Saturday, July 15, 2006

Ichiro-sensei Explains the Middle East

The Seattle Times: Sports: Ichiro goes deep, keeps roots secret: "When asked what the Mariners needed to do to rid themselves of the tough times, Ichiro — who hit several balls over the right-field bleachers during batting practice — went deep.

'If there is a problem,' he said, 'we need to notice it, what creates the problem. The problem usually isn't just on the cover. You need to look much deeper.

'For example, if we're taking about a tree, and the tree has a problem, you need to look at the root. But you cannot see the root. The mistake is to keep watering the fruit. That's not going to solve anything. You need to find where the problem is first.'"

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK, making my best effort to hijack the thread at comment number one, I'm talking Mariners here, not Hezballah. It is so very hard to know about these things from a distance, kind of like trying to divine the future direction of the Soviet Union by looking at who was standing where up on the Red Square reviewing stand, but Ichi is right. We depend too much on the individual efforts of him, Betancourt, Beltre, Sexson. And our pitching is very erratic. Guardado is gone - but I predict that he will blossom in Cincinnati. Some vital spark is no longer there. Ichiro is correct. It is at the root. But those of us on the outside can't see what it is.

Charlie Martin said...

I'm not sure it counts as hijacking the thread when I'm taking Ichi-sensei and mis-attributing him to be making comments on the Middle East when he was actually talking about bas'boru.

Anonymous said...

Baseball Kremlinology is a fascinating subject, worthy of frequent and highly developed postings. We may have to do a bit of this.

They could however grow very, very long.

loner said...

Maybe it's just that in 2001 Seattle went 109-53 and then lost to "America's Team" (in the post-9/11 togetherness moment) in the American League Championship Series in worse fashion than they had the year before. It was left to the Arizona Diamondbacks, against the previously invincible Mariano Rivera in the 9th inning of game 7, to end the Yankees run, for good and all as it turned out, by winning their first championship. A year later, as Mariner fortunes declined, my Anaheim-Disney Angels won their first championship by rallying (And a monkey shall lead them!) one last time. A year later the Florida Marlins won their second championship in their tenth year in existence. Then, well then, the Boston Red Sox came back from 3-1 down to the Yankees in the ALCS and won their first World Series since 1918 and a year later the Chicago White Sox won their first World Series since 1917.

Up is down, black is white... It coulda, shoulda started with the Mariners.

Love Ichiro. Wish he played for us.

Anonymous said...

Glad he doesn't!

chuck said...

...to end the Yankees run, for good and all as it turned out, by winning their first championship.

Reminds me of what a dumb kid I was. Back in 1953 my family relocated to the Boston area. Naturally all the kids were Red Sox fans, except for me, I was a Yankees fan. So, they asked why, and I said because the Yankees were winners. Boy, did I have some learning to do.

Then there were the arguments as to which of Gene Autry or Roy Rogers was the greatest, but that is for another time.

loner said...

The Angels were the family team. Everyone else I knew where I grew up who gave a damn about baseball was a Dodgers fan. Either I've mellowed or the change in their fortunes has made me far less inclined to invective while watching or hearing about them.

Roy Rogers.