And the Mariners say: Thank you, Billy Beane.

The Oakland A's general manager, who has made a tidy side career of bewildering the Mariners by outsmarting them with half the player payroll, did them a favor: He caused so much American League digestive tension with his win-now deal-making, that he made the Detroit Tigers burp up a quality player to the Mariners for a youngster with a dubious attitude and Seattle future.

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Coach Sigi Schmid promised "the real Monday Night Football" before the Sounders took on the Los Angeles Galaxy. But if that is an example of the Sounders' response to the prime-time lights of national TV, they need to book noon Thursdays at old Memorial Stadium.

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A Fox Sports story, citing anonymous baseball executives, casts Mariners general manager Jack Zduriencik as indecisive and a vacillator, reluctant to conclude deals that are causing delays around the Major League Baseball's trade market, which closes at 1 p.m. PT Thursday for non-waiver deals.

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Basketball junkie Steve Ballmer will fulfill his longtime yearning to be an NBA owner. His $2 billion purchase of the Los Angeles Clippers, delayed by a nasty legal squabble between Donald Sterling and his wife, Shelly, was green-lighted Monday when a probate judge in Los Angeles ruled that Shelly operated within the rules of the Sterling family trust in selling to Bellevue baron and former CEO of Microsoft.

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RENTON -- From the 2,500 Twelves perched daily upon the VMAC berm to the televised punditocracy in Bristol, Los Angeles and New York, all binoculars and microscopes are trained on the Seahawks to spot some symptom of the dreaded Super Bowl hangover.

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RENTON -- Unsurprisingly for the smooth machine the Seahawks have become, as training camp opened Friday on sunny, breezy lakeside morning, everyone was reading from the same script regarding the missing Beast.

Marshawn Lynch was a holdout, and everyone was in their lanes.

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Here at the Safeco Field Home for Declining DH/First Basemen, the place is overbooked. Large men with worried looks are milling about. They are told to relax, things will sort themselves out. But already, Justin Smoak has been lodged in Tacoma.

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Two days before training camp opens, WR Sidney Rice, who played half the 2013 season before tearing his ACL but was re-signed in April, has retired, the Seahawks announced Wednesday. Citing an unidentified league source, ProFootballTalk.com, reported that the 27-year-old Rice’s decision "arises from his history of concussions. "

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As statuary goes, Seattle is a little shy. We sculpt salutes to Hammering Man, J.P. Patches and the Fremont Troll, which are cool except for the fact that they symbolize characters, as opposed to actual doers of deeds. The statue of V.I. Lenin exists purely as Fremont's salute to its own contrarian kitsch.

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During his pre-game press briefing Monday night, Lloyd McClendon was interrupted by a ring from his desktop phone. He answered.

"I got the press here, Jack," he said, and hung up. Naturally, we encouraged McClendon to put the the Mariners general manager on the speaker, but he politely declined. Then I imagined what I would have said if I were the Seattle manager taking that call:

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More than electric, Richard Sherman might be magnetic.

The Seahawks cornerback-turned-cultural-phenomenon drew a raucous crowd of 22,000 to Safeco Field on misty Sunday afternoon for a celebrity charity softball game. The Mariners average 23,858, although it's not a fair comparison -- Sherman's blue and gray teams hit better.

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Resplendent in a Sonics green jacket, Kevin Durant received two ESPYs Wednesday at ESPN’s annual award show in Los Angeles, another painful reminder that the best male athlete and top NBA player – his two awards – isn’t a part of Seattle sports’ growing party of successes.

But at least he’ll be around to drink to the town’s, and his, success.

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The choice was obvious, and John Farrell made it official Monday: Felix Hernandez will be the American League's starting pitcher Tuesday at the All-Star Game in Minneapolis.

“There are many deserving candidates to be the starter of this team,” Farrell, the Red Sox manager, told reporters at a Target Field press conference. “But given what he’s done over his long successful career, what he’s doing this year, it’s an honor to name Felix our starter.”

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As far as national-TV optics, the ESPN suits couldn't have asked for better -- on the day the World Cup ended an entertaining run in Brazil, soccer transitioned back to the U.S. Sunday night to a racous stadium of 64,207 for a regular-season Major League Soccer match bathed in intensity, tifos and a glorious sunset. One Copacabana beach short of the real deal.

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Dull thud Sunday aside, the Mariners have worked themselves up a half-season of credibility. They are 7-6 against the Oakland A's, 26-21 against the American League West and 25-14 against teams that were .500 or better when they played. At 51-44, the Mariners have the AL's fifth-best record and have four players in the All-Star Game in Minneapolis Tuesday.

So why is there apprehension amid elation?

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Mariners fans at Safeco Field made a discovery Friday night. They still have hair on the backs of their necks. Been years since the follicles had reason to stand up.

But there they were, saluting an uproarious game that dripped drama, controversy and felt like Mariners games half a generation ago. It was something more than a warm summer night at the park. And hey, the Mariners won.

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Mere moments after his return to the warm bosom of Sounders soccer came news Monday that World Cup darling DeAndre Yedlin is being wooed by the siren call of top-flight European soccer.

As is often the the case when a boy goes off on an adventure, he comes back a man.

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As long as the Mariners offense can be overwhelmed by Hector Noesi, Erik Bedard and Jason Vargas -- all of whom are ex-Mariners who pitched at least six shutout innings against them this season -- their leap from fourth place to third in the American League West will be as dizzying as it gets.

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THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION

OF SEATTLE SPORTS FANS

July 4, 2014

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As the game wore on, there was little doubt about the identity of the superior team. Which made the drama all the more compelling for a nation that loves the underdog. For a nation that for a century has been world's overdog, that's some irony. But let's not allow geopolitics to get in the way of a good story.

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