Outside of trying to play spoiler when possible, the Mariners aren’t going to be involved in a pennant race once the second half kicks off on Thursday.  But there will be plenty to watch for as the organization takes the steps necessary to bring a winner back to Seattle as soon as possible.

Many players will be competing for jobs next season, including a couple rotation spots.  Next season Felix Hernandez will occupy one of those spots, but for now the rest are open.  That’s not to say they’ll be given out on a first come, first serve basis, however.  Just because a pitcher is in the rotation right now doesn’t mean they’ll be in the rotation next year, even if they’re doing alright.  Given GM Jack Zduriencik’s mentality and the added pressure placed on him for this disastrous season, the Mariners will be looking to contend next season, and in order to contend the Mariners are going to have to find upgrades where they can.

Right now Jason Vargas, Ryan Rowland-Smith and Doug Fister are all in the Mariner starting rotation, but I doubt they all figure into the picture next year.  Felix, as mentioned, will take one spot.  Michael Pineda may earn  another.  There is also the possibility of Erik Bedard, however slight it may be.  And we haven’t gotten into potential acquisitions yet.  The free agent market has a couple intriguing names, and you never know who might become available in trade.  Bottom line is, if Seattle is contending next season one of the Vargas-RRS-Fister trio is going to get bumped from the rotation by someone better. 

Not to take anything away from them, of course.  They’re all fine, MLB caliber pitchers (at times, anyway).  But none of them figure to become a solid number three anytime soon.  They are what they are.  So they’ll compete for those last rotation spots starting immediately.

Vargas has the inside track right now.  The Mariners chose Vargas to be their fifth starter out of Spring Training over Fister, and has been much better than anyone could have expected: 17 starts, 107.2 innings, 5.68 K/9, 2.34 BB/9, 8.3% swinging strikes, 3.09 ERA, 3.63 FIP, 4.84 xFIP.

With that ERA and FIP some might make the argument that Vargas transcends this competition, that he should be in line for the 3rd spot in the rotation.  Well, no.  And even if you could make that argument, wouldn’t it be better if he was in the four slot with an even better pitcher going third?  Good teams don’t have to have a archtypal hurler at every stop in the rotation (see: AL East powerhouses).

The xFIP is still plenty good for someone in Vargas’ role, but hints at some rough times ahead for a guy who has been lucky in limiting home runs.  A lot of that luck is home field advantage, as Vargas is a great fit for Safeco Field and gets his fair share of bailouts from its expansive outfield, but at some point some are bound to make it over the wall, and there are also these pesky little things called road games.  Vargas lets hitters put a lot of balls in the air, which means he should have given up more than eight homers by now.

Fister is having an equally impressive season: 13 starts, 84.1 innings, 4.16 K/9, 1.71 BB/9, 3.6% swinging strikes, 3.09 ERA, 3.76 FIP, 4.39 xFIP.  Fister hasn’t thrown as much as Vargas due to a shoulder injury earlier in the year, but their ERA/FIP/xFIP numbers are very similar.  However, the results are generated very differently.  The right handed Fister pounds the zone with fastballs and generates a good number of ground balls, minimizing the damage of the hits he’ll give up as a pitch to contact pitcher by walking hardly anyone.  The lefty Vargas is a flyball pitcher who uses Safeco and his stud outfielders to his advantage, keeps his walk rate down, and is able to miss a few bats with a swing and miss changeup.

It will be interesting to track Fister going forward, because he is not pitching the way he did last season.  If he continues to get outs in the Carlos Silva mold he will be an intriguing option for next season.  The groundball version of Fister is much more suited to a park.  Fister had some trouble giving up home runs over Safeco’s hitter friendly right field wall.

Rowland-Smith is the guy scratching and clawing to get back into the conversation after he was guaranteed a spot coming into the season.  It’s been a terrible year for the Hyphen but things have started to look up.  Seeing that what he was doing wasn’t working this year, he’s been changing his approach (throwing more two seamers resulting in more ground balls) and the results have been encouraging.  But he’s still very much the underdog here as he has seen other parts of his game diminish.  His velocity is down, his secondary offerings don’t look as sharp as they have in the past, his swinging strike rates have been falling since he first emerged and subsequently so have his strikeout rates.

RRS hasn’t been a big league caliber pitcher for much of this season, but we all still pull for the Hyphen.  He’s one of the best loved Mariners.  If he weren’t he probably wouldn’t even be in this conversation.  It would be Vargas and Fister versus the field.  But everyone loves RRS– I imagine the organization does too as they’ve gone out and made him one of the faces of the franchise– and wants him to pitch like he did when we thought he’d be a rotation mainstay for years to come.  Here’s hoping he can figure a way to pitch himself back into the 2011 rotation.  Alternatively, I don’t think he would make the worst bullpen arm.  His stuff should play up in short relief, helping him get back to where he was in past seasons.

Those three aren’t the only ones vying for the last rotation spots, just the favorites.  New acquisition Blake Beavan is a Rick Adair favorite and could make a case for a spot next spring, while there is never any shortage of back of the rotation arms trying to impress; guys like David Pauley, Luke French, Ryan Feierabend and anyone else that might emerge from the system or that Seattle might pick up between now and then.

In a lost season fans have to find ways to keep interested.  On Felix Day it’s winning.  On others, you have to find games within the game.  One of the many ways I’ll be trying to keep interested is tracking these three (and anyone else who might emerge) as they compete for limited 2011 slots.