Something Has Got to Turn for the Seattle Mariners

Last night, the Mariners dropped the series opener against the Angels by a score of 5-4. It was a game script that Mariners fans have become too infuriatingly familiar with. The Mariners scored first in the third but then immediately gave it back in the bottom half of the inning. In the 4th inning the Mariners loaded the baseball against Angels starter Kyle Hendricks. Tellez hit a sacrifice fly to deep right field that would have been a Grand Slam in 24/30 MLB Ballparks, including T-Mobile Park. The Mariners could only add on one more run this inning and went from having an opportunity to knock the Angels out early, to only leading 3-1. Then came Bryce Miller who in his first start back from injury followed a lot of Mariners pitchers' recent woes and could not finish innings. In the bottom of the 4th inning, Miller got the first two batters out, then allowing a 2-out single to Jorge Soler and then a 2-Run Home Run to Travis d’Arnaud, tying the game 3-3. Julio in the 5th had a massive triple to make it 4-3 but the Mariners then immediately gave the Angels a 5-4 lead in the bottom half of that inning. The Angels took this lead and ran with it to take the first game of the series, giving Kyle Hendricks his 100th career win and the Mariners another stinging loss.

The Seattle Mariners have now lost 11 of their last 16, seeing a 3.5 game division lead collapse to being 2.5 games back. The offense has regressed back to their old form, they strike out too much and don’t take advantage of clear scoring opportunities. The only players that seemingly contribute at all on offense as of late are J.P. Crawford, Julio Rodriguez and Cal Raleigh who has obviously been their main contributor. This coincided with a pitching staff that still has not found their past form largely due to injuries but also just not executing in crucial moments. The simple main diagnosis for this horrendous Mariners stretch of games is that they can't find ways to take advantage of scoring opportunities and on the pitching side just can’t find a way to get out of an inning. The amount of crucial 2-out hits and Home Runs in this stretch of games is just sickening. 

The Mariners today are going up against Jack Kochanowicz who they saw earlier this year on April 29th in a game where they won 5-3, carried on the back of a red hot Jorge Polanco who provided all 5 of the Mariners runs. That red hot Jorge Polanco isn’t here right now so the Mariners will have to figure it out on offense with Luis Castillo on the mound who the Mariners need more than ever to give a quality outing. Especially, because, looking towards Sunday where you have a struggling George Kirby, still getting his legs under him coming back from injury, going up against the Angels best pitcher in Tyler Anderson.  

The Mariners need to do something, literally anything, to get back to winning form. Because, while it’s only June and there is a lot of baseball to be played, these types of stretches are why the Mariners in years past have consistently found themselves at the end of the season just one game back from making the playoffs. 

This stretch isn’t season ending, especially this time of year. In fact, it was late June of 2022 where an underperforming Mariners team was at Angels Stadium for a series and lost the series finale to drop to a 34-40 record. But that was the game where the infamous Angels-Mariners brawl happened that was partially credited for the Mariners turning their season around and helping them break the drought. But this bad of a stretch does require urgency to turn it around, so while I’m not advocating for another full out brawl, it would be nice to see some more fight in the Mariners on the field.