Mariners sign Ryan Garko to one-year deal

Posted on February 1, 2010

Ryan Garko of the Cleveland Indians gets ready in the dugout before the game against the Oakland Athletics at the McAfee Coliseum in Oakland, California on May 12, 2007. (Photo by Brad Mangin)

 

The Seattle Mariners reached a one-year agreement with journeyman first baseman Ryan Garko today for $550,000. The 29-year-old Stanford alum spent several productive years in Cleveland before being traded to the Giants on July 27, 2009. His stay in San Francisco could not have bee any worse as he got off to a horrible start and quickly took up residence in skipper Bruce Bochy’s dog house. Garko hit .235 with the Giants and hit two homers in 115 at-bats.

The Mariners are hoping that Garko can be a potent right-handed bat for them playing first base or DH’ing against lefties (Ken Griffey Jr. will get most of the DH AB’s against righties). For Garko’s sake I hope he can bounce back to the hitter he was in 2008 when he hit .273 and knocked in 90 runs. Garko was abysmal last season as a Giant. In my book he became the right-handed equivalent of John Vander Wal. Many Giants fans will remember when the Giants acquired the lefty pinch-hitting specialist from the Pirates for the stretch run in 2001 (along with Jason Schmidt). Vander Wal SUCKED. KNBR radio talk-show host Brian Murphy rooted so hard for Vander Wal that he sung a song about him every time he came to the plate. It did not help.

I will be looking for Garko when I visit the Mariners in Peoria next month. I hope he plays better in the blue and white than he did in the orange in black. Garko was never a Giant.