The Mariner Monitor

The rain started to fall midway through Wednesday night’s game, but it couldn’t wash away the tears on manager John McLaren’s face as the Mariners lost yet another game, 9-4, to the Tigers.

Seattle probably lost it in the third inning when the Detroit, who was already leading 2-1, dropped a seven spot on starter Jarrod Washburn. Eight of the first nine batters Washburn faced got hits. The highlight, well lowlight, of the inning came when career back up Marcus Thames sent a ball soaring into the leftfield bleachers for a grand slam.

The crowd went into a frenzy and even amongst the mayhem of the moment, I swear I could hear Geoff Baker slamming his head on press row.

The final damage report for Washburn: 2-1/3 innings, 12 H, 9 R and 2 K.

As always, the offense was just as weak as the pitching.

The three, four, five hitters–Jose Lopez, Raul Ibanez and Jose Vidro–collected a grand total of zero hits against Tigers starter Kenny Rogers. The same guy who is over 40 and has an ERA of 6.66. As a whole, Seattle managed to collect eight hits and scratch out four runs against the veteran starter but Detroit’s Zach Minor and Fransisco Cruceta shut the team down by pitching 3-2/3 innings of no-hit relief to close out the game. The Mariners now have zero regular starters hitting over .300.

The lone positive was the bullpen who cleaned up after Washburn’s mess. Cha Seung Baek and Ryan Rowland-Smith gave up just two hits and allowed zero runs over the final 5-2/3 innings.

This loss was a little different from the others since I got to witness it first hand and I should’ve been given proper warning: “Team in person is worse than they appear.”

If Seattle drops the final game of the series, especially if it’s as pathetic as the first two games, I say McLaren doesn’t travel to New York with the team.

I promised photos and they are coming, but we have a new computer at home and I don’t know how to make the pictures smaller yet. The minute I can reduce them to a reasonable size, I’ll share my experience with you.