Chris Jakubauskas made the most of a spot start, throwing three hitless innings against Kansas City, and the Seattle Mariners inched out to a 2-0 lead.

Then they changed pitchers.
Left-hander Justin Thomas gave up three consecuive singles - two to left-handed hitters - then a three-run home run to right-hander Billy Butler.

Mitch Maier homere to right field later in the inning. Ouch.

Kansas City leads afer four innings, 6-2.

The Mariners have cost themselves a few runs, the most blatant when Ronny Cedeno broke too early from second base in the fourth inning with only one out, and was tagged in a run down.

The next batter, Franklin Guttierrrez, singled.

Still, most disappointing search this spring may be trying to find a left-handed pitcher who can get a left-handed hitter. The Mariners haven't yet seen that fellow.

Larry's got the M's and I'm over at the Japan-San Francisco Giants exhibition game. The much anticipated match-up between former UW standout and Cy Young award winner Tim Lincecum and M's right fielder Ichiro Suzuki.

UPDATE: Ichiro got a hit in his fourth at-bat and Kenji Johjima came in to pinch hit and had an RBI single to right off of Alex Hinshaw.

The first at-bat goes to Lincecum, who sawed off Ichiro on his second pitch for a broken bat ground ball to second. After giving up a single to Hiroyuki Nakajima on a slider, Lincecum came back and struck out the next two hitters.

At-bat No. 2: Ichiro falls behind in the count and fouls off several pitches before working a walk from Ichiro. He later stole second. Lincecum left the game two batters later after walking another hitter.

This spring, Lincecum has pitched 9 1/3 innings, allowing no runs, giving up just two hits and striking out 11.

The Japanese media is here in full force with close to 100 people, but it pales to the 500 plus media members that covered the first round of the WBC in Tokyo. Because of the onslaught of reporters, Ichiro hasn't been doing interviews other press conferences and per WBC rules, reporters aren't allowed in the clubhouse after the game. Myself and Larry Stone have asked to speak with both Joh and Ichiro and Antony Suzuki, who works for the M's as Joh's translator, is doing the same capacity for the WBC and is trying to set that up.

Here's some video of Kenji Johjima taking BP earlier

We're dividing our assets today, with the Whirling Divish in Scottsdale watching Ichiro, Kenji and team Japan while the Mariners are here in Surprise against the Royals.

Gil Meche just worked a 1-2-3 inning, striking out two. Willie Bloomquist is the second baseman behind him and Tug Hullet caught the cermonial first pitch.

Out in the bullpen, another ex-Mariner, Horacio Ramirez.

Chris Jakubauskas started for the ailing Erik Bedard and his strained behind, and stuck out Bloomqist in the first inning on a brutal breaking pitch.

After one, no score.

Erik Bedard has been scratched from his start today because of an issue on the left side of his gluteus maximus. Yes, I can hear your chuckles.

Anyway, Bedard has been bothered by it off and on, starting about four days and it is exacerbated when he throws off the mound.

You will recall that Bedard had hip issues on his left side, but manager Don Wakamatsu said there is nothing wrong with the hip that is a muscular.

"It's something that we felt would be better to have him skip a start now and then probably have him throw a bullpen on Saturday," Wakamatsu said. "We're not real concerned about it."

Other notes from today's morning meeting with Wak ...
* Josh Fields will not throw this weekend as Wakamatsu had mentioned earlier.

"We're going to back that off and see him later in camp," Wakamatsu said. "There's no rush. He took so much time off that we're going to let him get more acclimated."

* Wakamatsu talked about Sweeney picking up Fields' tipping his pitches.
"I think that's a reason he's been a good as he's been," Wakamatsu said. "He's been doing that all year. He's a professional hitter his whole career and being able to see those things obviously attributed to that."

* Wakamatsu has raved about Shawn Kelley early on in camp and sees him projected as a big league reliever down the road.

"The way he's pitching, obviously stuff wise, he's shown he has an ability to pitch in the big league this year," Wakamatsu said. "We'll keep running him out there and make that evaluation. I've been real impressed with his maturity."

* Even with the injury to Brandon Morrow, Wakamatsu still feels isn't allowing him to be thought of as anything as a starter.

"We talked about it this winter, and we want to go down this road as far as we can go," Wakamatsu said. "We haven't talked about moving him back by any means."

Wakamatsu said one of the main reasons they moved him to a starter is that they could control issues such as injuries.

* On the closing situation, Wakamatsu re-iterated that he didn't want to go with closer by committee if no one has established themselves.

"It's still really early, and these guys are going to have at five, six or seven more outings before we make a decision," he said.

Wakamatsu wants to see someone pull away, not drop out by default or bad performances.

* Adrian Beltre's shoulder was a "little cranky" after yesterday's game and the determination when he plays will be day to day.

* LHP Tyler Johnson isn't likely to be ready to start the season. Wakamatsu said its the best he's felt so far, but it would be a stretch to have him ready for the season.

* There will be a few minor roster cuts tomorrow with more to come on March 16th.

* Wakamatsu wasn't sure about the players from the eliminated teams in the WBC returning. He did say that he would like to see Phillippe Aumont pitch in a cactus league game. Obviously, his strong outing in the WBC game against the U.S. was a factor, but also Aumont was in major league spring training last year and Wakamatsu felt it was something he deserved.

Mariners
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Chris Woodward 2B
Russell Branyan 1B
Mike Sweeney DH
Jeff Clement C
Wlad Balentien LF
Matt Tuiasosopo 3B
Mike Morse RF
Ronny Cedeno SS
Chris Jakubauskas P

Royals
Coco Crisp CF
Willie Bloomquist 2B
David DeJesus LF
Mike Jacobs 1B
Billy Butler DH
Alex Gordon 3B
Brayan Pena C
Mitch Maier RF
Luis Hernandez SS
Gil Meche P

When the Netherlands beat the Dominican Republic in World Baseball Classic action yesterday, Wladimir Balentien immediately tried to telephone Adrian Beltre.

Unable to reach his Mariners teammate, Balentien showed up early today and left a note in Beltre’s locker: “Nice game, Dominican!”

Both men wanted to play for their country in the WBC. Beltre was told by the Mariners he couldn’t play for the Domnican, and Balentien was invited to play for the Netherlands but decided against it.

“I have to try to make t his team,” he said, “I’d have loved to be in the WBC.”

No one was more surprised than Balentien when the Netherlands beat the Domican Republic in extra innings, 2-1.

“That’s like winning the World Series for that team,” he said.

Now, Balentien wants to see his team beat Venezuela.

“I want to see Ronny (Cedeno) cry, too,” he said, with Venezuelan native Cedeno listening.

For Beltre, there was disappointment and a shrug.

“I’m glad I wasn’t there – that would have been much harder to take, but there was nothing I could do,” Beltre said. “We had a lot of chances to, but it’s baseball. You can’t explain why.”

Did he get Balentien’s note?

“Oh yeah,” he said. “And I’ve been listening to him all morning.”