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Gordon - I totally agree with you that the 40 man crush is a major reason the Mariners are not doing a few things... but I am not sure if more than 50% of the readers here understand this limitation and the complexity it adds to moving players around.
I think most people understand the 25 man roster, and all the limitations that has... but at least the 25 man roster gets reset every September, and then again at the beginning of the new season.
The 40 man is an on-going limitation - all year every year. It never gets reset. The 40 man roster does change automatically a couple weeks after the World Series, when players contracts usually expire... thus creating the new list of free agents for the off season.
However, any change to the 40 man roster is permanent. Thus, if you take a player off the 40 man roster through the DFA process, that player is a free agent after the 10 day waiting period. It does not matter if the player is Jason Bay or Carter Capps... you just let the player go with out any compensation. The player may decided to re-sign with the Mariners, but there is no rule that says he has to.
The only exceptions to get players off the 40 man roster are the 60 day disabled list, and the restricted list that Montero just went on. Further, come the end of the season, there is no disabled list, so the players on the disabled list MUST be put back on the 40 man roster. I believe the same is true with the restricted list, but I am unsure about the timing.
Thus, even though we have a couple spots open on the 40 man roster currently, the Mariners do not want to put themselves in a position of having the 40 man crush in the off season.
On this squad, the Mariners have 19 pitchers and 19 hitters - which is a normal distribution. Of these 38 players, roughly 18 will be free agents - 8 pitchers: Harang, Perez, probably Saunders, and several players who are still under team control - meaning it is the Mariners choice to keep them or let the player go - like Furbush.... and 10 hitters: Ibanez, Morales, Morse, Ryan, Blanco, Quintero, Chavez, Peguero, and players still under team control like Triunfel and such.
On top of all this, there are players who MUST be added to the 40 man roster from the minors who have been with the organization 5 years by December 1st or so, or these players are made available to the Rule 5 Draft.... and the Mariners have plenty that fall into this category.
From this point, and the reason Jack gets multiple assistants and still gets the big bucks, the Mariners need to figure out who gets added, which positions will need to be filled by new players and etc... but I will leave that part to the experts.
Therefore, adding a young player to the 40 man, especially a reliever, probably does not make much sense. However, adding a Brian Sweeney or other veteran you do not care about for the future DOES make sense. So I would not be surprised to see the Mariners add a free agent like Travis Blackley or Mark Reynolds and such just to see if there is anything there for next year - or just get us through the year without hurting any young arms.
Feel free to add anything I missed Doc, Gordon or Spec...