Winning Ugly

By Blaidd Drwg

Last night, aided by 6 walks and 3 HR, the Mariners had one of the ugliest 7-0 victories I have ever seen against Tampa Bay. The Mariners actually only had 4 hits in the game, but because of the timeliness of the hitting and the fine pitching of Jason Vargas, it did not matter.

The ugliness of the game was punctuated by the 3rd inning where the Mariners sent 9 guys to the plate, had 1 hit, hit one ball out of the infield and still scored 3 runs. Here is the play by play:

C Peguero hit by pitch.
I Suzuki walked, C Peguero to second.
B Ryan sacrificed into fielder’s choice to catcher, C Peguero to third, I Suzuki to second.
J Smoak walked, C Peguero scored, I Suzuki to third, B Ryan to second.
J Cust grounded out to first, I Suzuki scored, B Ryan to third, J Smoak to second.
F Gutierrez lined out to shortstop.
A Kennedy intentionally walked.
M Olivo reached on infield single to third, B Ryan scored, J Smoak to third, A Kennedy to second.
C Figgins lined out to center.

This could have been a much bigger inning if the Mariners managed to put a ball in play that went more than 90 feet. It is a fundamental problem with this team, but that is for another post.

In other Mariners news, before the game they sent down Michael Saunders to Tacoma and called up Greg Halman. I am not a big fan of Halman, he strikes out way too much and doesn’t take walks, but do we really need to carry 5 outfielders? The M’s seem committed to trucking Peguero and his .170 BA out to LF every day and they have Mike Wilson on the bench as a backup OF. Halman is not going to play every day, so why not leave him in Tacoma where he can get regular AB’s instead of riding the bench in the bigs?