Bonus game today as a B game against the Padres was played on their practice field. Of note, Jeremy Reed went 3 for 3 with a home run. Jeremy having a nice spring so far. The situation for him with the Mariners does not appear to be good as the team would prefer to have another right handed bat on the bench. The news not all bad though as there are a ton of scouts at every game, the B game included. Maybe someone will need what Jeremy can bring to a team.

The pitching was the story of the game that was played on the lower field. Horacio Ramirez got the start and pitched 3 innings giving up one run on five hits. He walked one and struck out six. The guys mostly from the minor league side were really swinging.

Chris Reitsma followed in what was his first appearance since undergoing a fifth elbow surgery. This is a guy I have to cheer for. You would be hard pressed to find a better guy in any major league clubhouse. It ate him up that he was not able to help the club last year and he told me that was a factor in deciding to give it one last try. He looked great in his final tune up against Mariners hitters earlier this week, but was touched up a bit today. He didn’t have his location and wound up surrendering two runs on three hits, one a home run. He struck out one and walked one. We will ask the skipper after the game what the plan for him is moving forward.

The main attraction of the B game was the spring debut of Phillippe Aumont. The first round draft pick did not disappoint needing just ten pitches to get through a scoreless fifth inning. He struck out one and gave up a hit that probably would not have been had Beltre been at third. After his outing Phillippe spoke with a large group of reporters and then gave me an interview for the pre game that can be heard here.

Phillippe spoke of being held back a bit because of a sore arm, in the group interview he called it dead arm. He has no major injury history to be concerned with but he has dealt with nagging back and hip issues in the past. Neither is uncommon to someone his size. He was a little irked when this was brought up and told us that neither was an issue right now.

Aside from this small bit of irkedness, Phillippe has been a pleasure to deal with. He has good poise for a nineteen year old who has only been speaking English for only a few years. He displays confidence no doubt picked up in his international experience which included pitching in Cuba, Taiwan and Japan while representing Canada. Seems like a good kid.

On to other matters…It looks like first cuts will not happen until after the Tucson trip. The M’s and John McLaren opted this year to keep the number of invitees down so the roster is at a manageable 57. It is the first time that I can remember seeing an empty row in “Fantasy Island” the middle bank of lockers that clears out first as cuts are made.

Yuniesky Betancourt is hitting second today. I asked if this was a function of Adrian still being out or if there was a possibility that Yuni could hit second. This kicked off a discussion about lineup construction. Mac talked about his philosophy regarding the line up and changing it up. An interesting conversation that gives an indication of what we might see can be heard here.

I am going to wrap this up, it is the bottom of the 2nd and the Mariners are up 3-1. This one is fun to watch as both teams are putting out pretty much their full line ups. Mac is a believer in trying to beat the rival on whatever field the game may be played on. His preference is to set the tone and it looks like Mike Scioscia is answering the challenge. Seen some aggressive base running as well with Greg Norton stealing 2nd and coming home on a shallow sacrifice to left. He was safe on bad throws on both plays, but hey, that can happen when you force the issue.