Mariners lose ground after demoralising sweep in Detroit

The Mariners are swept in a series they couldn’t afford to lose, and are now three games behind the Astros and searching for answers.

As we’ve written before, this is a Mariners ball club seemingly like no other. An unpredictable one which loses series they should win, and vice versa; one which has historically found a way to ultimately fall apart even when things are seemingly going well.

As such, the Mariners rode into Detroit in good spirits, after a four-game winning streak which included a masterful sweep of the Mets by a combined 22-1 runs over three contests. Then, as painful and frustrating as it must be for M’s fans, their team unsurprisingly transpired to be swept by a sub .500 Tigers team with nothing to play for.

A career nightmare for Kirby

The most embarrassing game was the first one on Tuesday night, as the Mariners were destroyed 15-1 in their biggest loss of the 2024 season. George Kirby was humiliated as he allowed career worsts of 13 hits and 11 runs in just 3.2 innings.

Certainly, you have to wonder how this will impact Kirby’s confidence moving forward, and why Mariners manager Scott Servais didn’t take him out earlier, to save him from further humiliation? In any event, it’s safe to say any claim for this year’s AL Cy Young Award is now firmly off the table.

After the game, Servais discussed the performance of Kirby, and stressed that it wasn’t all on him. Speaking to the media, he said:

“I thought George’s stuff was pretty good early, but he obviously made some mistakes as they extended some innings. We could have made some plays, too. They had six infield hits and we had five of them in our gloves.”

If the series opener was the most embarrassing, the second game on Wednesday night was the most frustrating. The 3-2 extra innings loss was absolutely a case of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

Mariners lineup fails to take full advantage

Leading 1-0 in the top of the eighth, the Mariners managed to load the bases and were in a position to put the game away. However, all they could manage was an RBI single from the recently returned Julio Rodríguez, to make it 2-0.

The Mariners would ultimately be made to pay, as the Tigers responded with a two-run homer in the bottom of the inning, to tie the game at 2-2. The home side then won it with a walk-off double in the bottom of the 10th, to devastate the M’s.

Servais admitted the 3-2 loss was a tough one to digest. Speaking afterwards to the media, he said:

“This one hurts. We know the Tigers are playing well after what they’ve done to us, but we had control of the game and couldn’t finish it off.”

With all due respect to Servais, the Tigers entered this series with a 56-63 record and an injury-hit rotation. No, this wasn’t a case of the Tigers playing well in a general sense – it was a case of them just playing well against the Mariners specifically.

To add injury to insult — literally — Rodríguez re-injured his ankle, and eventually had to be replaced. He sat out Thursday’s series finale and you have to wonder how long he will be missing this time around, with critics arguing the two-time All-Star came back from his injury too quickly in the first place.

Thursday’s series finale highlights offensive struggles

On the subject of Thursday’s game, this was the one which highlighted the continuing offensive ineptitude of the Mariners. Even allowing for a couple of recent surges helped by the addition of Randy Arozarena and then Justin Turner, the lineup overall remains among the worst in the Majors.

Following Thursday’s slate of games, the Mariners are last in the entire league in batting average, tied second-last in slugging percentage and third last in OPS. Most importantly they have scored the fourth-fewest runs, criminally wasting a pitching staff which has the best ERA in the Majors.

The Tigers series truly showed the Mariners linuep at its worst, with just nine hits and four runs in the three games combined. Thursday’s effort was the poorest of the three, with just one hit and one run.

Following the 2-1 loss in Thursday afternoon’s game, Servais was lost for answers. Speaking to the media, he said:

“This was like watching a rerun of a bad movie.Obviously, we can’t ask Bryce (Miller) to do anything more than what he did today. We’ve just got to find some offense.”

Certainly Miller — as with Bryan Woo a day earlier — put in a wonderful outing which nine times out of 10 would have surely resulted in a win. Instead, both times the bullpen gave up slim advantages in the eighth inning, and the Mariners ultimately lost.

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Losing ground at the top of the AL West

With the sweep the Mariners fall to 63-59 on the season, three games behind the Astros at the top of the AL West and with four more losses. Of growing importance, the M’s are now also 3.5 games out of the third and final wild card spot in the AL.

For what it’s worth the Mariners do still face one more three-game set versus the Astros, in Houston between Sept. 23-25. However, given that this is the second-last series of the 2024 regular season, you have to wonder if the M’s will still have a chance of winning the AL West at that point?

Of more immediate importance, the Mariners will continue their nine-game road trip with a weekend series in Pittsburgh versus the Pirates. The Pirates do enter the three-game set with a poor 56-64 record, but M’s fans now know better than ever, that their team can’t be guaranteed to take advantage of a sub. 500 opponent.

Logan Gilbert will be charged with righting the ship, as he takes the mound for Friday evening’s series opener. However, it’s the offense which needs to step up, to stop this season of so much promise from slipping away.

What’s it going to take for the Mariners to get on a roll and find some consistent winning form? More to the point, do you believe they are capable of putting together a string of wins and catching the Astros at the top of the AL West? Let us know in the comments section below.