John McLaren, Save Yourself

I'm gonna do this "Keith Olbermann Special Comment" style.

John McLaren, you deserve credit for the way you've handled this disastrous season.

Sure, we can quibble about some of your moves, but no one would argue that the majority of the blame falls not on you, but on your players and the GM who picked them.

Yet, through all the losses, you've done the honorable thing and absorbed the blame for the sake of your players, and the sake of your employers.

It's time to start thinking about yourself.

If you let yourself go down with this flaming poo pile of a ship, you'll forever be known as the architect of one of the most disappointing teams in major league history. And unlike Jim Leyland, you don't have a World Series ring to point to.

Step aside now--allowing some excuse like "I'm not able to motivate this team, maybe someone else can"--and let the world see that it wasn't your fault, that no one could've managed this collection of over-the-hill groundout machines.

Another manager will take over, will see similarly terrible results, and we'll all know once and for all that it was the ingredients, not the cook.

It might cost you in the pocketbook, but will buy back some respect in the baseball world.

Otherwise, you'll be like another former Mariner manager who got his shot at the helm with a flawed team, Bill Plummer.

After Plummer's disaster of a season, the then 45-year-old found himself deeply unemployable. Only now, sixteen seasons later, has Plummer worked his way back up to the AAA level as a manager (he's the skipper of the Tucson Sidewinders).

In another circumstance, with a different team, your player's manager style might work. For this team, I don't think anything would (and I'll bet you feel that way, too).

Let Bill Bavasi go down with the ship--save yourself, while you still can.