The Light Bag
Answering your pressing concerns
The Light Bat is on the road this week, and as such our regularly scheduled Winter Fungo and, uh, Free Form Fridays are suffering from interruption. To compensate I’m introducing The Light Bag, a tried and true method of soliciting one’s audience to help generate content. I’m grateful to all of you who sent in your questions, and to the rest of you for reading and understanding the irregular schedule. Normal service will resume next week. On to the Light Bag!
What does Mitch Garver’s 2025 stat line look like? -MacAllan Guy (macallanguy.bsky.social)
Let me just get something off my chest before I actually answer Mac’s question. 2024 Mitch Garver had a 99 wRC+ at home. That’s not great; certainly not what you were hoping for from an every day DH but it’s……non-disastrous. Additionally 2024 Mitch Garver hit .153/.281/.363 at home. That is AWFUL! APPALLING! A GROTESQUERY! That a player can approach league average production while batting .153 is further proof that society has crossed the threshold into perpetual decay from which we will never recover. Go Mariners.
Anyway, Mitch will be ok this year I think. Something like ..215/.320/.400. Of course sometimes a veteran has a seemingly down year and they just never recover. See: Richie Sexson, Kolten Wong, etc. Do not see Jorge Polanco, as he obviously will bounce back nicely at third base this season.
Is Colt Emerson Him? -Patrick Callahan (iampatrickc.bsky.social)
I am a huge Colt McColt fan, and have been literally since before the Mariners drafted him. He hits wherever he goes, including the most recent Arizona Fall League, where he posted a line of .370/.436/.537 in a league littered with players 3-4 years older than him. For my money he’s the most exciting Mariners prospect since the Julio/Kelenic duo.
/Stephen A. Smith voice
BUT
I don’t think he has any truly exceptional tools. His skillset is based on him continuing to hit for average and showing good plate discipline. His defense is good/not great. Every prospect’s most likely outcome is “bust” until they’re an established big leaguer. Additionally, it’s worth noting that while McColt is the team’s consensus best prospect he’s far from a consensus top prospect league-wide. If he’s healthy and productive in AA this season I imagine he will start generating that sort of buzz, but until it happens it hasn’t happened.
McColt is exciting. I’m hoping he’s a longterm infield fixture in Seattle. He’s got a ways to go before he reaches the prospect heights of Julio and Jarred Kelenic, and even at those stratified levels only one player has panned out to this point.
Also, the Mariners’ track record with positional development is, well, you’re reading this newsletter so you get it.
Whaddya got for ranking Beethoven’s nine symphonies? -John Choiniere (johnchoiniere.bsky.social)
Ah yes time for a definitive and 100% correct POWER RANKING of classical music.
Sixth - Front to back bangers
Fifth - Iconic
Seventh - Last movement rips
Third - Breakthrough
Ninth - Overrated but cool
First - Pretty basic stuff
Second - Still grinding
Eighth - Relatively forgettable
Fourth - Just not my thing
For now America still allows dissent and disagreement however in this case it would be fruitless because, as I said, it is correct.
Does Dan Wilson have the courage to tell a server they gave him a completely different meal than he ordered? -Samuel Joseph (samueljoseph51.bsky.social)
An interesting question, although I do not think the issue is one of courage. Dan Wilson is, almost without question, a man of tremendous courage. He let Randy Johnson throw thousands upon thousands of baseballs directly (sometimes less directly) at him for years and years. He took a very public-facing job for which he had almost no real qualifications and exactly zero experience; a job that he recently described as “drinking through a firehose”. Would a coward drink through a firehose for your entertainment? Would he SAMUEL!?
No he would not. In fact I submit that when Dan’s ribeye (butterfly. Gotta cook out the devil) comes out as a heaping bowl of fettuccine alfredo and Dan simply smiles and says thank you he is in fact showing courage. He will eat whatever you put in front of him, without question and without complaint. This is because he remembers his mother telling him to finish his dinner back in Minnesota. There are some people who don’t get food at all, DANIEL!
Now, let us give thanks.
I want three paragraphs on who you think the main character is in the Malazan Book of the Fallen series. -The Space Pope (@bkdoesnotcare)
(I have to preface an answer to this by admitting I’ve only read 5.5 volumes of this 10-book series. No I am not counting this as one of the three paragraphs)
You want me to pick a singular main character from a series that spans continents, species, dimensions, and hundreds of thousands of years? You come to me, a mere mortal seeking this knowledge? Well that’s fine because I actually know the correct answer.
Malazan Book of the Fallen is, above any and all other considerations, a story of Empire. It is about the spiraling and unceasing maelstrom of pain set in motion by Conquest, be it material, spiritual, social, or what have you. It is about the primal concern our species has refused to evolve past that says in order for me to have enough I must have more, and it must be taken from others at any and all costs. It is a meditation on how the wrongs we do to ourselves and others ripple through time and space, and that freedom from those sins is not something we can ourselves achieve, and that their consequences can never be stopped. Death begats death. Pain begats pain.
It is a series that constantly reminds us that we have the world we have collectively created, and that even the divine is beholden to our thoughts, memories, and intentions. Reality is the product of our choices, and in a way that spans lifetimes and histories so much greater than any individual or even single generation can begin to comprehend. To begin to grasp that in a way that affects change feels impossible. It’s a profoundly mournful, deeply beautiful series and I’ve enjoyed it greatly thus far.
You are having a game night. Who from the current Mariners roster do you invite, and what games do you play? -Seth Curtis (seth-curtis.bsky.social)
We’re broadly dividing this game night into two parts: Social/party games and strategy games.
Party Gamers: Bryce Miller, Taylor Saucedo, J.P. Crawford, Luke Raley
Games: Monikers, That’s Not a Hat, The Gang, One Night Ultimate Werewolf
Notes:
-Sauce is absolutely a devoted fan of Cards Against Humanity, so he is picking the dirtiest cards he can in Monikers.
-Bryce is offended by the idea of cooperative poker offered by The Gang, but relents when told he can open carry his six-shooter at the table.
- Luke is surprisingly a savant at the memory-demands of That’s Not a Hat, possibly because while everyone else is imbibing in a vice of choice he is sipping a tall glass of milk that is exactly 62.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
-J.P. subverts the social metagame of One Night by loudly declaring to everyone he is a werewolf every round. When confronted by this his go-to response proves unassailable
Strategy Gamers: Mitch Garver, Randy Arozarena, George Kirby, ICHIRO
Games: Root, Age of Innovation, Spirit Island, The Grizzled
Notes:
-Spirit Island takes four hours, due to the fact that Garver takes forever to take his turn as he constantly over-analyzes not only his board state but that of his fellow players.
-Randy wins Root effortlessly, deploying a brutal understanding of efficiency and tactical adaptability as The Bird Eyrie. He does not speak during the entire game.
-Despite Age of Innovation having the lowest level of player interaction of any game here, ICHIRO turns it into a raucous and boozy affair filled with side bets, dares, and appalling levels of profanity.
-The Grizzled is not finished. Despite it being an excellent cooperative experience, it reminds George too much of his time in The Great War.