Mariners News: Logan Gilbert nets career milestone and Munoz can't throw a strike

After a bad finish to the series against the Cleveland Guardians, the Mariners headed to Milwaukee for their first road series of 2024. Maybe they could get back on track against the Brewers, and see the offense start to figure it out. You could argue that they were in the best possible spot on the mound to open the series, as they were throwing Logan Gilbert. He and Kirby both had exceptional first outings, but Gilbert was able to make it through seven innings, the most of any Mariners starter in their first start this season.

It was a rough start for Gilbert, who gave up two in the second. He never really got settled in, giving up another run in the 4th, and then was pulled in the 6th and ended up giving up four runs through 5.2 innings. The big problem this game for him was the long ball, as he gave up homers to Adames, Dunn, and Yelich. It's really hard to win a game when your starting pitcher gives up three homers.

Gilbert notched a career milestone against the Brewers with his 500th K

There was some good news/ exciting news from the start for Gilbert, as he notched his 500th career strikeout when he sat down Christian Yelich to end the inning. Even though Gilbert has made just 90 starts for the Mariners, he is already 16th all-time in team history for strikeouts. With another strong season, he will make it all the way into the top ten, possibly passing Joel Pineiro for 9th at 658 strikeouts.

The Mariners tied it up in the 6th, fell behind again, and entered the 9th inning down 5-3. Was it time for chaos ball? It sure seemed like it, as the Mariners sent Samad Taylor up to the plate, and he kicked off a run that say them go single, single, ground rule double to open the inning. They tied it up at 5, and it seemed like the Mariners were going to once again crazily figure things out in extras.

With Andres Munoz on the mound, you would have to think that things were going to go well. He had never walked more than two hitters in 141 outings... until last night. Grab a barf bag, cause you are going to need it. Here is how the inning went for Munoz.

Walk
Walk
Walk
Strikeout
Walk - RBI, game over.

He threw 17 balls and 9 strikes, just a terrible outing. You always want to see your team walk off a win... but the Mariners walked off the Brewers in a rarely seen fashion of literally walking them around the bases to end the game. The Mariners blew an opportunity late, blew a career milestone by Gilbert, and watched their strongest bullpen piece forget how to throw strikes. Hopefully we can write this off to first road game jitters, but a 3-5 start isn't what anyone wanted for the Mariners.