Mariners Sign Pokey Reese

The Mariners signed Pokey Reese to a 2-yr contract today. The book on Reese is that he's a great defensive player with good speed, but who can't hit a lick. Once upon a time he was a great all-around prospect, but he never materialized into the hitter that the scouts thought he could be and it's unlikely that's going to change now that he's 31 . Back in 2000 the M's tried to trade Ken Griffey Jr. for Reese, but at the time the Reds wouldn't do it (opting instead to trade us soon-to-be all-star Mike Cameron).

To clear up room for Reese, the Mariners released Jolbert Cabrera. Cabrera is apparently all set to join an undisclosed Japanese team. Cabrera was added to the M's last year just before the season started. He ended up having a pretty decent year (at least the first half anyways) and was one of the few bright spots in a dismal season. My favorite Cabrera moment came during a post-game interview after he had just been walked to force in a game winning run against the Chicago White Sox.

"Cabrera said he was going to crowd the plate if the count got to 3-2 and hope to get hit by a pitch by Koch. Asked if he'd ever been hit by a 100 mph fastball, Cabrera said, “I got hit by the bullet. That's pretty close.” Cabrera was shot in the right buttocks in an attempted car jacking in his hometown of Cartagena, Colombia, on Dec. 21, 2001."

Now that's one tough dude!

It looks like the M's will start out the year with Reese at SS and they'll send Jose Lopez back down to Tacoma (AAA) to start the season. Lopez is only 21 and has plenty of talent, so he'll be back in the bigs soon enough.

In the meantime, I'm expecting the M's opening day lineup to look something like this:

RF Ichiro
CF Randy Winn
3B Adrian Beltre
1B Richie Sexson
2B Bret Boone
LF Raul Ibanez
DH Bucky Jacobsen/Scott Spiezio
C Miguel Olivo
SS Pokey Reese