Wild Facts Wednesday: The Mariners Newcomers stand out

Every week in baseball there are always some weird things that happen. Whether it is a position player pitching (Jesus Sucre was the best by far) or a player having some unfortunate luck at the plate; it is guaranteed that something interesting or weird is going to happen.

In part, it’s what makes baseball fun and exciting. Even though they have been playing the game for 130+ years, there still seems to be events every year that happen for the first time. We aren’t going to see them every week, but we are going to see some wild and weird things happen.

With that, I have decided to analyze what happens each week and report the findings of my research. For my new series here on Sodo Mojo, I will be giving a few weird facts or stats that I have found from the past week of Mariner baseball. Fortunately with “Chaos Ball”, I’m sure to find some interesting statistics and facts each week. This week’s focus was on some of the newcomers: Robbie Ray, Jesse Winker, and Eugenio Suarez.

Jesse Winker has had a reasonably interesting week so far like some of the other newcomers with the Mariners. At the plate, he has not been extremely effective hitting the ball, but it has actually been what he has done without hitting the ball that is very telling. So no, we do not need to worry about Jesse Winker Though he has only 2 hits in his 18 plate appearances, it is important to remember that it is not always about the hits!

Another interesting fact that I found was how successful Winker has been at the plate over the last 162 games. Being in the top 6 with the names that are in this group is phenomenal. Let’s not overreact to his lack of hitting in the first 4 games.

Those are some incredible names to be grouped with. Winker rakes, and he went 1-3 with two more walks in the series opener against the White Sox. It sure would be nice to see them drive some runs in, especially in support of the next guy on the opening edition of weird Wednesdays.

Robbie Ray has been a valuable addition to the Mariners pitching staff. Anytime you can add in someone to the staff who received Cy Young votes, it’s a big upgrade. Even moreso when you are adding the guy that actually won the award!

A wild fact about Ray is that he is the 1st pitcher in Mariners history with tight pants to toss at least 7 IP while allowing 1 run or less on Opening Day (I joke I joke). But he was phenomenal!

There are a couple of things that stand out about what Ray did. That Randy Johnson only did it once, and that the Mariners wasted Felix Hernandez. The fact that the King did it five times is incredible and probably lost on a lot of people.

Overall, Ray is showing exactly why he won the Cy Young award last season and why he is one of the best of the newcomers. Thanks for reading the first edition of Wild Stats Wednesdays! Please feel free to tweet wild stats to me @jasonsmarr10 on Twitter or to our @sodomojoFS page so I can include them in next week’s edition!