Griffey’s latest prank targets M’s catching coordinator Hansen

Non-Speedy Graphito strikes again!

Roger Hansen was working with players on minor league fields Wednesday when he was asked to report to one of the upper fields near the Seattle Mariners’ spring training clubhouse.

“I was tipped off that I needed to head up to Field 2 to look at those players,” said Hansen, the Mariners’ popular catching coordinator who lives in Stanwood. “As I started to walk up, I saw the thing.”

“The thing” was something larger than life orchestrated by someone larger than life.

Covering the entire 60-foot-by-30 “batter’s eye” on the center field fence at Field 1 was a photo of Ken Griffey Jr. embracing Hansen along the dugout railing at Peoria Stadium.

The photo was shot early in spring training and Griffey, whose friendship with Hansen goes back to their days as minor league roommates in 1988, decided to have some fun with it. Early this month he had copies hung from the training room wall before Hansen pulled them down.