Mariners vs. Rangers: A tale of three pitchers

A breakdown of the action versus the Texas Rangers, with a particular focus on the three starting pitchers for the Seattle Mariners.

After what could be considered a successful series against the Houston Astros, three games versus the Texas Rangers must have seemed like a walk in the (T-Mobile) park. The Mariners entered the Rangers series with a 15-2 record in the last 17 games between the two divisional rivals in Seattle and a five-game winning streak overall.

The series started off well enough, as Seattle won the first two games 6-2 and 4-2. However, uncharacteristic errors and 12 stranded base runners resulted in a 8-6 loss in the finale.

Overall though, taking a second straight series versus an AL West opponent has to be seen as a positive. Even at this early stage of the season, it is important to keep pace with your divisional rivals and the AL leaders in general.

For this series review, we are still going to provide quotes, statistics and other notes. However, for our takeaways, we’re going to specifically focus on the Mariners’ three starting pitchers:

1) A better showing from Ray:

Robbie Ray‘s first two games as a member of the Seattle Mariners could not have been more different. His first start saw him give up just three hits and one earned run in 7.0 innings, then followed this up by allowing a career-high 10 hits along with six earned runs in 6.1 innings.

Ray’s second performance was impacted by rain-swept conditions in Chicago, although he made no excuses; in addition, White Sox starter Dallas Keuchel had to contend with the same weather. Regardless, the Mariners’ prized offseason acquisition was aiming to bounce back on Tuesday night.

In what was his home debut in Seattle, the 2021 AL Cy Young winner did indeed bounce back. He pitched six solid innings, giving up just four hits and and two earned runs in the process.

Ray struck out four and allowed a season-low one walk. As a result, he went on to secure his second win of the season and help the Mariners to a 6-2 victory.

Interestingly though, the case could be made that the 2017 All-Star wasn’t entirely back to his best (although it was clearly good enough on the night). While his slider was on point, his fastball seems to be slightly off from where it was at last season.

This was in part why Ray was taken out after six innings, despite having only thrown 85 pitches. As much as he limited the recorded hits by the Rangers, their hard contact was becoming more frequent towards the end of his outing.

Not that there is anything in particular to be concerned about. This is still the same pitcher who led the AL in ERA and strikeouts in 2021, and will prove to be one of the Mariners’ top guns and most consistent arms as the season progresses.

One thing which helped Ray on Tuesday specifically, was being spotted an early 3-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning. This allowed him to be more aggressive in his approach.

The 30-year-old discussed his mentality with the media after the game. He said:

“I just try to throw the pitches that I want to throw, in the places that I want to throw them and make them hit my pitch. That was kind of the goal today.”

NEXT: LOOKING LIKE THE REAL DEAL