PEORIA, Ariz.  No teams hit more home runs last season than the Yankees and the Philadelphia Phillies, who met in the World Series. Cliff Lee, who won twice in that series, understands that reality.  Yet when Lee looks around the Seattle Mariners’ clubhouse at the Peoria Sports Complex, it is hard to accept the premise that power still matters. The gloves practically sparkle from his new teammates’ lockers.  “It’s going to be a defensive-oriented, pitching-oriented team, and as a starting pitcher, I’ve got to like that,” Lee said on Wednesday. “That’s a huge part of winning. This is an organization that’s starting to show that’s important, and I think it’s going to catch on.”  Few teams open the exhibition season with more optimism than the Mariners, who won 85 games last season, then signed the free-agent infielder Chone Figgins and traded three prospects to the Phillies for Lee. They extended the contracts of center fielder Franklin Gutierrez and shortstop Jack Wilson, both defensive standouts, and locked up the ace starter Felix Hernandez through 2014.  Considering that the Mariners had the best earned run average in the American League last season, at 3.87, improving pitching and defense at spacious Safeco Field has made Seattle a serious threat to the Los Angeles Angels in the A.L. West. But there could be a problem.  “You’ve got to hit, either way,” Lee said, dryly. “You’ve got to score runs or the game’s never going to end.”  The Mariners scored only 640 runs last season, the fewest in the league. No team had ever won as many games while scoring so infrequently. The Mariners did not re-sign first baseman Russell Branyan, who led the team in homers with 31, trading instead for Casey Kotchman, a better defender.  “There’s not a general manager in baseball who wouldn’t take a 3 or 4 hitter if they knock on his door tomorrow, and I would be one of them,” Mariners General Manager Jack Zduriencik said. “Certainly you’d be happy to add 30 home runs to your lineup. But in the grand scheme of things, you either score runs or prevent runs, and we did a pretty good job last year of preventing runs.”  Zduriencik addressed the offense with Figgins, who led the league in walks for the Angels and will bat second, behind Ichiro Suzuki. Batting third will be Milton Bradley, the left fielder acquired from the Chicago Cubs for starter Carlos Silva.  The Mariners’ fate could rest largely on Bradley. If he is the offensive force he was for Texas in 2008, when he led the league in on base plus slugging percentage, the Mariners will score. But if he slumps as he did last season in Chicago, when he clashed with management and fans, the Mariners will suffer.  “Any time I’ve had a problem anywhere, it’s because I’ve been disrespected,” said Bradley, who is playing for his eighth team in 11 seasons. “And I will not be disrespected by anyone.”  To that end, Zduriencik said he was confident in the culture of the Mariners’ clubhouse. Manager Don Wakamatsu lets players be themselves, and the veteran Ken Griffey Jr. keeps teammates loose with biting humor and nearly nonstop commentary on everything that crosses his line of vision.  Even if he is comfortable, Bradley must stay on the field. He has played more than 130 games just once in his career. But if he is healthy and productive, the Mariners have a dangerous hitter behind Suzuki and Figgins, who put things in motion with their speed.  “When you’re athletic, you’re able to do more things through the course of a season, instead of just playing one type of ball,” Figgins said. “We’ve got guys that can hit the ball out of the park, guys that hit doubles, guys that bunt for base hits, guys that can go first to third. Stuff like that, through the course of a season, comes into play big.”  After their first game Wednesday, an 8-7 loss in 10 innings to the San Francisco Giants, Wakamatsu was delighted that his team drew nine walks, stole two bases and moved up on a wild pitch. The Mariners saw 33 pitches in the first inning off the Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum, and Jose Lopez slapped a hit-and-run single with Bradley running from first.  “To me, it’s scoring as many runs as we can, whatever that number is,” Wakamatsu said. “As simplistic as that is, that’s our approach. I can’t come out and say, ‘We need to hit 200 home runs this year.’ That’s something I really don’t have any control over. What we can do is be aggressive.”  Wakamatsu is bringing Hernandez and Lee along slowly in spring training, and a fifth-starter candidate, Doug Fister, started on Wednesday. The third and fourth starters are Ian Snell and Ryan Rowland-Smith, part of an unimposing staff that took advantage of strong defense last season.  “Our pitching was outstanding,” Griffey said. “We’ve got to give them a little bit more help. We’ve got one of the best 1-2 punches in baseball. It’s just a matter of going out there and getting some runs early and letting them pitch their ballgame.”  Griffey, 40, was carried off the field with Suzuki after the final game of last season. The Mariners had lost 101 games the year before, and the fans stood and roared in appreciation for the turnaround.  The scene has stayed with Zduriencik, who still marvels at the fans’ enthusiasm for a team that had finished in third place. He gave them more to like this winter, and knows what that means.  “Now, there’s a big challenge,” Zduriencik said, “because people are expecting a lot of great things from us.”
The Mariners last season won 85 games, had the best E.R.A. in the A.L. but an offense that lacked any punch.