In the All-Washington Series, Will the Mariners or the Nationals Come Out on Top?

The #20 Mariners (37-39) return home after a tough East Coast road trip and the #27 Washington Nationals (30-47) visit T-Mobile Park after their series with the Padres. The Nationals have had a frustrating season so far, though they just won their series with the Padres. While by no means guaranteed, I believe that the Mariners will win this series.

Pitching

Monday, June 26 RHP Luis Castillo (2.89 ERA, 32 runs, and 101 SOs in 87 IP) v. RHP Trevor Williams (4.14 ERA, 42 runs, and 58 SO in 76 IP) Suarez and Wong have experience batting against Williams. Suarez hit about one out of four pitches. Wong hits almost 40 percent of his pitches. The Nationals who have been at bat with Castillo pitching struggled with the highest percentage for hitting pitches, .250.

Tuesday, June 27 RHP Bryan Woo (5.09 ERA, 10 runs, and 26 SOs in 17.2 IP) v. RHP Jake Irvin (4.71 ERA, 26 runs, and 33 SO in 42 IP). Both Woo and Irvin are relatively new so there is no record of players batting average when they pitch.

Wednesday, June 28 RHP Logan Gilbert (4.07 ERA, 42 runs, and 89 SOs in 86.1 IP) v. LHP Patrick Corbin (5.32 ERA, 59 runs, and 57 SOs in 89.2 IP) Murphy, Pollock, Suarez, and Wong have received pitches from Corbin. The first three hit one out of three of his pitches. Wong has had a bit more trouble. Nationals’ players who have faced Gilbert have too few at-bats to predict what might happen.

Offense

These are the position players we expect to see batting against the Mariner pitchers. BA is batting average. RBIs refer to Runs Batted In, and ABs refer to “at-bats.” (The number in parentheses for the Nationals are jersey numbers).

Position	Nationals	Mariners
Catcher	Keibert Ruiz (#20) .227 BA, 27 RBIs in 242 ABs	Cal Raleigh .228 BA, 33 RBIs in 228 ABs
Catcher	Riley Adams (#15) .304 BA, 9 RBIs in 56 ABs	Tom Murphy .232 BA, 7 RBIs in 82 ABs
1 B	Michael Chavis (#6) .262 BA, 3 RBIs in 42 ABs	Ty France .276 BA, 34 RBIs in 293 ABs
	Dominic Smith (#22) .255 BA, 17 RBIs in 271 ABs
2 B	Luis Garcia (#2) .274 BA, 35 RBIs in 274 ABs	Kolten Wong .164 BA, 11 RBIs in 134 ABs
		Jose Caballero .230 BA, 17 RBIs in 122 ABs
SS	CJ Abrams (#5) .235 BA, 33 RBIs in 243 ABs	J.P. Crawford .240 BA, 25 RBIs in 246 ABs
3B	Jaimer Candelario (#9) 261 BA, 36 RBI in 276 ABs	Eugenio Suarez .222 BA, 44RBIs in 279 ABs
DH	Joey Meneses (#45) .293 BA, 39 RBIs in 294 ABs	Mike Ford .174 BA, 8 RBIs in 46 ABs.
Outfield	Stone Garrett (#36) .225 BA, 17 RBIs in 132 ABs	Jarred Kelenic .249 BA, 35 RBIs in 261 ABs
Outfield	Derek Hill (#34) .211 BA, 0 RBIs in 19 ABs	Julio Rodriguez .240 BA, 41 RBIs in 246 ABs
Outfield	Lane Thomas (#28) .295 BA, 39 RBIs in 298 AB	Teoscar Hernandez .253 BA, 43 RBIs in 293 ABs
Outfield		AJ Pollock .159 BA, 13 RBIs in 107 ABs

In the Nationals' 8-3 win over the Padres yesterday, Lane Thomas and Stone Garrett had one RBI each. Jaimer Candelario and Joey Meneses each had three RBIs. Thomas leads the team in home runs and in bases stolen, so these are some players to look out for. Cal Raleigh, Mike Ford, Teoscar Hernandez, Eugenio Suarez have hot bats for Seattle. Go Mariners!