ve already done it twice in this road trip—first, in LA when we sent Garrett Olson out against Hiroki Kuroda, and tonight, in perhaps an even more unlikely occurrence, when we sent Jason Vargas against C.C. Sabathia.

Not just Jason Vargas, mind you, but a very sick Jason Vargas.

The M’s snagged the lead in the top of the first inning, and never let it go, winning 8-4.

Ichiro started the game off with a double, and scored on a Jose Lopez ground out. He had two hits on the night, one of them being a crucial two-run double in the fourth. He also stole his 17th base of the year.

Other standouts were Franklin Gutierrez, who had three hits including a solo bomb off C.C. Sabathia, and Russell Branyan, who delivered the fatal blow in the form of a mammoth two-run homer in the ninth inning.

The long ball certainly must have been a big relief for Russell, who struck out four times yesterday and three more times today.

The M’s were able to chase C.C. after only five-and-two-thirds innings of work. Sabathia was saddled with six earned runs and left the game with the bases loaded and two outs in the sixth.

Jason Vargas was apparently very sick with the flu, and was only able to work four innings of four-run ball.

Fortunately for the M’s, Miguel Batista, Mark Lowe, and David Aardsma all stepped up to work a combined five innings of shutout relief en route to victory.

One of the other big stories of Thursday’s game was Ryan Langerhans. As you know, we acquired him a few days ago from the Nationals, and he made his Mariner debut tonight.

He had two hits on the night, one being a double that he ripped past Mark Teixeira, and the other being a line drive single to right that set us up to score a run nicely in the second inning. He also had a deep line out to center field.

This was a huge win, as it evened up our road trip at 3-3, and finished off this tough series on a high note as we head to Boston tomorrow. If we can just win one game against the Sox, I’ll consider this road trip a success.

Anything more is just a bonus.

Other News and Game Notes

•Ichiro’s hit streak is now at: one game.

•It looks as though the Angels are probably going to win tonight against Baltimore, so we’re likely to remain three-and-a-half games out of first place. We will gain half a game on Texas today, though.

•Felix Day is tomorrow!

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The A's traded away their lone ace Rich Harden to the Chicago Cubs before the deadline last season. Unfortunately, with all of the injuries he suffered with the A's, he wasn't really able to do much for them.

Unfortunately, this left Oakland's starting rotation pretty much empty, Justin Duchscherer being the exception, although he is out until June.

They do have a few young pitchers with a lot of potential in Trever Cahill, Josh Outman, and Brett Anderson, but they won't be ready to put up big numbers for at least a couple of years.

The A's bullpen is average, highlighted by Russ Springer, Jerry Blevins, and young closer Brad Ziegler.

Ziegler burst onto the scene in 2008, setting the record for most scoreless innings pitched to start a career (39), and he's fitting nicely into the closer role so far this season, although it isn't all that hard to fill Huston Street's shoes.

The Athletics did take a step in the right direction this offseason by improving their lackluster offense, with the additions of stud left fielder Matt Holliday and first baseman Jason Giambi, who started his career with Oakland back in 1995.

Even with these improvements, though, the Oakland offense is still fairly mediocre. They do, however, have a nice, powerful middle of the order with Holliday, Cust, and Giambi. That's enough to strike some fear into the hearts of most pitchers.

The A's aren't exactly off to a great start—they're currently sitting at a 7-11 record—but I do think things will improve for them, especially come June when they have Duchscherer back at the top of the rotation.

Overall, Oakland has improved since last season, and should have a slightly better 2009.

My bold prediction: third place, AL West, 77-85.

Tomorrow: Texas Rangers.

Naturally, I'll start with my team—the Seattle Mariners.

It was painfully obvious last year, that the Mariners were not a good team. Suffice to say, almost nothing went right in a 101 loss, last place season. The 2008 Mariners were also the first team in history with a $100 million payroll to lose 100 games. Not an accomplishment to be proud of.

This year, though, there is a completely different atmosphere surrounding the Seattle Mariners.

During the off season, they got a new GM, a new manager, three new outfielders, a new first baseman, a new DH, a new backup infielder, and three new relief pitchers.

First, the new GM—Jack Zduriencik. Jack spent the last nine years or so in the Brewers organization, and played a big part in turning them into a playoff caliber team. During his first few months on the job, he made several low risk, high reward transactions, which have already proved to have a big impact on the ball club.

Possibly the best move he's made thus far, was hiring the Mariners new manager.

Which brings us to Don Wakamatsu. He was most recently the bench coach for one of our division rivals, the Oakland A's, and on November 19, 2008, became the first Asian manager in the history of Major League Baseball.

The Mariners have a whole different feel with Wakamatsu at the helm. With him came a small ball style of baseball, with which the 2008 Mariners were not familiar with.

The M's are a team that has to make due without a real powerful offense, and this new game plan of moving up runners and station to station baseball is helping them do that.

Now, onto the players. Defensively, there's little to worry about. The outfield is nice and comfy with Ichiro, Endy Chavez, and Franklin Gutierrez.

In the infield, the only hole is at SS, which Yuniesky Betancourt patrols in his whimsical way. Luckily, it looks as though if Yuni doesn't step it up defensively and offensively, that spot will soon be occupied by Ronny Cedeno, a much better defensive player.

Aside from that, the infield is nearly error free with Adrian Beltre at third base, Jose Lopez at second base, and Russell Branyan at first base—he's new, but he looks fine there so far.

The Mariners pitching looks fantastic so far. They have the third best team ERA in all of baseball at 3.50, and the best 1-2 punch in the American League when healthy, with King Felix Hernandez and Erik Bedard.

The rest of the rotation is a bit blurry, currently the other 3 are Silva, Washburn, and Jakubauskas.

Silva had a dreadful 2008 season, and although he looks a little bit better this year, there is still a lot of work to be done before he can help this team rather than hurt them. As of right now, he's really not fooling anyone.

Jarrod Washburn had a similar 2008, but has come back in 2009 with a new sinker grip, and it seems to have paid off, as he's looked very solid in three of his four starts.

Jakubauskas is just filling in as the No. 5 starter, until Australian lefty Ryan Rowland-Smith returns. Jak's future with the Mariners, for 2009 at least, appears to be in the bullpen.

The only real issues with the Mariners bullpen are the lack of a southpaw, and Roy Corcoran. The first problem will hopefully be solved in a month or so when Cesar Jimenez returns from the DL.

As for Corcoran, he had a great year in 2008, but if he doesn't stop sucking every time he pitches in 2009, he'll probably end up in Triple A Tacoma.

Last but not least...well, okay, least, is the hitting. The Seattle Mariners have anything but an overpowering offense.

It's not quite as bad as their .253 team BA suggests, though, due to the current under performing of players such as Adrian "no luck" Beltre, and Jose "Loafie" Lopez.

When these two start hitting, it should provide a much needed boost to the offense. They also have two newly acquired power hitting lefties in Ken Griffey Jr and Russell "the muscle" Branyan, both good for around 20-25 home runs.

One thing the Mariners offense does not lack, is speed. With Ichiro and Endy Chavez at the top of the order, and Yuniesky Betancourt and Franklin Gutierrez at the bottom, I guess you could say they have speed from top to bottom.

Having good speed greatly increases the number of ways there are to manufacture runs. This is good, because like I said, the M's do not have an overpowering offense.

All around I'd say the Seattle Mariners are a slightly above average team, who are miles and miles ahead of where they were last season. My bold prediction for the Seattle Mariners, in a weak AL West division is:

First place, AL West, 83-79 record.

Tomorrow—Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim

As usual, a lot of teams are off to surprisingly good starts. Some of these teams include the Blue Jays, Padres, Pirates, Marlins, Royals, and Mariners. I'm going to focus on the Mariners.

We all know about the disaster that was the 2008 Seattle Mariners season. They finished with a 61-101 record, the worst in the American League and the second worst in all of baseball, behind the always lovable Washington Nationals.

It was an awful season in pretty much every way possible, including, but not limited to: one of Bill Bavasi's going-away presents, Carlos Silva, going 4-16 with a 6.46 ERA, Erik Bedard missing the majority of the season with hip problems, Richie Sexson having a forgettable first half and being released midway through the season, along with many other problems.

But, during the off-season the Mariners hired a capable GM in Jack Zduriencik, and former A's bench coach Don Wakamatsu as their manager. Jack Z made a few very impressive moves over the off-season.

First, he signed veteran first baseman Russell Branyan. Russell (The Muscle), is a guy with a tremendous power upside who has never really had the opportunity to be an everyday player.

He's been given the chance to do that so far in 2009 and he's looked fantastic, leading the M's in HR with four and sporting a .309 BA.

Then, in a great trade, he traded away RP JJ Putz, RP Sean Green, and OF Jeremy Reed to the Mets for OF Endy Chavez, RP Aaron Heilman, and minor-league prospects Mike Carp, Maikel Cleto, Ezequiel Carrera, and Jason Vargas.

This boosted our farm system tremendously and added some more speed and another good glove to our OF.

On the same day, he traded minor league infielder Luis Valbuena to Cleveland for OF Franklin Gutierrez. This solidified us having a great defensive outfield.

A couple of other big moves in the off season included signing Ken Griffey Jr. to a one-year contract, which will get the job of putting butts in seats done nicely, and signing veteran IF Mike Sweeney.

Both of these guys are tremendous clubhouse presences and help the chemistry of the team.

Now, fast forward to the present.

The Mariners are atop the AL West with a 12-7 record.

The Angels are crippled with a buttload of injuries. As of right now, they do not have a good team. They are missing their 2 best pitchers in Lackey and Santana, and their best hitter in Vlady.

They no longer have their best hitter of '08 in Mark Teixeira, or their record setting closer, in Francisco Rodriguez. They, frankly, are not the same team they were last year.

Setting aside Kelvim Escobar, who is on the 60-day DL, the Angels are not going to be a complete team until late May or early June.

The big question is, how much of a gap can the Mariners create before the Angels are at semi-full strength?

Well, they have arguably the best 1-2 punch in the American League, with King Felix and Erik Bedard, with a strong bullpen, and a lights-out closer.

They have a decent balance of speed and power with Branyan, Beltre, and Griffey in the middle of the lineup, and Ichiro and Endy at the top.

The Mariners though, are not without injury either, their up and coming young starting pitcher Ryan Rowland-Smith is out for a few weeks, and so is their starting catcher Kenji Johjima.

Currently, Chris Jakubauskas and Rob Johnson, respectively, are filling those 2 holes. Jak is ok, but his role for this season is probably going to be long relief once Rowland Smith is back, and Rob Johnson is occupying the catcher spot without too many problems, and providing some occasional offense.

A few very important spots for the Mariners this year, are going to be the 3 and 4 starters, and SS.

Jarrod Washburn is off to a good start, with a new sinker grip, while Carlos Silva looks slightly better than last year, but still pretty bad.

Yuniesky Betancourt refuses to change his over-aggressive approach at the plate, and his defense is declining.

How these three spots are going to turn out, I don't know, but I can safely predict that it is going to be crucial towards whether or not the Mariners make the playoffs.

A quick look at the two AL West teams I haven't mentioned.

The Rangers, as usual have the best offense in baseball, but as usual, have no pitching to speak of. They won't contend.

The A's also have virtually no pitching, and even with the additions of Matt Holliday and Jason Giambi, still do not have a very intimidating offense. I think they'll have a better year than Texas, but I wouldn't put them any higher than third place.

The way I see it, the race is ultimately going to come down to the Mariners and the Angels. Yes, it is early, but the Mariners do have staying power and the Angels are not the AL West superpower they were in 2008.

Look forward to September, Mariners fans, unlike last year, we'll still be playing for something.