2) Marco Gonzales starts poorly for second consecutive season:
There is a theory that even though Marco Gonzales said all the right things publicly, he was still extremely unhappy after Ray got the nod for opening day. However, their respective first starts to the season have justified the Mariners’ decision.
Prior to Sunday’s game, there was reference to Gonzales going 9–1 with a 2.70 ERA, 59 strikeouts and just 21 walks in 14 second-half starts during 2021. However, the start in Minnesota instead brought back memories of how poorly he began last year.
In that first start of the 2021 campaign, the 30-year-old allowed eight hits, five runs (all earned), three homers and a trio of walks in six innings versus the San Francisco Giants. His opening game against the Twins was arguably even worse.
Nothing went right for Gonzales, on a day which included giving up the first grand slam of his Major League career. Coming in the opening inning, this set the tone for him and he was unable to recover.
The southpaw went on to give up three homers in all, for just the fifth time in 122 MLB games. He allowed six runs in total — only two were earned, but more on this momentarily — and struck out just one batter compared to two walks.
As a result of all this Gonzales lasted just two innings, for his second-shortest start during his time as a Seattle Mariner. (He threw 31 pitches in the first inning and then another 27 in the second.)
Another factor which didn’t help the Fort Collins, Colorado native on the day, was that he repeatedly fell behind in the count. Of the 14 batters he faced, he threw a ball on the first pitch on 10 occasions.
In fairness to Gonzales, not all of the blame can be pinned on him, after Adam Frazier made a two-out fielding error in the first inning. If the 2021 All-Star makes the play, the Twins would not have been in position to hit the grand slam; for context, Frazier only had five errors at second base last season.
As a further example of how Sunday was a collective failure for the team, the pitching staff gave up six home runs in total. This was the 13th time this had happened in franchise history and the first since the 2019 season.
Despite what must have been a frustrating outing for him, Gonzales was measured when speaking to the media afterwards. He said:
“Not the start I expected obviously. (It was) disappointing, but now I’m just looking to bounce back and move forward … I felt my warm-ups were on target, (but) I made a couple of mistakes and they put a couple of good swings on some balls.”
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