Mariners complete impressive sweep of the Texas Rangers

The Mariners completed a second consecutive impressive series against a divisional rival, as they took all four games from the Rangers.

How quickly fortunes can change. This time last week, the Mariners had been swept twice and were on a season-high six-game losing streak.

Since then however, Seattle has won two consecutive series against divisional opponents to climb back to .500 with a third of the season complete. First up, they took two of three against the AL West-leading Oakland Athletics.

Then the Mariners followed this up with their first sweep of the season, courtesy of winning all four games against the Texas Rangers. While this season may still be perceived as part of the rebuild, the recent run of wins was much needed.

Things started off fairly smoothly on Friday night, as Seattle completed a 5-0 win. This was then followed by more typical tense Mariners games, courtesy of two consecutive 3-2 victories.

The home side then completed an impressive sweep of the Rangers with a 4-2 win on Sunday. Of particular note for a team which has struggled offensively this season, Seattle outhit Texas 29-22 over the course of the four games.

Next up, the Mariners have their second series of the season against the Athletics. First of all though, here are some takeaways and other notes from the four-game set against the Rangers:

4) Flexen bounces back in style

Prior to his last start, you could make a compelling case for Chris Flexen being the best member of the rotation. However, he then went out against the San Diego Padres and had the worst outing of his career.

Flexen allowed a career-high eight earned runs, while tying another career-high with 10 hits. Making it even worse, this all happened in just 1.2 innings, which represented the shortest start of his Major League career.

As such, it was always going to be interesting to watch how the 26-year-old responded to this adversity. It speaks volumes that he bounced back with arguably the best start of his four-year career in the Majors.

Flexen was quite simply outstanding against the Rangers on Thursday night. He matched his career high of seven innings, while the three hits he allowed were his fewest yet in a Mariners uniform.

Best of all, the right-handed pitcher gave up no runs, to help Seattle on the way to a convincing victory. As a result, he clinched a team-best fifth win; overall, the Mariners have won seven of the nine games he’s started this season.

The command which had deserted Flexen in his previous start was back to its best against the Rangers. Of his 87 total pitches, 60 went for strikes.

Breaking this down further, the former New York Met had six strikeouts, which was double the total he managed in his previous four starts combined. In addition, the 15 called strikes and 12 swinging strikes totaled on 31 percent of his pitches, was his most efficient rate of the season.

Of the 24 batters Flexen faced, he recorded first-pitch strikes against 15 of them. On top of all this he only gave up one walk, overall resulting in a season-low four batters reaching base.

All of the Newark, California native’s pitches worked on the night. However, it was his cutter which particularly drew attention.

Mariners manager Scott Servais said Flexen’s cutter was the best he’d seen from him since arriving in Seattle. Certainly it was extremely effective, as Rangers batters went just 2-for-10 against the pitch and it resulted in three of his strikeouts.

As much as Flexen was clearly delighted with his outing, he said he had just gone through his normal routine prior to Thursday night. Speaking to the media, he added:

“The physical stuff is still there. It was just (about) trying to get back on track, mentally stay locked in and not let (the previous start) affect you.”

Ever the humble person, Flexen also made time to compliment his catcher, Tom Murphy. He said:

“I definitely was able to execute and I thought Murph did a hell of a job back there. We were able to mix in-out, up-down and offspeed-hard.”

NEXT: STILL LAST BUT GETTING BETTER