I personally choose to believe that Wilson/Martinez are better at looking at the guys on the 40-man roster and choosing better lineups than Dipoto/Servais.
They are also better at identifying what they want each player to do.
The fact that Robles hit ZERO HRs and had a 192 wRC+ was clearly significant.
The Dipoto mantra of "it's hard to string hits together in MLB" held this team back.
It's hard to string hits together when you have 13 guys all trying to hit HRs.
It's much easier when everyone is trying to hit a LD off the wall.
There's no question Dan and Edgar had an affect on the changes, and I agree it might not be as much as people think, but it's hard to fully quantify because there really are so many different factors that go into all of it. But I thought it might be interesting to look at the 34 games prior to D&E arriving, compared to the 34 after they arrived, and there certainly are some interesting points to look at on offense. In the 34 games before D&E the M's offense had:
0-run games: 3
1-run games: 6
2-run games: 8
3-run games: 2
4-run games: 3
5+ runs: 13
10+ runs: 6
Now compare that to after D&E arrived:
0-run games: 1
1-run games: 1
2-run games: 5
3-run games: 4
4-run games: 4
5+ runs: 19
10+ runs: 2
The most obvious differences are the changes in 0/1/2 run games, where prior to D&E there were 17 combined, versus only 7 after D&E, and on the other end, looking at 5+ runs going from 13 to 19 is pretty big. While it's interesting to note that the M's were 13-21 before D&E, and 21-13 after, the more interesting thing is that while they were amid their deflating 13-21 run, they still averaged 4.2 runs per game, which is respectable, before they upped their average to 5.1 per game.
The other big factor you neglected to mention was the performance of the bullpen, which was crucial to the losing ways before Servais was fired. Not that their record was significantly worse in the 34 games prior (3-9 before, 5-7 after), but you could tell the lack of trust in the BP was leading other players to lose hope... giving away leads to bad teams is not confidence-inducing. While the BP's record got better, it's not nearly enough to account for the rest of our record getting massively better. But the bullpen's ERA of 4.63 in the prior 34 hurts... that's over a run every two innings, with unfortunate consistency towards the D&E move. After D&E that ERA came down 2.89, which is giving up less than one run every 3 innings, and is waaaay easier to build and maintain team confidence behind. I would argue that Dan's role in 1) the usage of the BP, and therefore 2) the BP's better performance, probably lifted a mental weight off the mind's of the offensive bats, letting them feel confident that the leads they create will be maintained.
I watch allllmost every game the Mariners play, and it was clearly written on all the players' faces that they had lost all confidence in the last week or two before Servais was fired. Any change, at that point, would have to be positive... it's just hard to get any lower than they looked. So one could argue that any new managers coming on board would have created a similar relief in the mind's of the players. But what D&E did from that point on is clearly all positive, according to the players. Stability and confidence are an amazing thing, especially when they've been lacking.
I personally choose to believe that Wilson/Martinez are better at looking at the guys on the 40-man roster and choosing better lineups than Dipoto/Servais.
They are also better at identifying what they want each player to do.
The fact that Robles hit ZERO HRs and had a 192 wRC+ was clearly significant.
The Dipoto mantra of "it's hard to string hits together in MLB" held this team back.
It's hard to string hits together when you have 13 guys all trying to hit HRs.
It's much easier when everyone is trying to hit a LD off the wall.
Or...I could be wrong.
There's no question Dan and Edgar had an affect on the changes, and I agree it might not be as much as people think, but it's hard to fully quantify because there really are so many different factors that go into all of it. But I thought it might be interesting to look at the 34 games prior to D&E arriving, compared to the 34 after they arrived, and there certainly are some interesting points to look at on offense. In the 34 games before D&E the M's offense had:
0-run games: 3
1-run games: 6
2-run games: 8
3-run games: 2
4-run games: 3
5+ runs: 13
10+ runs: 6
Now compare that to after D&E arrived:
0-run games: 1
1-run games: 1
2-run games: 5
3-run games: 4
4-run games: 4
5+ runs: 19
10+ runs: 2
The most obvious differences are the changes in 0/1/2 run games, where prior to D&E there were 17 combined, versus only 7 after D&E, and on the other end, looking at 5+ runs going from 13 to 19 is pretty big. While it's interesting to note that the M's were 13-21 before D&E, and 21-13 after, the more interesting thing is that while they were amid their deflating 13-21 run, they still averaged 4.2 runs per game, which is respectable, before they upped their average to 5.1 per game.
The other big factor you neglected to mention was the performance of the bullpen, which was crucial to the losing ways before Servais was fired. Not that their record was significantly worse in the 34 games prior (3-9 before, 5-7 after), but you could tell the lack of trust in the BP was leading other players to lose hope... giving away leads to bad teams is not confidence-inducing. While the BP's record got better, it's not nearly enough to account for the rest of our record getting massively better. But the bullpen's ERA of 4.63 in the prior 34 hurts... that's over a run every two innings, with unfortunate consistency towards the D&E move. After D&E that ERA came down 2.89, which is giving up less than one run every 3 innings, and is waaaay easier to build and maintain team confidence behind. I would argue that Dan's role in 1) the usage of the BP, and therefore 2) the BP's better performance, probably lifted a mental weight off the mind's of the offensive bats, letting them feel confident that the leads they create will be maintained.
I watch allllmost every game the Mariners play, and it was clearly written on all the players' faces that they had lost all confidence in the last week or two before Servais was fired. Any change, at that point, would have to be positive... it's just hard to get any lower than they looked. So one could argue that any new managers coming on board would have created a similar relief in the mind's of the players. But what D&E did from that point on is clearly all positive, according to the players. Stability and confidence are an amazing thing, especially when they've been lacking.