Raul Ibanez helps M's open season's second half with 8-2 win

Not once as he rounded the bases did Mariners slugger Raul Ibanez allow the thought to enter his mind.

That the cheers ringing in his ears, down from the uppermost reaches of a near-packed stadium, might be telling him goodbye. Or that his farewell gesture, to the Seattle throngs he had played in front of for parts of 10 seasons, might have just come on a second-inning grand slam belted off Cleveland Indians starter Aaron Laffey.

Ibanez would add two singles to cap a three-hit Friday night in his team's 8-2 rout of Cleveland to open the unofficial second half of a 2008 season already long lost. But if Ibanez is ultimately dealt by the July 31 deadline, it will likely be that bases-clearing drive that caps his Mariners career.

"He's a great guy, an unbelievable player," said Felix Hernandez, the only other Mariners player to register a slam this season.

Hernandez benefited most from Ibanez's hitting on a night 42,570 showed up to Safeco Field for a relatively meaningless game, many of them hoping to score a free bobblehead doll in the pitcher's likeness. Bolstered by Ibanez's blast to right field, then a three-run homer by Jose Lopez off Laffey in the fourth, Hernandez had little trouble cruising through six carefree innings for the 99-pitch victory.

Casey Blake managed a solo homer off Hernandez to start the sixth. But the game was long done by that point, courtesy of Ibanez's bat.

The eighth three-hit game for Ibanez this season could not have come at a better time where his trade value is concerned. Both the Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Mets have expressed interest.

Arizona may be in hottest pursuit, with minor-league prospects like second baseman Emilio Bonifacio and outfielder Gerardo Parra being tossed around as possible trade bait. The D-backs are reportedly unwilling to include any pitching prospects in a deal, and may be reluctant to trade Bonifacio because of concern that incumbent second baseman Orlando Hudson will leave as a free agent after the season.

But the two sides are talking.

Talk tends to grow this time of year. Ibanez has been around and knows that.

But he insists he never thinks about it. Not while rounding the bases on his grand slam. Nor when he goes to bed at night, or wakes up in the morning.

"I don't think that far ahead, really," he said with a shrug.

He can't afford to. Not the way he approaches the game, with a mind-set devoted totally to every second of those nine innings he'll play.

"For me, it starts the night before," he said. "And right when you wake up, it's game time. From the moment you open your eyes in the morning, you're already thinking about who's pitching and what's coming up and what your approach for that day is."

Mariners manager Jim Riggleman has seen what happens once Ibanez arrives at the ballpark.

"He does so much," Riggleman said. "He's in great physical shape, and he spends a great deal of time in the batting cage every day. He's relentless in there."

Riggleman admitted that there's a school of thought that some players shouldn't spend as much time in the cage as Ibanez. A shortstop or a catcher, he said, might lose some of their game if they expended that kind of physical energy.

Ibanez is different.

"With what he does in the offseason to prepare for the season," Riggleman said, "he's physically so strong that he doesn't lose anything during the course of the season."

It's Ibanez's work ethic and easy clubhouse interaction that Riggleman most admires. Ibanez joked after the game about how Hernandez "hasn't stopped reminding us" about his own grand slam ever since he hit it, off the Mets' Johan Santana at Shea Stadium in late June.

That easygoing, humorous side doesn't usually lend itself to forceful, in-your-face clubhouse leadership. Ibanez, instead, is a quieter, lead-by-example type.

He had grounded into a double play with two on and none out in the first inning. But after Laffey walked Willie Bloomquist on four pitches to force home the first of five unearned Seattle runs in the second — courtesy of an error by shortstop Jhonny Peralta — an on-deck, focused Ibanez knew the first pitch he saw would likely be right down the middle.

He was right.

"It's a clean slate every time you go up there," he said. "And the quicker you can let go of negative things that happen, the quicker you can get back to focusing on the things you need to do."

Another Ibanez example worth following for his last-place team, whether he's here for the duration or not.

Geoff Baker: 206-464-8286 or gbaker@seattletimes.com