Ok, so I took a break from writing my Rays story and drove the 1/2 mile from my house to Cheney Stadium to watch Ryan Rowland-Smith's start tonight (I know, I have a problem if I'm going to random Triple A games on my nights off).

Anyway, Rowland-Smith didn't have his best command tonight. But overall it was a pretty solid start with Mariners Director of Player Development Greg Hunter and Director of Baseball Administration Jim Na on hand watching.

Rowland-Smith worked six innings, two runs on six innings with three walks and two strikeouts. Of the two runs - one came on a sacrifice fly and the other on an RBI single to left.

The only time he was really hit hard was when he fell behind in counts. And it wasn't as though he was missing badly with his spots. The home plate umpire was a little tight with his strike zone. Rowland-Smith threw 101 pitches, 66 were strikes.

Perhaps my favorite aspect of Rowland-Smith's performance came in his final inning of work. He got himself in trouble walking the lead off hitter, giving up a single and then a two out work walk to load the bases. He then gave up an RBI single to Chase Lambin. But just when the inning could have gotten out of hand, Rowland-Smith bowed his neck a little and struck out Brett Hayes looking on a perfect 2-2 fastball on the outside corner at 90 miles per hour.

So it raises an obvious question with a simple answer: Who would you rather have starting games at this point: Rowland-Smith or Miguel Batista?

I think I know the answer.

Other notes from the game ...

* The Rainiers hit back-to-back home runs as Matt Tuisasopo crushed a grand slam to left off of Chris Seddon. Wlad Balentien followed with a solo home run to left.

* Rob Johnson continues to hit, he has two doubles this game

Who needs the outfield? ...
Two of baseball's fastest men are playing at Safeco Field tonight - the No. 1 and No. 2 players in the American League in infield singles.
Twins center fielder Carlos Gomez leads the AL with 41 infield singles, and Ichiro Suzuki is second with 31. No one else has more than 25. ...

How Not To Pitch ...
Hey kids, don't try this at home. Miguel Batista needed 23 pitches to get through the first inning - and 13 of those were balls.
Batista, working deliberately, walked two and gave up an RBI double, and didn't seem to want to challenge many of the first six men he faced.
First inning walks to get into the heart of the order? Batista knows better.
Twins 1, Mariners 0 ...

Morrow's Future Is TBA ...
Manager Jim Riggleman admitted tonight that he may have spoken too soon when he saw reliever Brandon Morrow would soon be starting in Tacoma.
The organization hasn't determined just where Morrow is best suited, or where his highest value to the team lies.
"He started in college, but that doesn't really count," Riggleman said. "J.J. (Putz) started in college, too."
There are many cases of great relievers coming out of poor starters - everyone from Mariano Rivera to Goose Gossage.
Where Morrow's long-term future lies, the Mariners have not yet decided. ...

How Not To Pitch, Part 2 ...
Batista got ahead of Nick Punto, 1-2, then threw a waist high fastball that became a home run.
Two singles and a walk later, he was in trouble neck deep - and the Twins burned him with a pair of sacifice flies.
Heading for the bottom of the third:
Twins 4, Mariners 0 ...

How Not To Pitch, Part 3 ...
Before getting an out in the fourth inning, Batista gives up a double and a walk and is lifted.
In all, he ot nine outs, allowed seven hits and four walks, six runs. Batista threw 82 pitches - 41 strikes.
Don't be surprised if Ryan Rowland-Smith is brought up from Tacoma to make a start in Batista's place.
It's August, and Batista's ERA is 6.80.
Twins 6, Mariners 0. ...

Patience Needed ...
The Mariners have talked and talked to Yuniesky Betancourt about learning the strike zone, but at the plate he remains one excited puppy.
If the pitch is in the air, he's swinging.
Fifth inning, one out, Kenji Johjima at second base. Rather than work the count for a hitter's pitch, Yuni swung at the first pitch Glen Perkins threw - a fastball about eye high.
He flied out. The Mariners didn't score.
After 5:
Twins 6, Mariners 0 ...

You Can't Shut Out These Guys ...
Raul Ibanez, Adrian Beltre and Jose Lopez singled to load the bases with no one out, so of course it seemed likely they might even chase Perkins.
They didn't.
Instead, Jose Vidro grounded into a double play, with Ibanez scoring, and Bryan LaHair flied out.
Twins 6, Mariners 1 ...

Look Up 'Scrappy' - It's a Mariners Team Photo ...
Bases loaded, one out, Raul Ibanez hits the seventh grand slam of his career. Beltre doubles, Lopez singles him home, tie game.
Spotting the AL Central's first place team six runs, then coming back for the tie?
Priceless. ...

The Way It Was Envisioned ...
Pinch-hitter Jeff Clement singled home the go-ahead run in the bottom of the seventh inning.
Down in the Seattle bullpen, Brandon Morrow is warming up for the eighth. That means almost certainly that J.J. Putz - so effective on Sunday - will have the ninth inning.
Mariners 9, Twins 6 ...

Reaching double figures ...
A 10-run inning can do a lot of things, and this one did. Morrow sat down, J.J. is probably napping.
Cesar Jimenez is in and will likely finish.
Mr. Ibanez has driven in six runs - all in the same inning.
Mr. Batista will not lose.
Amazing.
To the bottom of the eighth:
Mariners 11, Twins 6 ...

It's been exactly one month since Erik Bedard threw a pitch for the Seattle Mariners, and likely will be at least another month before he's ready to pitch again.

Sidelined by a shoulder impingement, Bedard is playing catch this week and looking ahead.

"I'm not comfortable with the thought of not pitching again this season," Bedard said. "I kind of have to throw just to know I'm fine.

"One start wouldn't be enough to know I'm back at full strength - you've got to make a couple of starts to see how you bounce back."

For now, playing catch is 'baby steps,' he said.

"I've been doing a lot of weight work and things off the field, but without doing anything baseball related, it's tough to feel part of the game. You lose sight of what pitching is like."

When Bedard has been healthy, he's pitched relatively well - 6-4 with a 3.67 ERA in 15 starts.

"When the Orioles were in town I was talking to a few of them, and I told them, 'The one thing I didn't want to happen happened here - I got hurt,'" Bedard said. "You come to a new team and you want to show them what you can do. The worst thing possible is an injury that keeps you off the mound. I know there are people who don't believe I'm hurt."

Bedard will play catch three days this week, then be re-evaluated. If there is no problem, he'll increase the intensity of throwing until he's ready to begin working from a mound.

"I don't want to go into the off-season not certain I'm healthy," Bedard said. "This year has been tough enough. I don't want to go through a winter like that."

Larry is covering tonight's game as I work on the second part of our series on other teams in baseball the Mariners can emulate. The first story ran on Sunday and it focused on the Minnesota Twins.

Here's what the cover looked like on Sunday's section front.

As for my story. There was a lot more I could have written about, like the decision to draft Joe Mauer over Mark Prior, or some of the mistakes the Twins have made as well. Realistically, the Twins' success may stop at the divisional level. As they are currently constructed, and even in their stronger teams in the past, they seem to a player or pitcher short of being a legit World Series contender. But all in all, I think Mariners fans would gladly take seven of eight seasons with records over .500 and three playoff appearances.

Let's get to some more links ...

* Here's Larry's game story from today's paper that leads with the strong performance of JJ Putz. Apparently the sooner JJ returns to form, the sooner the process of converting Brandon Morrow to a starter begins.

* The game notebook talks about Erik Bedard playing catch for the first time in a month. What is the over/under at the number of starts he makes the rest of the season. I'd put it at +/- 3 and take the under.

* I know it's torture for some of you, but I wrote feature on Adam Jones on Friday. I talked with him for quite a while, he's great guy and not much different from when I was covering him with the Rainiers. And everyone I talked to in the Orioles organization raves about him.

* From the Baltimore Sun, Jones left Safeco in a walking boot after taking a foul ball off his already achy ankle that he's been playing on.

Here's the Sun's game story.

AUDIO ALERT: Lee Pelekoudas did an interview with Mitch Levy this morning. You can listen to it here.

I don't necessarily agree that the perception that it was just dumping salary with Washburn. Look if Washburn is part of your plans in the future then say it. But if he's not, dumping his salary on another team and freeing up $10 million to be used on someone else next season doesn't seem like a bad idea to me.

* Speaking of lefties in the Mariners system, Ryan Feierabend won again on Sunday for the Rainiers, who have won six in a row.

From the Mariners' minor league report...

Ryan Feierabend notched his 3rd consecutive win since returning from the disabled list, giving up 1 earned run on 7 hits with 5 strikeouts in 7.0 innings. He has not lost since April 13 and lowered his ERA to 1.91.

I covered the game on Saturday, and got to see one-time prospect Denny Stark's return to Cheney Stadium. AFter finishing 14-2 in the 2001 season, Stark, Jose Paniagua and Brian Fuentes were sent to Colorado for Jeff Cirillo. Yes the same Brian Fuentes that's one of the better lefty relievers in the National League.

I'm actually going to try and take a break from writing to sneak over to Cheney and watch Ryan Rowland-Smith start tonight.

* Here's an interesting story from SI's Jon Heyman that broke down how the Manny Ramirez transpired.

* Here's a story on Dustin Pedroia from ESPN magazine. He belongs to the Glen Hubbard/Mike Gallego all-stars (players that I'm actually taller than) - Chone Figgins, Erick Aybar, David Eckstein are all members.

* Yahoo's Jeff Passan offers up another example of why I want to cover a team Ozzie Guillen manages. It was awesome when he spiked his hat and offered up the lineup cards to the umps.

* The Washington Nationals are playing themselves out of a chance for "Steve Strasburg" with a weekend sweep. They are now 41-70, while the Mariners are 42-69 - it's going to be a dogfight.

Longtime Atlanta Braves announcer Skip Caray passed away in his sleep on Sunday.

* Here's Caray's obituary from the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

* AUDIO: Here's Caray calling the Sid Bream slide

* Chipper Jones and his current Braves teammates react to his passing.

* Dale Murphy and other former Braves offer their thoughts on Caray.

* AJC Columnist Mark Bradley offers his thoughts.

* Current Braves beat writer Dave O'Brien for the AJC remembers Caray in his blog

* Former Braves beat writer and current SI columnist Jon Daniels offers his thoughts.

I know this is a Mariners blog, but if you are of a certain age, you'll have some memory of watching Atlanta Braves games on TBS and listening to Caray call games. And almost anyone who listened to the Caray call a game can do an interpretation of his signature voice and the rhythm with which he spoke and made calls.

In this day of ESPN and DirectTV, it's tough to remember how few baseball games were broadcast back in the 1980s. Growing up in Montana, our early cable stations included WGN and TBS, so you had either Cub games that were broadcast by Skip Caray's much more famous father, Harry Caray, or you had Braves games, with the understated but always prepared Skip Caray, televised on any given day. Getting to watch baseball with such regularity wasn't common. Before that, you only got the old ABC Monday night game or the Saturday game of the week on NBC.

Many of my friends are Cubs and Braves fans to do this day, simply for the fact that we were able to watch them on TV so much. I can still remember watching Dale Murphy bat in those ugly light blue road uniforms and Caray calling his home runs. In this day of over the top, opinionated and blathering broadcasters, Caray was the antithesis. He was understated, almost to the point of soothing, but he knew the team, he knew the players and he understood the game. A true professional.

Working in this business, I rarely get star struck by anybody. But when I was in Atlanta, I was in line in the cafeteria. And from right behind me, I heard Caray's oft-imitated voice, ask me about the day's food, "How does it look?" I think stammered some sort of response. I even called one of my buddies to say that I talked to Skip Caray.

As Mariner fans celebrated Dave Niehaus' yesterday, it served as a reminder of how important and how attached fans grow to their respective broadcasters. And so while Mariners fans celebrated the voice of their franchise, Braves fans mourned the loss of theirs.

Rest in peace, Skip Caray.