Ripken: Streak Not the Cause of the Slump

Baltimore area reporters have begun their annual exercise of advising Cal Ripken Jr. that he would benefit from a day off, ending his consecutive-games streak.

The Oriole third baseman was in a 15-for-65 slide through Friday and batting .262. He had a .365 slugging percentage that was well down on the team and was on pace to hit a career-low 13 homers with 75 runs batted in--despite more than 600 at-bats.

Ripken, of course, bristles when his preoccupation with the streak is questioned.

“It seems like some people don’t seem to think that the streak is a good thing,” he said. “And it seems like they look to capitalize on it when I’m not hitting. I say hitting is hitting, and it’s not a matter of the streak.”

Ripken acknowledged that he is concerned about his production, but he has been through it before.

“I’m 37, not 27,” he said. “I know it’s not realistic for me to think that I’m going to hit .300 with 30 homers and 100 RBIs. But my job is to work hard to get where I should be, and that’s what I plan to do.”

Ripken said a realistic goal at this point would be 20 homers and 80 RBIs.

As always, he will decide when the streak ends. It has long since gone beyond a managerial decision.

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Seldom has a once-dominant team fallen so quickly into such disarray as the Seattle Mariners. The Randy Johnson issue remains the major headline, but the pivotal problems in Seattle are a bad bullpen and a bad defense--particularly at third base with Russ Davis, second base with Joey Cora and left field with Glenallen Hill.

The Mariners’ performance during the Angels’ sweep in Anaheim last week was an embarrassment. The indignity was compounded by Omar Olivares’ 4-2 victory Wednesday. Olivares, who signed with the Angels as a free agent and has helped hold an injury-riddled rotation together, went 1-4 with a 5.49 earned-run average with the Mariners last season and wasn’t included on their playoff roster.

“I couldn’t hit for them, I couldn’t field for them,” he told Puerto Rican reporters in a semi-rip last winter.

Now, Olivares (5-2, 2.70 ERA) says it was mostly a problem of not being in a routine, going nine days between starts on some occasions, three days on others. The Mariners had traded Scott Sanders to Detroit for Olivares and Felipe Lira last July 18 and now have neither, though Lira has been stashed at triple-A Tacoma. Olivares has come up big with the Angels.

After Olivares had beaten the Mariners on Wednesday night, Seattle Manager Lou Piniella referred to last summer’s Detroit deal and couldn’t resist needling the right-hander.

“We made the right trade, but we never saw the guy we hoped to get in the deal,” Piniella said. “That’s the guy we saw tonight.

“But then he’s always put his best numbers up early in the year, so we’ll see.”

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Ken Griffey Jr., on Johnson’s struggles: “Teams beat our dominator and that gives them even more confidence against our other guys.”

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Oakland Manager Art Howe viewed the recent selection of his son, Matt, by the Athletics in the June draft as the highlight of his career.

Matt, a former Texas Christian outfielder, provided another in his first game with the Class A Southern Oregon Timberjacks last week, going three for three.

“He called me at 3 in the morning, he was so excited,” the senior Howe said. “He had a single, double and triple. I told him it was a good thing he didn’t get that homer and hit for the cycle because it would be all downhill after that.”