Mariners create new kind of win, beat Rockies 6-4

If there’s a Mariners-style win this year in the Non-Chaos Division, it’s probably this: a strong tee shot keeps the opposing team on the ground enough for the offense to slowly stack a few points on the board, either by scratching a few points with a starter bouncing on the soft stomach of another team’s pen, then the bullpen comes in and closes the door. The majority of the heavy offensive lift is done by the top three batters, who drag the rest of the lineup behind them, with the low lineup sometimes punishing a pitch error for a solo homeroom. Tonight the Mariners reversed the script a bit, spreading the offense across the lineup and overcoming a late-inning hiccup to secure at least a split streak with the Rockies, meaning the Mariners haven’t lost. standard since the Yankees came to town. beginning of July.

The last time the Mariners faced Germán Márquez, he had a perfect game heading into the sixth inning, when Taylor Trammell ended it with a solo home run. With Trammell out of the lineup tonight, it looked like Marquez might not be perfecting the Mariners – Cal Raleigh walked in his first major league walk in the second inning to put an end to that idea early on. start – but a non-hitter felt very present at the table, as the Mariners’ approach of preventing Marquez from reaching a two-stroke count and being able to deploy his curved ball by swaying on the first pitch only resulted in Quick innings for Marquez until the fourth inning, when Kyle Seager thankfully finished a non-hit-watch by dipping just one into centerfield. Cal Raleigh followed up with his very first MLB hit, but Jarred Kelenic and Dylan Moore struck to end any threat.

Cal Raleigh had a great evening tonight on both sides of the dish – we’ll come back to his offensive impact a bit later – as he helped Marco out of a small problem early on after Garrett Hampson scored three throws in the game. Marco struck out Connor Joe at bat for injured Chris Owings, but during that strike Raleigh scored another first: his first MLB was caught stealing.

Marco stepped on Trevor Story but got Charlie Blackmon to end the round for a clean first run. Overall, her things looked a lot better tonight; his misses were mostly limit throws instead of the big misses they have been, and the change was a particularly good weapon for him tonight, generating both puffs and weak contact.

The only speedbump Marco hit tonight was in the fifth round; he walked eight-hole hitter Joshua Fuentes on five pitches, then gave Connor Joe a bad pitch – 88 in the middle of the middle – which Joe redirected to 440 feet for a two-point shot without a doubt, not helped by Coors. This would be Marco’s last run of the night, and two runs in five runs isn’t going to improve his ERA significantly, but after recapping Marco’s latest starts (and I was sad doing it), I can attest that it was much better -watching a release than his previous few.

Now down 2-0, it looked like the game was heading down a particularly silly lane as Mitch Haniger started the next set with a solid hit but was thrown trying to stretch what was perhaps a single. generously sized in a double. but without the necessary fuss. Seager then hit a double that probably would have scored Haniger if he hadn’t had a sudden attack of bad decisions, then France hit a single that would DEFINITELY have scored Mitch had he not been passed by the farticus brainicus. That left the scoring opportunity in the hands of tender-footed young rookie Cal Raleigh. I think I actually said out loud, “No pressure, Cal.”

Do this Cal without pressure:

Jarred Kelenic scored the second inning of the round, which put any chance of scoring the go-ahead in the thin but strong hands of a Dylan Moore. DMo has had a scuffle this year, especially on accessible pitches in the area, which may be why Marquez felt like he could get away with a slider in the middle of him. And true to form, DMo made a mistake on this very accessible ground. But then Marquez came back to that well a second time, and this time, this time, Dylan didn’t miss:

Intermediate production? Extra-basic moves and homers? This is not the typical formula, but we are not crazy about it, no we are not. Of course because this is a Mariners win there had to be top notch production, thanks to Mr. Ty France who saw the Mariners try to waste a two-way opportunity and said NO .

Those two extra races would prove to be important because, once again, boldly breaking out of the genre conventions of a Mariners victory in 2021, the bullpen actually wobbled a bit tonight, making the game a bit more upsetting. than it could have been.

JT Chargois replaced Marco in the fifth and managed to post a clean run but needed an assist from Shed Long, who took down Ryan McMahon trying to go from first to third on an Elias Díaz single. No, like, literally, like once again the infielder’s trope as an outfielder is reversed:

Drew Steckenrider also worked a scoreless inning, this time with help from Cal Raleigh behind the dish:

Again, having suffered some questionable receptions from Torrens earlier this season, it’s fresh and fun to have a receiver as good as Cal there. He’s had a few hiccups here and there, as you would expect when a young receiver goes from the same familiar pitches in minors to a whole new staff of pitchers (including some who weren’t even with the club. big league during spring practice), but overall Cal was as impressive behind the dish as he was.

The biggest swing in the bullpen has come from the man who has been the most reliable arm over the past few weeks. Charlie Blackmon led the 8th by tripling against Paul Sewald, then CJ Cron, who stands at the plate like salami hanging in a butcher’s shop window, ambushed a first throw slider that slipped into the upper middle of the area, redirecting it 465 feet into the Colorado sunset. Sewald rebounded for McMahon to fly off a fastball and Díaz to gently exit on the slider before hitting batter Brendan Rodgers on the slider again. Cursors aren’t easy to throw at Coors Field and it looked like Sewald had found his grip on the pitch by the end of it, but there was still an inning to go with the Mariners’ lead reduced to two decidedly out of the way. Coors test. .

After Carlos Estévez, casually pitching 98-99, brushed aside the top of the Mariners’ order at the start of 8th (Hanger got on, but Seager and France struck to put an end to any idea of ​​running insurance), the upset feelings became a bit more pronounced when Kendall Graveman started with hitter Raimel Tapia. Why stray from the kind that produced so much success in the first half, I couldn’t help but wonder. Play the old stuff! Free Bird! Etc. Thankfully, Graveman – himself throwing a cool 97-98 – bounced back for Hampson to chase his cursor, followed by an easy crush of Connor Joe’s bat, and then fired Trevor Story, who should be released from prison in the Rockies ASAP, over three lengths, ending on another nasty Story slider driven from the area. Maybe the occasional gender change isn’t that bad. After all, if Ian Fleming had never given up on spy novels, we wouldn’t have Disneyland’s second best ride. Have fun in the second half of the season.