Author: Art Thiel

Never having met a metaphor he could not twist beyond recognition, Art has been illuminating, agitating, amusing and annoying Puget Sound sports readers for a long time. Along with Steve Rudman, he co-founded Sports Press Northwest because it didn’t seem right that the Google monster should aggregate daily journalism into oblivion without at least a flesh wound from somebody. Thiel and Rudman labored under the Seattle Post-Intelligencer globe until the print edition died an undeserved death in March, 2009. Art continued on at its online successor seattlepi.com while working on SPNW’s creation. His radio commentaries can be heard Friday and Saturday mornings and Friday afternoon on KPLU-FM 88.9. In 2003 he wrote the definitive book about the Seattle Mariners, “Out of Left Field,” which became a regional bestseller. In 2009, along with Rudman and KJR 950 afternoon host Mike Gastineau, Thiel authored “The Great Book of Seattle Sports Lists,” a cross between historylink.org and Mad Magazine that has become mandatory reading for any sports fan who has an indoor bathroom. A graduate of Pacific Lutheran University as well as two dead papers and a live one, the News Tribune of Tacoma, he has become a fan of entrepreneurial online journalism because it allows him to continue a lifelong passion to take the English language to places it rarely visits willingly, and does not involve the cleaning of kennels or stables.

The game was supposed to feature a showdown between two great Japanese pitchers, Hisashi Iwakuma and Masahiro Tanaka. But a rainout in Kansas City pushed Tanaka back a day in the Yankees rotation. So the Yankees trotted out another rookie, someone named Vidal Nuno. Who was Vidal Nada to the Mariners.

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If the Mariners were in the sweepstakes for Kendrys Morales, they lost. The veteran free agent designated hitter, who hit .277 with 23 home runs and 80 RBIs last season in Seattle, signed Saturday with the Minnesota Twins, a team that was not in the speculation for his services.

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LB Bruce Irvin had hip surgery Monday, according to the Seahawks, who did not disclose details after the day’s organized team activity. Irvin offered offered via Twitter his own prognosis, saying he will be back for the starting of training camp in late July.

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