Day Nineteen: Pete O'Brien

I posted the front of this card on Facebook yesterday. Here is the back of this card. Honestly, I think it might be the best picture I've ever seen on the back of a card actually. Like really it might be the best picture I've seen anywhere. Could it be that this is the ultimate Mariner image? Is this composition the distillation of all things Mariner? Is it a microcosmic shot of what living in Seattle is like? Goddamn, it is just possible. Pete O'Brien might well be the most iconic Mariner. And this is his shining pre-Photoshop mash-up madhouse mountain top. Let's talk about Pete O'Brien.

First off, Pete O'Brien was a member of the historic 1991 team so I want to give him his dues there right away. I treasure that 91 team in a special chamber of my heart. They are one of the reasons we have baseball (or will have, or had, or whatever) in the Pacific Northwest and why no matter how bad the Mariners get the team will never move. We are stuck with them and for that I am eternally grateful. So thanks, Pete O'Brien, you dumpy looking pre-pre-tech-goon single batting glove wearing bespectacled moribund man. I salute you. And now I am going to rip you to shreds.

Pete O'Brien had some legit seasons as a Texas Ranger in the mid-80s. He was a good gloveman at first in those days and put up numbers that the 1980's were known for (.290/25/90ish). Heck! He even garnered what would appear to be 2 MVP votes in 1986. (That is simply insane btw. It seems impossible but it says so in Baseball Reference.) The mid-80's Texas Rangers were a pretty good line-up. They had Ruben Sierra, Julio Franco, and Pete O'Brien, evidently. As a kid I didn't really believe that the Texas Rangers were a real team. Their uniforms from those times are really amatuerish and they played in a part of the country that I couldn't even fathom. They were irrelevant to me. And so Pete O'Brien's MVP worthy (wow) pedigree was unknown when he arrived in Seattle looking like a very underwhelming specimen of an athlete. Luckily, Pete O'Brien is not a name associated with any lost heroes or prospects. Pete O'Brien is just a really bad free agent signing. There's that to be grateful for. And it isn't insignificant. Because we can fondly remember Pete being a shitty player without thinking of some counterpart elsewhere winning batting titles or world series'. Mariners fans come to appreciate small gifts of attrition. So here is Pete O'Brien, signed to a team that is looking to make a name for itself. And he is a guy who is only one off year in Cleveland away from some meaningful years. He had amassed about 20 WAR over the first 8 years of his career. And he was 0.0 that first year in 1990. And each subsequent year he was a negative WAR man. So basically he was less than worthless to the Mariners. And if winning was actually the thing that symbolized Mariners fandom then perhaps we would regret our time spent with Pete O'Brien. However winning has very little, if anything, to do with being an actual fan of the Mariners. It's the rich tapestry of shame and weirdness. The odd stories that so liter the landscape of the club's history and present day. All the head-scratching failures, just every last bit of haplessness. I was at a game in 2018 with a friend who is a Red Sox fan (not that good of a friend) and he apologized to me because the Red Sox were beating the Mariners really horribly. "Oh I don't care about that!" I laughed. He looked at me puzzled. And I couldn't explain to him beyond, "I'm a Mariners fan." But now that I am doing this daily blog I can explain it by saying, Pete O'Brien is the 19th highest entry in my list. That doesn't mean that he is somehow the 19th greatest Mariner, or even the 19th most memorable. But it does mean that his ridiculous visage has carved out enough space in my mind (and heart) that he is the 19th guy I chose to write about. Much love, Pete O'Brien, you freaky weirdo.

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