The curse of 1st base has haunted Seattle for years. The last above-average season for the Mariners at 1B came from Russell Branyan in 2009. The last truly great season from the position came in 2005, when newly acquired Richie Sexson put up a 4-win season with a .263/.369/.541 slash, 39 homers, and a 144 wRC+. So far, Daniel Vogelbach is in AAA again and Danny Valencia, while hitting well since his disastrous first week, has not turned heads. We’ve taken somewhat serious and somewhat less serious looks at the dearth of offensive productivity in the past decade, but life did not stop in those moribund seasons.
Checking in with the Mariners’ ghosts of 1st base past
