Games 112+113, Mariners at Royals
Game 1: Marco Gonzales vs. Danny Duffy, 11:15am
Game 2: Erasmo Ramirez vs. Jake Junis
The M’s schedule this month is already brutal enough, so this double-header-on-getaway-day feels extra cruel. The M’s now face an important day of baseball with a guy making his M’s debut and another pitching his 2nd game for the M’s, and who may be limited to 70-80 pitches. Kind of like Andrew Moore’s first game, it is imperative that Marco Gonzales give the M’s some innings today.
I talked about Danny Duffy in yesterday’s game post, so let’s review Jake Junis. He throws a sinking four-seamer from a low-ish arm slot, which he uses to set up a slurvy slider with a ton of horizontal movement. Brooks says he throws a curve as well, but it’s so similar to the ‘slider’ it may just be reclassifying the slowest of them as a different pitch. Whatever you call it, Junis’ slurve is an effective pitch, especially to righties. In his short career though, he’s struggled against righties just as much, as his fastball’s been destroyed by them.
Game 1:
1: Segura, SS
2: Valencia, 1B
3: Cano, 2B
4: Cruz, DH
5: Seager, 3B
6: Heredia, CF
7: Gamel, LF
8: Zunino, C
9: Martin, RF
SP: Gonzales
Cody Martin’s been recalled as the 26th man today. That’s not the big story on the transaction wire, though. The M’s just traded R’s CF Boog Powell to Oakland for A’s 1B Yonder Alonso. I know the market for bat-first players is as low as it’s been in…ever, and I know Alonso’s struggled after a red-hot start, but holy crap. Like Tyler O’Neill, Powell was always going to struggle for consistent playing time here. Yonder Alonso will immediately start each game vs. RHPs, and maybe a few vs. lefties. The M’s got better today.
The Rainiers beat Memphis 5-4 thanks to a 9th inning comeback and a walk-off single by Taylor Motter. The big hero of the comeback was speedy CF Ian Miller, who got a bunt single and a stolen base. Andrew Moore starts today.
Tulsa destroyed Arkansas 13-1. The less said the better. Nick Neidert takes the hill today for the Travs.
The Nuts won 11-10 behind four hits by Eric Filia. Robert Dugger starts today.
Clinton lost 5-1 despite a 2B and 1B from Jhombaker Morales. Ljay Newsome takes the mound for the L-Kings today.
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Seven pitchers so far, and they will use at least Vincent before it’s over I would think. Then Erasmo will give them five innings, they hope, and someone(s) will have to pitch in both games.
Wow the timing on this Vincent implosion is very disheartening….
The timing of not getting that runner home from third is not very encouraging either.
“So, any of you other guys wanna pitch?”–what Servais probably wants to ask his non-pitchers between games.
David Phelps left the first game with tightness in his elbow, but at least they acquired another first baseman.
Erasmo leaves a meat ball in the middle of the plate….and here we go.
My good feelings from the first game have all but left the building with that HR..
Yeah, good thing we got ANOTHER 1st baseman, since our pitching is going so well…wow. If we DO make the WC, we won’t last one round.
ARGHHH! WHY did we trade for a first baseman??? I guess that is why….but if we had decent pitching, we wouldn’t need it.
That old Vince McMahon walk up song is playing in my head right now as I get score updates for this game. “You got no chance, no chance in hell”
Is there some thought that Jerry Freaking Dipoto can’t work more than one trade in any given period of time? That Boog Freaking Powell was the critical piece that would have landed us Clayton Kershaw if Jerry hadn’t just given him away to get the best first baseman this franchise has had in awhile?
Yeah, if there’s pitching to be had, Jerry will be out there overpaying for it. Don’t worry, he’s on the job. Meanwhile, for 2017 Alonso was a heck of a get.
and Zunino is once again completely lost at the plate
Do you remember Robert Ramsay from the 1999-2000 Ms’ bullpen (and WSU and Vancouver WA before that)? I hadn’t realized that he’d battled brain cancer ever since then and died a year ago (glioblastoma multiforme, the same cancer that killed Gary Carter and Tug McGraw, as well as Ted Kennedy and Joe Biden’s son, and that John McCain has).
He and his wife remained active as runners and climbers, after he died his wife climbed more than ever — but was killed by lightning several days ago while climbing the Matterhorn.
http://www.oregonlive.com/today/index.ssf/2017/08/she_found_peace_in_climbing_af.html#incart_most-read_
Sad; RIP.
Wow, that’s very tragic.
And now, Felix is out again for 3-4 weeks with shoulder bursitis, according to the team. I expect he will either be out longer than that, or else will be sub-par when he comes back – it’s an inflammation injury, and can linger for quite a while even after you’re mostly rid of it (my knees can tell you that)
Phelps is out 10 days at least with an elbow impingement.
Man, this team is snakebitten when it comes to pitching injuries. Although we knew, given his age and recent history, that some of the expectations around Felix were unfortunately best-case scenarios… but with pitching overall, I think the team has ended up closer to the “worst case” end of things.
With so many pitching injuries, I’d say there needs to be a very close examination of training programs.
Game 114 is not starting well.
1 out into the game and its already getting out of hand… It’s going to be a slow burn heading into the offseason.
This team may hang around .500 but they certainly aren’t making any wild card games or certainly a playoff series. Sad. The pitching simply isn’t there.
Okay Mariners, let’s take advantage of this.
That works…
Nice to see the OTHER team walk the bases loaded for once. Now do something with it, guys!
… Crap.
Nice defense there, Alonzo.
I hadn’t looked at his defensive numbers before – Alonzo is a rather bad defensive first baseman.
Hey there, Leonys Martin! 7-6 Mariners!
Come on, Diaz. I’m getting sick of watching you channel your inner Jose Mesa.
That’s out number TWO, Edwin. Not three.
Thank god, they needed that win.
Nice to see Martin continue to show us we have a deep outfield if we need it.
Probably the most infuriating part of this season is with any semblance of pitching health, this is potentially a 95-win team.
The M’s are now tied with KC for the second Wild Card slot. And remarkably have the best record in the AL since the All-Star break? The whole league is playing down to their level now?
When is the last time we’ve been in a playoff spot this late in a season? I can’t even remember. Even when we missed by a game a few years back I don’t know if we were ever actually tied or ahead of anybody for the wild card or division. 2002???
Fan Graphs had us at 26% chance of Wild Card before last nights win BP has us at 31.2% today with the win and other’s losses. Basically the odds of an Ichiro or Edgar hit )
Amazing checked the all time leaders… Edgar and Ichiro are in a dead tie for career average at .3115 for 91st all time. Talk about two different ways to skin a cat.
No Lead Is Safe with Gallardo on the mound… spot him 3 runs and he promptly starts giving it back.
Still on track to win 27-9!
In all seriousness, I’ll take every early run we can get.
Not only do we have the best record in the league since the all star break (15-9), they’ve done most of their damage on the road (10-4).
Gallardo is making me crazy…
Galllardo is a lot like Felix….
In the fact that he’ll take 100 pitches to go 5 innings.
The offense looks like they won’t give this one up easily tho. It’s a shame we gotta hit the pen so early.
The rub is this is the perfect type of game to bring… Gallardo out of the deep pen to go 3-4 innings in a blow out. Leave it to him to make his sub-efficient start require his unexplainably solid mop-up skills.
Don’t look now but the M’s have made up 5 games in the standings on Houston over the last 11 games for each. Only 13 back. Why settle for a Wild Card!
Sowulo- right on. We’ve made up 13 games with less time in the season left before 🙂
I hate, “Let’s try for 2nd place, we’re not good enough for 1st.” That is a terrible attitude to play with.