Seattle Mariners Series Preview: v. Cleveland Indians

What a run it’s been this last week!

If you’ve noticed, I’ve been MIA for the last week or so as I was taking a big-ol road trip across the country (stay tuned in the next few days for a recap on some baseball musings from the midwest). Being on the road didn’t keep me from keeping up with the streaky Mariners. Hopefully the guys can keep it rolling through this weekend’s series against the Indians, here’s your series preview.

Matchups

Game one: Trevor Bauer (2-3, 4.40 ERA) v. Chris Young (6-4, 3.23 ERA)

Bauer got rocked in his last start against Detroit giving up 4 homers on 8 hits. However, he’s been decent through the season, going 6 or more innings in all but two of his starts. Chris Young is 4-1 at Safeco this year and is rolling through lineups. Opponents are batting only .173 against him at home, though the Indians are coming to seattle with the 6th best team batting average in the league at .257 (Seattle: .242).

Game two: Josh Tomlin (4-5, 4.39 ERA) v. Roenis Elias (7-5, 3.74 ERA)

Tomlin is looking for some serious redemption after getting dominated by Detroit last week. Tomlin went only 4 innings and gave up 8 runs on 8 hits taking the loss. Tomlin is searching for his first win since May 21st, and is seriously hoping to avoid a fourth straight loss. Elias is coming off of a win against the Royals (who were really hot at the time), and is in search of a third straight win. In fact, he’s 4-1 in June with only one blemish where he was chased after only 3.1 innings.

Game three: TBA v. Felix Hernandez (9-2, 2.24 ERA)

There’s not much else to say about Felix this season other than that he’s been dominant. The only downside is that he’s being overshadowed by Masahiro Tanaka in early Cy Young conversations. Felix has gone a minimum of 7 innings in all his June starts and has a 1.49 ERA for the month. He’s yielded only 6 runs over his last 36 innings, and only one homer. Look for Felix to keep the ball rolling as he searches for his 10th win.

Mariners Notes

• Felix has been mentionned in Cy Young conversations again, albeit it’s still early. Even if he manages to keep it together for the rest of the season, he faces a huge hurdle to overcome Tanaka, as he has been incredible in his first MLB season.
• Even though the M’s are hot right now, they still can’t seem to catch the A’s and Angels, who remain 3.0 and 6.5 games ahead of the Ms. That being said, the M’s and Angels are in a fight for the AL Wild Card spots. This season it seems that the AL West is the AL Best.
• Sodo Mojo editor Dan Hughes has promised to shave his head if the Mariners make the playoffs this year; and we’re all holding him to it.
• Erasmo Ramirez has been sent back to Tacoma, which many fans are taking to mean that we’ll be seeing Taijuan Walker make his way back shortly.

Around the AL West

Like I said before, the Mariners just can’t seem to catch the A’s and Angels, but in the mean time, they’ve opened up a huge lead on the Rangers, who have fallen off the bus in June.

• The A’s are in Miami for some interleague play this weekend. The Marlins aren’t as bad as they have historically been, they’re only a game under .500, so this certainly might not be a cake walk for the A’s.
• The Angels are in Kansas City to take on the Royals. The Royals had been on a ten game winning streak until the Mariners came to town and swept them at home. This would be an ideal time for the Mariners to get some help from KC.
• The Rangers, while 6.5 games back of Seattle, are at home to Minnesota this weekend.
• The Astros had my hopes up for a while as it looked like they might get back on the win train. But they’ve gone 2-8 in their last 10 and are a full 15 games back in the west. They’re at home to face the red-hot Tigers this weekend before hosting the Mariners next week.