(San Francisco, CA) In a season that has been consistently inconsistent, the Seattle Mariners had a chance to win their fifth straight game on Wednesday night and sweep the San Francisco Giants in the process. An injury to Bryce Miller forced the rookie to miss the start so Tommy Milone made his second spot start of the season. While Milone was good, Alex Cobb stole the show for the Giants as they got back at the Mariners with their own shutout, avoiding the sweep 2-0.
There wasn’t a lot of action in the finale of the series. A good ole’ fashioned pitcher’s duel was the theme of the game as Tommy Milone and Alex Cobb traded zeros for most of the game. In the bottom of the 3rd, the Giants would land the first shot. A leadoff walk for Brandon Crawford got the inning started for San Fran. Wilmer Flores then hit a grounder that hit the third base bag and popped into left field to put runners at the corners with one out. LaMonte Wade Jr. hit a deep fly ball to center that was too deep for Julio Rodriguez to try to make a play at the plate. Crawford scored easily and San Francisco took a 1-0 lead.
Seattle squandered a few scoring opportunities early in the game and then the Mariner defense gave the Giants another run. In the bottom of the 5th, Austin Slater was on second after a walk and a single by Wilmer Flores. LaMonte Wade Jr. hit another deep fly ball to straightaway centerfield. Julio Rodriguez looked like he had it under control but the ball ended up popping off his glove for an E8. That allowed Slater to score and extended the Giant lead to 2-0. Ty Adcock came in to replace Tommy Milone after that and pitched his way out of trouble to keep the deficit right where it was at.
It wasn’t just the Mariners struggling to hit with runners on. The Giants struggled as well. Combined, the teams went 0-17 with runners in scoring position. Some of the credit has to go to both pitching staffs with Alex Cobb as the headliner. The San Francisco starter went six innings and gave up six hits but didn’t allow a run or a walk while striking out seven.
In the bottom of the 7th it looked like San Francisco would break the game open against Justin Topa. One out singles by Wilmer Flores and LaMonte Wade Jr. started a threat for the Giants. After striking out J.D. Davis for the second out, Topa would hit Patrick Bailey on a 1-1 pitch to load the bases. Scott Servais would decide to bring in Tayler Saucedo who had been struggling mightily as of late. The lefty put an end to those struggles as he got Michael Conforto to groundout to Kolten Wong at second to escape the bases loaded jam with no damage done.
Back in the opener of the series, Seattle hit All-Star closer Camilo Doval extremely well as it was Doval’s worst outing of the season. They wouldn’t have nearly as much success this time around. Doval went right through Mike Ford, Eugenio Suarez, and Jarred Kelenic for a 1-2-3 top of the 9th to record his 25th save of the season and shutting down the Mariner sweep attempt 2-0.
Seattle (42-43) will now head to Houston to wrap up the first half of the season with a four-game series against the Houston Astros. In the opener, George Kirby (7-7, 3.21 ERA) will get the ball for the Mariners against the banged up Astro lineup. Houston (49-38) has not announced who their starter will be in game one.
Matt’s Takeaways
All things considered, this was a good series. It built on the big series win with Tampa Bay and gives the team a chance to really feel good about themselves at the break. The best part was that the Mariners were scoring by stringing together hits. Only two home runs were hit by the M’s in the three games so they had to manufacture runs another way which is something they haven’t done this season. They also did this all without arguably their best hitter in Ty France. Logan Gilbert obviously stole the show and had the best outing of his entire career. If he can have some sort of consistency, this rotation could really put the Mariners in a position to make a second half run. With the Astros being as banged up as they are, three out of four wins would have Seattle really humming heading into the second half.
Notable Performances
Mariners
Cal Raleigh- 2-3, 2B
J.P. Crawford- 2-4, 2B
Tommy Milone (L, 0-1)- 4.1 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 0 SO
Giants
Alex Cobb (W, 6-2)- 6 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 SO
