THE FRONT ROW WITH JASON ELLIOTT, December 6, 2013

So, the Seattle Mariners are on the verge of signing Robinson Cano.

No, really, this is actually a rumor that could become a reality since heating up on Twitter on Monday.

Without a true power, unless you call Kyle Seager's 22 home runs last year power, the move makes sense for a team that finished 20 games under .500 last year.

Paying him $240 million over 10 years, that's another story.

WITH THE signing of Cano, will that really solve all the problems that kept the team out of the playoffs last year?

Cano doesn't pitch, although with a rotation including Felix Hernandez, Hisashi Iwakuma and Taijuan Walker, that is the strength of the team.

But Cano doesn't play in the outfield, where the Mariners need the help the most.

They've released both Franklin Gutierrez and Endy Chavez, leaving only Michael Saunders among those that actually saw playing time in the outfield for Seattle last season. They can always re-sign Raul Ibanez, but they haven't started heading that direction quite yet.

Ibanez wound up playing more games in left field than anyone in the organization could have imagined - what with the return of Michael Morse and former North Idaho College and Gonzaga standout Jason Bay - but neither finished the season with the team.

Dustin Ackley, who is the team's highest-paid returning infielder, played in the outfield after the emergence of second baseman Nick Franklin and shortstop Brad Miller after joining the team in June.

Adding Cano might help turn things around, but he's also one person on a team that has underperformed in recent years.

THE MOVE kind of feels a lot like a few years ago, when the team acquired Cliff Lee from Philadelphia in 2009.

Big early hopes and dreams, but with Lee starting the season injured, the team floundered out of the gate and once Lee returned to the team, he was auditioning for other teams and was later dealt to the Texas Rangers for a bunch of prospects, including current first baseman Justin Smoak, among others.

From all the various reports, Cano's entire contract is guaranteed, with a no-trade clause involved, but that's just a stepping stone, should it start to not work out.

Don't get me wrong, Cano will bring some excitement to the team, whether that being him having a chance to drive in some runs late in a game, to even having that player come up with a clutch hit, instead of the Mariner way of the past few years and waiting until the other team makes the mistake.

Just as long as he's not wearing the No. 24, adding Cano might turn out to be a good move - something that has been few and far between in recent years within the organization.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d'Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JEPressSports.