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For example, you're assuming that Jack Z is the guy who hired those analysts, and that he's the one who is keeping them there. Z is not the highest-level executive within the Mariners! Keeping in mind that one of the conditions Lincoln and Armstrong had for GM candidates, at least when they hired Jack, was SABR-friendliness, I could very reasonably see a scenario in which Tony Blengino built a statistical analysis department, and then got fired, and now that he's gone Z no longer listens to them but feels compelled to keep them on payroll because otherwise Lincoln and Armstrong might grok that he's not playing by the rules they set when they hired him. That may not be the way it is, but I see no reason why that COULDN'T be the way it is... the Admiral Rickover analogy sort of breaks down if it was the President who demanded he hire the chemists in the first place. Or if one of the preconditions for his getting the admiralty was having chemists on staff. Which, in Z's case, it was.
Your larger point is taken: even with sources, we can't ever definitively say what Z is thinking, because only Z knows that. But isn't that what you're doing when you say, for example, "Morse was a good idea but Z was snakebit"? You don't know what Z was thinking when he signed Morse. His process could've been terrible, and he might not've been snakebit at all. If we discount process completely, because you're right, we don't know, all we are left with is results-based analysis. And going by results-based analysis paints a horrendously ugly picture. Have the Mariners made a single good move since they excised Blengino in the middle of last offseason? The Kelley and Carp dumpings look disastrous now, as do the Jaso/Morse trade and the Saunders signing. Giving Brandon Maurer an early-season crack at the rotation was a trainwreck; so was promoting Zunino only to watch him get injured and burn service time on the DL. Kameron Loe imploded, and then so did the entire rest of the bullpen...
You (and James) say that if the Mariners weren't listening to SABR they'd be getting left behind by the other 29 teams, perhaps excluding KC and PHI. But isn't this what that looks like? They've now made an entire season's worth of catastrophic moves. And if we can't guess at their motivations, you're right that we can't condemn their process... but we can't say they've been unlucky, either. All we can say is that their moves have been near-universally bad.