A couple links for your perusal. ESPN has ranked the 122 US professional teams (hockey, basketball, baseball, football) in fan satisfaction. The Seahawks are ranked 13th. The Blazers are 92, right below the Houston Texans (ouch!). The Mariners are 90.

Art Thiel from the Seattle Post-Intelligence breaks down the Mariners rank and the fact that they are ranked near the Red Sox. He provides us with this glum gem:

As far as the Mariners being ranked low with the Red Sox, it's possible that the native New Englander steeped in club tradition is more comfortable with complaint and bitterness. The 2004 championship is over, and Red Sox Nation is back to being fulfilled by disappointment and low expectations.

The Mariners, once irrelevant, then astonishing, are only in the early stages of building a Red Sox-like industry out of consistent futility in pleasant surroundings.

Sounds like fun.

Here's a pretty good article about how spring training has gone for the Mariners. I'm excited about the new catcher, Jamie Burke. He's from Roseburg, Oregon, 35, and hasn't played much in the big leagues. And he's not the sucking black hole in the lineup named Rene Rivera, so.

Hey, a lady got to umpire a spring training game. Cool.