The Mariners lost another spring training game today, once again allowing the other team to eclipse runs worth a football point while scoring few runs themselves (minus those scored by the kids in trash time). However, this game was still more worth watching than yesterday because… more things happened. Some of it was good and a lot more of it was bad, but at least something happened because no game that puts Julio Rodríguez in front and places him in midfield can ever be boring.
Julio’s performance is a microcosm of the highs and lows of today’s game. The Good: Julio started with a leadoff double by ambushing a first-pitch fastball from former Mariner Drew Smyly. The bad: He then did a little baserunning oopsie when Ty France sat in the middle and dove in for third instead of running home – a mistake that caught on for the rest of the front of the lineup (Winker, Haniger and Suárez) made three straight outs. Ouch. But double!
Worse, Julio dropped a ball cold in the sun and recorded three more strikeouts after his leadoff double: one by Smyly, who refused to even say the word “fastball” to Julio; one by former Met Robert Gsellman, who painted 93 directly on the outside corner; and one from AL West’s former weathered lighthouse Jesse Chavez, who didn’t throw anything at him that wasn’t four feet from Julio’s bat. However, he redeemed his slip in the outfield with this nice running catch that ended a big inning for the Cubs:
Julio makes up for his earlier mistake in the outfield by tracking down that hard fly ball to end the inning and stop the Cubs from extending their lead: pic.twitter.com/LAZdfDs2F7
— Lookout Landing (@LookoutLanding) March 30, 2022
Marco’s performance today was also characterized by ups and downs. The Treble: He looked sharp and efficient early on with his pitches. Marco hit seven batsmen, including this absolutely sneaky sequence in the second where he hit the side:
Good morning Jason Heyward:
Hello Ian Happ
Good night, Clint Frazier:
But Marco also allowed nine hits over 4.2 innings, including three doubles and a home run — Seiya Suzuki’s first hit as a cub and a highlight you’ll no doubt watch ad nauseam wherever you get your baseball news. As sharp as he looked in the beginning, Marco left spots in the zone in the middle innings and they were penalized. At the end of the day Marco had given up just one run less (6) than struck out (7). The 85 pitches Marco has thrown likely signal the last of his Cactus League action to be ready for the opening series in (gulp) a week.
Marco’s battery mate for the day, Cal Raleigh, who played the entire game, had two strikeouts of his own, but he worked a walk and hit a three (a true three, not a spring training three) and then hit on a beam to give the Mariners her first run of the day:
Jarred Kelenic doesn’t know what “duality” means, so he just had a good game, racking up two singles and no strikeouts in his three at-bats. We love this for him (and for us).
Kelenic executed some nice at-bats today and was rewarded with two baseshots, including this solidly-hit: pic.twitter.com/NtCBNvpSnA
— Lookout Landing (@LookoutLanding) March 30, 2022
That hit came from Mitch Haniger, who had just one hit and struck twice, but his strike was a double tattoo in the right field corner, just missing as Oppo Taco. Kelenic also scored the only other run of the day for the Mariners’ starters, meaning he was involved in two of the starters’ three runs. It’s good; Another day your starters scrape three runs or fewer is less good. (To be fair, I should mention here that Ty France has had two singles and continues to look like the top hitter in the Mariners, the non-Abraham Toro division. Ty France tried duality once and didn’t like it. He respects always make sure to ask the restaurant if their ice cream is just plain vanilla or vanilla bean.)
Also in the good/bad/mostly bad column: Paul Sewald was roughly greeted by a leading homer from new cub Clint Frazier and a double from Nico Hoerner, and then paid no attention to Hoerner, easily finishing third to get sent home to a sack fly from Michael Hermosillo to extend the Cubs lead to 8-3. That was all he would allow after beating Rafael Ortega and then beating old foe Patrick Wisdom to end the inning.
Anthony Misiewicz, who wants to be just like Paul Sewald as an adult, also allowed a leadoff base hit and allowed a runner to advance without doing anything by throwing a wild pitch, but also came back with two strikeouts of his own. More of these Tony Sandwiches, please:
The kids came along at the end and helped make the score a little more respectable by beating up Michael Rucker, the Cubs’ successor: Connor Hoover, the 2021 international signing, Gabriel Gonzalez (!), the first shortstop of the Defense, Cesar Izturis Jr., and the recent signing of MiLB Riley Unroe all combined to add another pair of runs in game eight, turning an ugly 8-3 into a less ugly 8-5. It’s spring training, restrictions apply, but it sure would be nice to see the starters get the bats going a little more since there’s no duality in baseball that can save 14(!) strikeouts.