Tagged out at home, for home runs, Mariners lose 7-0
Thrice were they outed, thrice were the number of strikes needed to send them to doom.
The first tag came on the foot.
It was Mitch Garver’s foot, as well as 394 more that Brent Rooker clubbed his two-run shot to knock a wobbly Luis Castillo off his feet at last. Though The Rock’s inertia carried him through five rounds of Friday Night Fights, he tapped out with a 2-0 deficit that could’ve easily been worse.
On another night it might’ve been enough, but the Mariners had minimal reinforcements for their starter on either side of the ball. 13 strikeouts against an A’s pitching staff that projects as one of the league's worst, on a night Sacramento didn’t even need to break out their fireballing bullpen oni Mason Miller. That’s not always the story in the modern game, but it was tonight. Max Muncy tagged his first big league hit, a 430 foot bomb to stretch a late lead beyond reach, and for poetic injustice 2024 castoff Luis Urías returned to do the same and seal the score.
After the leg, but before Urías cherried the sundae, the second tag came on the body.
Everybody could see the throw coming in, well ahead of Garver’s plodding pace. More plow oxen than thoroughbred, Garver tragically was one of the few Mariners to produce at the plate all game. That precociousness placed him on second base for a Dylan Moore single, echoing Opening Day’s opportunity for Ryan Bliss to undo his productive day at the plate with haphazard baserunning. Outpaced by a mile at home, Garver made a stoic effort to sneak into the dish. A drunken uncle raiding the fridge for Thanksgiving leftovers moved with greater subterfuge, and cut down was Seattle’s most serious scoring threat of the night.
The third tag snagged the arm, a final insult as Garver at last contacted home plate, three tags too late.
Jeffrey Springs, the serpent’s teething toy of a southpaw the Athletics started Friday night, was immaculate. Say what you will about Seattle’s approach this evening, I certainly did. But Julio Rodríguez and Donovan Solano were understandably flummoxed, as was the lineup entire aside from Garver and Jorge Polanco. Deceptive, devastating changeups and sweeping sliders allowed an unassuming fastball to sneak past the M’s bats efficiently and excruciatingly. While Julio at least cracked his first hit of the season late, it was no great cause for celebration. If this lineup is meant for overcoming their foibles against lefties that hamstrung them all of 2024, they’ve failed their first test, though a challenging arm to overcome. Tagged, bagged, and unmoving, for every way the Opening Day comeback win evoked the spirit of the plucky 2021-22 clubs, this 7-0 loss left the modest 25,061 in the stands with a chill that felt distastefully evocative of 2023-24.