I think my favorite fan is the guy who always says: the M's suck because they always trade their good players for young guys and the good players go somewhere else and produce. Guess what: that is an epidemic throughout baseball. There are Yankee prospects and established players all over baseball too.

Trying to compare the M's to the Yankees is apples and oranges. Yankee payroll is over 200 million because they have their own broadcast system, as do the Angels, the Rangers and the Red Sox. Notice how good the Braves have been since Turner sold TBS and its no longer the Braves SuperStation?

Now, to clear up a couple RH factoids: 1) The M's were forced to trade Randy Johnson as he tanked it the first have of the year. The M's wanted to extend his contract and were willing to pay but Randy decided he wanted to leave and then turned around and flamed the M's in the media. He was a great pitcher but a moody SOB who almost got himself stuffed in his locker by David Sequi one night.

Arod: turned down a 4 year contract from the M's that would have paided him an annual salary very close to the Rangers annual salary. Rangers went 7 years and bankrupted their franchise. MLB had to step in and run it while it was sold to Nolan Ryan.

Griffey, forced a trade.

Ichiro, hitting .280 and declining. Now batting 8th for the Yankees and will be a platoon player for the remainder of the year and will be a free agent at the end of the season.

As for the current state of the M's: Yes they have been bad since 2001 and there are several reasons for this. 1) The success of 2000-2002 took a serious toll on the farm system. To bring in veterans like Boone, Olerud, Maclemore and others draft picks were lost. When you sign free agents, you lose draft picks depending on the class of free agent you sign. Then Bavasi's draft picks were all wash outs except for Felix. Mix in a few free agent signings, the Bedard trade and you are where you are now: rebuilding again. Have mistakes been made? Absolutely. The fruits of the Cliff Lee trade have not been realized as of yet. The Figgins signing has been a disaster, but some have worked out too. That is baseball. There isn't a single GM in baseball with a 100% trade/FA track record. Cashman has been hosed many times too. There is a kid with the Dodgers tearing it up and the Yankees gave up on him. It happens every season all over baseball.

So what happens now: the M's would have been stupid to resign Ichiro in the off season. It doesn't make baseball sense and it would be very bad business. Ichiro isn't even the 4th best player on this team this year. Seager is better, Ackley is a better lead off hitter, Felix is way better, and the OF we aquired from Detroit will be better than Ichiro with regular playing time. It was time to go. The 2001 team got really old in 2002 and went down quick. Holding onto veteran players for respect and so they can maybe get to 3000 hits instead of moving them out when they start to decline is a recipe to end up right where we are now. See the Celtics at the end of the McCale/Bird era for a prime example.

Redhook, isn't it about time for your Michael Vick is the greatest ever posts to start? Since Iceshark has sworn off his 49ers pre-training camp "the 49ers are God's team" posts across the way, I need a good chuckle or two.