Fences aren't cause of Mariners' offensive home woes

When Safeco Field was first put into operation after the All-Star break in 1999, it was immediately evident that it was a pitcher's park and that it was particularly tough on right-handed batters. There has been sporadic talk since then that perhaps things needed to be equalized, possibly by moving the fences in. That talk has heated up this year with the Seattle Mariners' performance at Safeco Field, where Seattle is 16-25, which at .390 is the second-worst home winning percentage in baseball behind the Kansas City Royals (14-23, .378). Almost all of that comes square down on the offense. Seattle is hitting .195 at home, a number that is almost staggeringly awful. It's not that the Mariners can't hit -- they own a reasonable .259 road batting average, and they have 51 road homers against just 21 bombs at home. That's a huge disparity considering that after a big early season spent on the road, the Mariners have almost balanced out their home-vs.-road obl...