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Piniella's remedy for Wilson: 'Just let him hit'


How much anguish or embarrassment, anger or frustration is rattling around inside Dan Wilson right now, no one really knows. He won't pour his heart out. He won't flail around or mope. He is a professional -- not just because the Mariners catcher owns a healthy contract through 2002. He handles himself with class. An asset to the organization, an entrenched and giving member of the community, it is hard to look at Wilson and think of him as anything less than an integral part of the Mariners. Wilson was behind the plate in Sunday's Game 5 of the American League Championship Series at Safeco Field, catching Freddy Garcia and later Jose Paniagua, Arthur Rhodes and Kazuhiro Sasaki. The way he called that game was a major factor in why the Mariners were able to send the series back to New York for Game 6 tonight at Yankee Stadium. The Mariners held the Yankees to a pair of runs, winning 6-2. When Rhodes issued two walks in a shaky seventh inning, and later, when Sasaki struggled to close it out in the ninth, Wilson was back there, gutting it out, digging out the forkballs and sliders and keeping things under control. For all that work behind the plate, Wilson understands that he is failing with a bat in his hands. "You try and separate the two elements," Wilson said. You can't let what you do on offense affect the way you play the game once you're behind the plate.
So far, Wilson has kept up appearances. It helped early in the season that Tom Lampkin was there to share significant duty behind the plate. When Lampkin went down with an elbow injury, Joe Oliver stepped in to take a major share of the work. So far, Wilson has played in 90 games; Lampkin and Oliver shared 105 games. The pressure to produce was eased. The pressure to perform remains. That is especially true at this crucial juncture, now that Oliver is plagued by a strained quadriceps muscle and was unable to start Game 5, as had been expected. The chance to go back out after starting Game 4 was good for Wilson, but turned into another afternoon of offensive futility. The drawn look on his face after Game 5 and the slumping body language tell everything about where Wilson is as a hitter in these dog days of October. So do the box scores. For Wilson, they keep coming up with goose eggs. They keep showing how he can't buy a hit, how he strands runners on base. It happened again Sunday, when he went 0-for-3, although he managed to draw a walk in the Mariners' fateful fifth inning, when they sent 11 men to the plate and scored five runs. It hurt to watch Wilson in the fourth and seventh innings, when, with two outs and runners in scoring position, he grounded out weakly, ending the threats. Wilson entered Game 5 without a hit in his past 40 postseason at-bats. He is 2-for-57 in his career, for a .035 postseason average -- the worst in major league history. "He is putting so much pressure on himself," Mariners manager Lou Piniella said, adding that the only thing left for Wilson to do to try and break out is to "just let him hit." The remedy relied upon by Piniella, a formidable hitter in his playing days, doesn't always work for another player. That might especially be true if the current state of Wilson's offensive ability represents the downside of a four-year slide.
In 1996, Wilson set career highs in hits (140), RBIs (83), homers (18) and average (.285), establishing new franchise highs for Mariners catchers and playing in the All-Star Game. In the whirlwind 1995 season, Wilson hit .278 as an integral member of the "You Gotta Love These Guys" squad.. Since '96, Wilson has experienced a drop-off noticeable to everyone within the Mariners organization and beyond. "Everyone in this clubhouse is doing everything he can to let Dan know we're pulling for him," said Oliver, who wanted to start Game 5 but said Piniella made the right call. "The way Dan caught the game was great. We held them to two runs," Oliver said "But part of how these things (hitting slumps) can snowball is because this game is so mental. You start to think about it, it starts to really affect you," Oliver said. It looks as though Wilson will again start tonight in Game 6 against the Yankees. He is a professional. His teammates are pulling for him, and so are many loyal Mariners fans. But the weight of his hitting woes won't get any easier against Orlando Hernandez. "It's been a long stretch (without a hit), that's for sure," Wilson said. "We'll see what happens. I think people are concerned more with the Mariners and whether we're winning. To be part of (a) win is a good feeling. It gets our confidence rallying, just to keep this thing going." For Wilson, this postseason has been a mixed blessing. The Mariners are still alive. They can postpone the party in the Bronx, then spoil it outright. Unfortunately for Wilson, his role in rewriting baseball's postseason record books continues as well.

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