THE CHEAP SEATS WITH STEVE CAMERON: Stay calm, the pieces are almost in place

Patience is…

What?

A virtue?

Nope, if we’re talking about sports, patience is silly.

It’s for old folks who liked the way society worked in the 1950s, when everyone was happy moving slowly toward some goal.

Nowadays, patience has been pretty much abandoned in a world that demands instant gratification.

Here are the marching orders…

Win now.

Win immediately, and never mind the cost – or a catastrophe down the road.

Things seem to be moving faster and faster. Technology has sped up daily life, it’s made every moment a new adventure, and…

Hey, who cares about the future?

When is that, next week?

In case you haven’t picked up on the thread here, I’m trying to make a point – and mark this first day of a new year.

However, I’m not expecting that sports and the people in it will think about moving backwards toward balance and some kind of equilibrium.

No, I suspect it’s foot on the gas and let’s zoom toward a crash, like, immediately.

IN FACT, if we can see some results in the next 15 minutes, that would be great.

Welcome to 2021, my friends.

And what’s the reason for this little lecture today?

Well, you can hear the screams of baseball fans

throughout the Northwest, all because the Mariners — who need a playoff appearance like a man in the desert needs water — turned down the opportunity of trading for Tampa Bay’s 2018 Cy Young winner, Blake Snell.

Instead, GM Jerry Dipoto chose not to bite, and let a few other teams bid for Snell.

Eventually, San Diego got him for a bucket full of prized prospects.

Dipoto walked away (figuratively speaking), when the Rays insisted on one of the Mariners’ blue-chip kid outfielders – either Jarred Kelenic or Julio Rodriguez – plus a handful of other young players.

Yes, I understand that fans want the Mariners to end the postseason drought that dates back to 2001, but rather than assemble a cast of expensive spare parts each season (hello, Robbie Cano) and change them out every offseason, Dipoto got religion.

It finally dawned on Mariners management that they’d have to grow a contending club organically – drafting, acquiring talent through unexciting means, and teaching.

It works, believe me it works, if you know how to do it right.

Of course, it requires patience.

From the club and from its fans.

THERE’S that word again.

Patience.

If you’re rooting for the M’s, or the Seahawks, or one of our local universities, you probably want them to win right this minute.

That natural, but...

Truthfully, the model you want to copy is probably the Seahawks — who built a Super Bowl champion, watched it come apart piece by piece, and now are busy building another team with that same goal.

Even though pro football is a different animal than MLB, the basic philosophy remains the same.

You need to see down the road, and not jump at the first shiny thing that’s available.

Now you’re saying…

“Wait, the Seahawks traded two first-round draft picks for Jamal Adams.”

They did, indeed, because they’re close enough to having a championship team that a blockbuster move to solidify the defense was worth it.

When the Mariners get THAT close to being a regular playoff participant, they could justify a similar trade — for someone like Blake Snell.

But not now.

Nope, now is for growth.

And patience, impossible as that may be.

Email: [email protected]

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns appear in The Press on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. “Moments, Memories and Madness,” his reminiscences from several decades as a sports journalist, runs each Sunday.

Steve also writes Zags Tracker, a commentary on Gonzaga basketball which is published each Tuesday.