It's good to be back

Rays coach Lou Piniella loves working near his Tampa home, but his warm memories of Seattle make this week's road trip a sentimental journey.

[AP file photo] Former Seattle Mariners manager Lou Piniellas gives a thumbs up to the crowd at a 2001 game. He returns today to Seattle, where he spent 10 years before joining the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

OAKLAND, Calif. - He had good friends and good food, a good job and good times. Lou Piniella returns to Seattle today amid plenty of attention, plenty of emotion and plenty of memories, and little doubt as to the biggest thing he left behind.

"What do I miss the most about Seattle?" he said. "Obviously the winning."

A lot of things have changed since Piniella was last in uniform at Safeco Field on Sept. 26, 2002, including his view of the baseball world. He went from a Mariners team that for years had been good, and without him thus far this season is the American League's best, to a Devil Rays team that has been historically one of the worst, and with him thus far has yet to show much improvement. The differences are stark, and certain to be noticed, when he returns today for the first time to the scene of his prime.

"I look forward to going back," Piniella said. "I have a good feeling, a wonderful feeling for that organization. I was there 10 years. I had a lot of friends, I enjoyed the players, I built wonderful relationships. There were reasons for me to want to come home, and it was time for me to come home. The success they're having, I feel good for them. I'm happy to see them doing well."

He insists there are no regrets, that he left with a year remaining on his contract for the right reasons and is content where he is.

"If I had to do it all over again, I'd do the same thing," he said. "I'm very happy here, very happy. And I look forward to the finished product here in a couple of years."

Piniella acknowledges it will be an emotional night (and weekend) as he reunites with players and team officials with whom he worked closely and won often for years, and with the Seattle fans, who never got a chance to say goodbye because of the clumsy negotiations process. The Mariners plan a short ceremony tonight, including a video tribute and a gift from Mariners officials.

"They basically feel they're saluting me; I look at it the other way," Piniella said. "I salute them for the time I spent there and how well I was received and how much I enjoyed it."

As much as Piniella speaks fondly of the past, of how they saved the franchise by turning Seattle into a baseball town, got a new stadium built and made four trips to the postseason, some think his present situation could present some mixed emotions.

"It's probably going to be bittersweet," said Rays outfielder Al Martin, who played in Seattle in 2000-01.

"He went in there and changed that whole organization around, just like he's trying to do here. There are some great guys on that team, and he's got to respect them for what they did for him. But at the same time he's got to feel like - I don't think he's going to say, "Did I make the right choice?' - but I think just looking at them is going to be hard, to realize you polished them up into a machine and they're going to come out and try to break you down even more."

The Seattle players are looking forward to seeing their old boss.

"He might try to throw two bases at the same time," Ichiro Suzuki told the Associated Press. "Remember last year after he threw the base? He hurt his shoulder, but I'm sure it's gotten better. Maybe now he can throw it farther."

Mariners general manager Pat Gillick, who made the bold move of hiring rookie manager Bob Melvin - the anti-Lou - as a replacement, said he expects Piniella will get a "very warm" reception. But he shouldn't expect compassion.

"It was his choice to make," Gillick said. "He wanted to get closer to home, and you can understand that. But Lou knew what the situation was going in. It was his decision. I don't have any compassion. He knew what he was doing. I don't believe he made the right choice leaving Seattle; we would have liked to have had him."

Piniella misses the winning and the excitement of playing in front of the large, fervid Safeco Field crowds. "It's an electric place," he said. But he was tired of the travel and tired of being so far from his Tampa home, and insists he is energized by the challenge of turning the Rays into winners.

Piniella, 59, has been surprised at how much attention his return, as a blond no less, has drawn. Two Seattle newspapers and two TV stations had reporters in Oakland for the Rays' series this week, and a large media session is planned this afternoon. It will also be a homecoming of sorts for Rays coaches John McLaren, Matt Sinatro, Lee Elia and Chris Bosio, who all worked for the Mariners.

Piniella said he is looking forward to dining at a few restaurants and stepping inside the visitors clubhouse for the first time, but otherwise he wants to keep the pomp and circumstance to a minimum and get the game started.

"The success they're having, I feel good for them," Piniella said. "What we've got to do is somehow over the next few years here is get it close to that point. That's really my interest."