We're in Tucson for three games, but there was good news from trainer Rick Griffin who reported that both closer JJ Putz and lefty reliever Arthur Rhodes played catch in Peoria and "felt great".

We've known of JJ's elbow tightness that has kept him on the shelf for over a week, but Rhodes was scratched from a scheduled one inning stint yesterday because of his own elbow stiffness. So, the fact that they played catch today with no pain is encouraging.

Not so encouraging, the outing of Jeff Weaver today in Tucson...he surrendered six earned runs on seven hits (two homers) in 4 innings of work...Jeff still feels confident he's on track to start the regular season, looking forward to his final two starts of the spring.

He told me after the game he was just missing with his pitches and didn't attack the zone as much as he should have.

Mike Hargrove cited a lack of command of his breaking ball as the culprit for Weavers problems...Mariner highlights today:

Ben Broussard was 3-for-3, but will likely open the season as a lefty bat off the bench. But he likely also would have at least fairly significant trade value to another club where he might play more regularly...those types of things will sort themselves out in these final 10-12 days before the lidlifter....Tony Torcato, a longtime member of the Giants organization, hit a homerun....he was batting .286 coming into today, and has hit quite well throughout his minor league career and brief stints with SF, but has always seemed to be a "wrong place wrong time" type of guy....

My first visit to Tucson Electric Park today...not a bad little park, but the drive down from Peoria took 2:35 to make what is normally about a 90 minute trip. We traveled on the Pearl Harbor Memorial Highway, past Picacho Peak, the westernmost site of a Civil War battleground. (How'd they get all the way out here?)

Another Tucson ballpark tomorrow, Hi Corbett Field, as the Mariners take on the Rockies tomorrow...Miguel Batista will start, followed by Sean Green, Sean White and Jake Woods. Will blog to you later!