La Piedra locks down the Braves, Mariners win 3-2 despite more late drama for series victory over Atlanta
By Charles Hamaker
Seattle, WA – The struggles of the first few weeks for the Seattle Mariners are beginning to feel like a whole different season, as the ballclub has turned their results around in a big way which includes their series win over the Atlanta Braves with tonight’s 3-2 victory. The Mariners offense only mustered three runs, coming from a two-run homer by Jorge Polanco and an RBI double from Dylan Moore, but that was just enough as starting pitcher Luis Castillo continued the teams historic stretch run of great pitching and Andrés Muñoz recorded the first five-out save of his young career. While there must be an improvement at the plate for the Mariners, just barely picking up wins in the last few games, Seattle finding a way to get these wins is a great sign for the group's resiliency and fight. While it is still early for the 2024 campaign, the Mariners of last season didn’t typically get these sorts of victories and if Seattle can maintain this level of fight against the best teams in baseball, another postseason run is coming.
Hip hip, Jorge!
The first few innings of this contest saw both teams pick up a base runner per half inning, but nothing was getting past first base as both starting pitchers in Reynaldo López and Luis Castillo were able to work around the men that they allowed in those opportunities. Those first two innings came and went without any real drama, before the third and fourth innings where Seattle did their only offensive damage of the night. After singling to lead off the bottom of the first inning, Josh Rojas drew a walk in his second plate appearance to put a runner on for the Mariners yet again. Lopez threw Seattle second baseman Jorge Polanco a changeup outside for ball one, and thought that perhaps another changeup might fool him, but the only issue was that it sat directly in the heart of the strike zone. Polanco powered the ball on a line drive out to right-field for a two-run homer, providing an instant spark and a jolt of life to the fans at T-Mobile Park. The Braves responded with another single but nothing else at the top of the inning, before Seattle was able to use some small ball to add the third run, a necessary tally for later in this ballgame. Singles by Mitch Haniger and Luke Raley provided some traffic against Lopez for Dylan Moore, who has struggled offensively since filling in at the shortstop position while J.P. Crawford deals with that Grade One Oblique strain. Moore jumped on a slider near the middle-top of the zone and lined it to the left field wall, allowing Haniger to score from second, pushing Raley and himself into scoring position. Another Josh Rojas walk, his second of a three-walk night, loaded the bases for Julio Rodríguez who was unable to come through with the bags filled for the second time in two games.
Getting into a stressful situation
With the success that their bats saw against Lopez, Seattle struggled against Atlanta’s Jesse Chavez out of the bullpen and couldn’t really get anything going at the plate outside of Josh Rojas completing his three-walk night. The Mariners turned things over to Ryne Stanek following seven shutout innings from Luis Castillo, and that’s where the bad sort of chaos showed up for Seattle. Stanek struggled immediately into his outing, as he gave up a single to Travis d’Arnaud and a wild pitch allowed d’Arnaud to move into scoring position at second base. Former Mariner Jarred Kelenic singled on a tough play to Jorge Polanco at second, and a lineout by Ronald Acuña Jr. allowed d’Arnaud to tag up and advance to third, putting runners on the corners with just one out. An Ozzie Albies single to left scored d’Arnaud from third easily and put runners on first and second with still just one out, ending Stanek’s day and forcing Scott Servais to call for Andrés Muñoz out of the bullpen. Muñoz got Austin Riley to make weak contact, but it was so weak that the ball just barely dribbled out in front of the plate in an awkward position for him and catcher Cal Raleigh. With a runner coming towards him from second, Raleigh didn’t want to leave the plate unprotected and Muñoz was unsure if he should go for it considering where the ball had rolled to. Andrés eventually did try to make a play at first, but considering the tough angle and the runner headed to first his attempt to get the ball just out of line went wide of Ty France and allowed Kelenic to come around and score.
It appeared that the situation may get even worse for Seattle as the team intentionally walked Matt Olson to load the bases, but it showed confidence in Muñoz to be able to clean up the situation at hand. Muñoz was able to get Marcell Ozuna to strike out, and thanks to the help of a lunging effort by Dylan Moore, get Orlando Arcia to ground out and hold that Mariners lead at just the one run. In disappointing fashion, Seattle was unable to do anything in the way of adding insurance runs in the bottom of the eighth inning, turning things back over to Muñoz in the top of the ninth to attempt a five-out save. Muñoz retired the side in order, including getting former teammate Jarred Kelenic to go down swinging, giving the Mariners an impressive series win over the Braves.
This is an impressive early season run...
As we’ve discussed over a few games, including last night’s win for game one of this series, the Mariners being able to win games such as this is a positive that they will need to learn from. While yes, it is frustrating that they haven’t been better at the plate and could certainly be making some better swing decisions/taking advantage of more of the pitches in areas that they should be hammering, I’d rather them be able to find different ways to win these tight and tough games than have them lose and have to learn in addition to having to make up games in the standings throughout the year. Winning and learning from those wins should always be the goal, as losing and having to learn from those defeats is something that’s valuable but doesn’t always help when so many of these games can matter down the line, with falling one game short of the postseason last year being a prime example of that.
Quick Mariners notes
23,534 was the announced attendance at T-Mobile Park for the second game of this three-game series between the Atlanta Braves and our Seattle Mariners.
That’s 49% capacity of T-Mobile Park (47,943)
Sockeye was the winner of tonight’s Mariners “Salmon Run”
2024 Leaderboard, so far
King: 8 wins
Sockeye: 6 wins
Silver: 4 wins
Humpy: 0 wins
The Green Muckleshoot Casino boat was tonight’s winner of the Mariners “Hydro Challenge.”
2024 Leaderboard, so far
Green boat: 7 wins
Yellow boat: 7 wins
Red boat: 4 wins
Seattle secured their 5th consecutive series victory with the 3-2 win over the Braves…they improve to 17-13 on the season and 10-8 at T-Mobile Park.
Seattle has handed Atlanta its first back-to-back losses this season.
The Mariners are 7-2 over their last 9, 11-3 over their last 14 and 13-5 over their last 18 contests.
Seattle’s 11-3 mark since April 15 is tied for best record in MLB with Philadelphia in that span.
The Mariners 1.61 ERA (29 ER, 162.0 IP) over their last 18 games (4/10-c) is their best in franchise history over an 18-game span.
The 1.61 ERA is the best in the Majors across an 18-game stretch since Cleveland’s 1.60 ERA from Aug. 28-Sept. 14, 2017.
Starting pitchers for the Mariners have now gone 18-straight games without allowing more than 2 earned runs in an outing…the last team to do that was the 2022 Los Angeles Dodgers, from April 20-May 11 that season.
In the 3rd inning, Jorge Polanco opened the scoring with a 2-run home run…it was his 4th of the season and his first since 4/15…he is tied with Mitch Haniger for 2nd-most on the Mariners this season.
Josh Rojas reached base in each of his 4 plate appearances out of the leadoff spot…he was 1-for-1 with 1 run scored, 3 walks and 1 stolen base.
Luis Castillo made his 7th start this season…he threw 7.0 scoreless innings and allowed just 3 hits and 1 walk with 7 strikeouts…earned his 3rd win in his last 3 starts.
Each of his last 4 starts have been quality (6.0+ IP, 3-or-fewer ER).
Over those 4 outings, he is 3-1 with a 1.38 ERA (4 ER, 26.0 IP) and a 0.77 WHIP.
Seattle relievers (Ryne Stanek and Andrés Muñoz) finished the game throwing 2.0 innings with 2 runs allowed, 4 hits allowed, 1 walk allowed (1 intentional) and 3 strikeouts.
This was Muñoz’s first career 5-out save and his 5th save of the year.
Atlanta challenged a safe call at first base in the 5th inning on a Jorge Polanco groundball…the challenge was successful.
What’s next?
Following tonight’s home win over the Atlanta Braves at T-Mobile Park, giving the Seattle Mariners the series win over the Braves, Seattle seeks the sweep in tomorrow’s series and homestand finale. The Braves and Mariners meet for the third and final time in this series tomorrow, Wednesday May 1st, with a first pitch time of 12:40PM PDT that will be broadcast on Root Sports Northwest within their market (Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Alaska) and on the radio at 710 AM. Atlanta will have veteran left hander Chris Sale on the mound to duel against young Seattle starter Emerson Hancock in this game as the Mariners are looking for their second sweep of the season. This Wednesday matinee game is also the third and finale Mariners value game of this series, as fans can get into the ballpark for just $10.
