Seattle Mariners: Should Don Wakamatsu Be Fired?

Earlier in the weekend Geoff Baker of The Seattle Times wrote an article outlining the idea that upper management might not be backing Don Wakamatsu completely, and possibly planning to fire Wak. Since taking over the Seattle Mariners, Wak took a bad team and made them semi-relevant in 2009. Well he has now taken a semi-relevant team and made them completely bad.

Say what you will about his management style, or that he was given a bad team to begin with and did what he could with them, all because Z didn't go out and get the big bat they needed. Now I admit this team was very badly built from the very beginning and Z should have put more thought into the offense, but you cannot put the entire blame on him. While no manager would be winning the pennant with this club, I don't think any manager should be sliding into the third worst team in the Major League as of Aug. 1.

Let's face it: One big bat wouldn't change how this entire team has performed. The base-running has been horrid, the bullpen even worse, and the hitting just being plain nonexistent. With the way the team is responding to him, it seems as though they simply don't care. Not a single player is playing with any guts or determination. It just seems like they all want to get through nine innings and go home.

This team is built to be a  sub-.500 club give or take five games. They are playing .260 baseball since July and just continue sliding into what could be their worst season in decades.

I do not think any manager can survive a 100-loss campaign, let alone the 110-loss campaign that they are on track for. No manager should be able to survive a 6-22 month, the Mariners' worst since Aug. of 1977!

Players have no respect for Wak, the GM has no respect for Wak, and I as a fan am really losing my patience for this team. We can blame the coaches, we can blame Bavasi, or Z, and we can blame Chuck Armstrong, and Howard Lincoln, but something has to change. We have to start winning and we have to start right away. No one wants to see a ball club like this. We don't invest so much care, love, time, and money into the Seattle Mariners to see them stumble so much.

Wak will just be another manager sent on his way. So I ask you as readers and fans: Should Don Wakamatsu be fired?