Dan Wilson steps into the role of manager as the struggling Mariners try to save their season

SEATTLE (AP) — Dan Wilson arrived in Seattle in the mid-1990s and became a beloved figured as a player for the Mariners, spending 12 seasons behind the plate as the catcher for some of the best teams in franchise history.

Now he’s stepping into a role that isn’t always beloved by the fans, taking over as the manager with 34 games left in the regular season and the team spiraling to the fringes of playoff contention in the American League.

“This is a good team. These guys have tremendous talent and sometimes some kind of a change in some direction can spark something,” Wilson said. “But these guys have it in them.”

Wilson was set to manage his first game on Friday night, when the Mariners open a series against the San Francisco Giants. The 55-year-old was chosen as the replacement for Scott Servais, who was fired on Thursday following a 1-8 road trip that dropped Seattle to 64-64 on the season and just 20-33 since the Mariners held a 10-game lead in the AL West in mid-June.

Servais was in his ninth season in Seattle, the second-longest tenure for a manager in franchise history. But it’s now Wilson’s position and his first time holding the job on a full-time basis in his career.

And this isn't a trial run as an interim boss. Wilson is the permanent manager moving forward, something that was important to him in the process.

“The idea is to start something new and you can't do that for 34 games. I think there's quite of bit of time that needs to happen,” Wilson said. “We're going to make a great run at this thing here at the end, but there's also this idea of looking long term as well.”

The thought of Seattle making a late-season managerial change seemed laughable in mid-June when the team was 13 games over .500 and seemed on its way to its first division title since 2001.

But the collapse since sitting at 44-31 has been swift and maddening, centering on an offense that can't generate enough hits and runs to take advantage of statistically the best pitching staff in baseball.

Ultimately, that led to the decision to remove Servais on Thursday, one that he learned about via a news alert prior to a scheduled meeting with executive vice president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto.

“It was a shock. I think everyone found out on social media because the first thing you do when you wake up is check your phone and all that sort of stuff,” shortstop J.P. Crawford said. “It was tough. He's been my manager ever since my first day here and he challenged me to be the best person I could be. Sad to see him let go.”

In an attempt to help jolt the offense late in the season, Wilson brought a familiar face to his coaching staff with Baseball Hall of Fame inductee Edgar Martinez serving as hitting coach for the rest of the season.

Seattle began Friday last in baseball in batting average, first in strikeouts and have scored two runs or less 23 times in the past 53 games.

“There’s no one I trust more with hitters than Edgar," Wilson said. "The thing I think about Edgar that I think a lot of people don't understand was he was a tremendous hitter, he had just tremendous talent. But that's not all he had. He studies hitting. He was a student of hitting and he can break it down better than anybody."

Martinez was Seattle's hitting coach from 2015-18 and has been an adviser for the organization since 2019. Wilson and Martinez were teammates with the Mariners for 11 seasons.

“I didn't have to do much contemplating. Dan was the one who called me and at first I thought he was joking, but I didn't have to think that much,” Martinez said. “I was excited. I was excited for him, excited to work with him.”

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Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson , upper right,speaks during a news conference before a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson, left, looks on next to hitting coach Edgar Martinez, right, during batting practice before a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson smiles during batting practice before a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson speaks during a news conference before a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

Seattle Mariners manager Dan Wilson speaks during a news conference before a baseball game against the San Francisco Giants, Friday, Aug. 23, 2024, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

FILE - Dan Wilson of the Seattle Mariners baseball team, posed Feb. 23, 2023, in Peoria, Ariz. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel, File)

FILE - Seattle Mariners' Dan Wilson, right, stands in the dugout with acting third-base coach Tony Arnerich, left, during a baseball game against the Texas Rangers, Thursday, April 21, 2022, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)

BOSTON (AP) — A study that explores the feasibility of using pigeons to guide missiles and one that looks at the swimming abilities of dead fish were among the winners Thursday of this year’s Ig Nobels, the prize for comical scientific achievement.

Held less than a month before the actual Nobel Prizes are announced, the 34th annual Ig Nobel prize ceremony at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was organized by the Annals of Improbable Research magazine’s website to make people laugh and think. Winners received a transparent box containing historic items related to Murphy’s Law — the theme of the night — and a nearly worthless Zimbabwean $10 trillion bill. Actual Nobel laureates handed the winners their prizes.

“While some politicians were trying to make sensible things sound crazy, scientists discovered some crazy-sounding things that make a lot of sense,” Marc Abrahams, master of ceremonies and editor of the magazine, said in an e-mail interview.

The ceremony started with Kees Moliker, winner of 2003 Ig Noble for biology, giving out safety instructions. His prize was for a study that documented the existence of homosexual necrophilia in mallard ducks.

“This is the duck,” he said, holding up a duck. “This is the dead one.”

After that, someone came on stage wearing a yellow target on their chest and a plastic face mask. Soon, they were inundated with people in the audience throwing paper airplanes at them.

Then, the awards began — several dry presentations which were interrupted by a girl coming on stage and repeatedly yelling “Please stop. I'm bored.” The awards ceremony was also was broken up by an international song competition inspired by Murphy's Law, including one about coleslaw and another about the legal system.

The winners were honored in 10 categories, including for peace and anatomy. Among them were scientists who showed a vine from Chile imitates the shapes of artificial plants nearby and another study that examined whether the hair on people's heads in the Northern Hemisphere swirled in the same direction as someone's hair in the Southern Hemisphere.

Other winners include a group of scientists who showed that fake medicine that causes side effects can be more effective than fake medicine that doesn't cause side effects and one showing that some mammals are cable of breathing through their anus — winners who came on stage wearing a fish-inspired hats.

Julie Skinner Vargas accepted the peace prize on behalf of her late father B.F. Skinner, who wrote the pigeon-missile study. Skinner Vargas is also the head of the B.F. Skinner Foundation.

“I want to thank you for finally acknowledging his most important contribution,” she said. “Thank you for putting the record straight.”

James Liao, a biology professor at the University of Florida, accepted the physics prize for his study demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout.

“I discovered that a live fish moved more than a dead fish but not by much,” Liao said, holding up a fake fish. “A dead trout towed behind a stick also flaps its tail to the beat of the current like a live fish surfing on swirling eddies, recapturing the energy in its environment. A dead fish does live fish things.”

Professor James Liao displays a stuffed fish while accepting a prize for physics for demonstrating and explaining the swimming abilities of a dead trout during a performance at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

A team of researchers perform a demonstration during a performance showing that many mammals are capable of breathing through their anus while accepting the 2024 Ig Nobel prize in physiology at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

People in the audience throw paper airplanes toward the stage during a performance at the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

FILE - Students walk past the "Great Dome" atop Building 10 on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology campus in Cambridge, Mass, April 3, 2017. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)