Mariners' bid for sweep snatched due to offensive struggles

SEATTLE -- With only two hits going into the ninth inning, only two runners reaching scoring position overall and strikeouts piling up to 12, the late-innings magic that the Mariners have manufactured for nearly two weeks was nowhere to be found on Thursday afternoon at T-Mobile Park.

Seattle went quietly in a 4-0 loss to the Astros that prevented the club from securing what would’ve been just its second four-game sweep against the American League West rivals in 14 series of that length since Houston joined the division in 2013. It was also the third time that the Mariners were shut out in 2024.

“The story of the day, just didn't get much going offensively at all,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said, “which is too bad.”

That a sweep was on the table, that the Mariners (31-27) remain in first place and that their pitching staff continues to show that it should keep the club in contention into the deep summer underscore promise as the season has cleared the one-third mark.

But games like Thursday’s also reveal warts, particularly when pushing arms like Logan Gilbert onto a tightrope. His four runs over six innings snapped a streak of seven straight quality starts against the Astros, on the heels of throwing eight scoreless innings in Houston earlier this month.

Gilbert was pounced on the second and third time through the order, surrendering a two-run, tough-luck homer to Alex Bregman that nicked the yellow padding on its way out in the fourth, a solo shot to Victor Caratini in the fifth and another RBI from Caratini on a forceout in the sixth, scoring Bregman after he hit a one-out triple over Julio Rodríguez’s head at the wall.

Gilbert had hiccups, the eight hits from Houston tying his most in 12 career starts against the division rivals (including postseason). But he also had virtually no wiggle room for the second straight start, after throwing six innings of one-run ball last Saturday at Washington.

“Some of it just comes down to execution,” Gilbert said. “And then some of it is them just putting the bat on a good pitch.”

On the other side, the Mariners’ 12 strikeouts extended their MLB high to 594, an average of 10.2 per game and putting them on pace for 1,659, which would break the MLB record set last year by the Twins.

They labored on Thursday against Spencer Arrighetti, the rookie who was injected into Houston’s injury-depleted rotation on April 10 and who was 19-of-23 on first-pitch strikes, racking up a career-high eight K's. Arrighetti also lowered his ERA from 6.93 to 5.98 in his ninth outing on Thursday.

“With the way that the game is going,” Dylan Moore said, “these pitchers are figuring out different slots and different this and different that -- and I don't want to make any excuses -- but like ... this game is [freaking] hard, man. It's just one of those things where you've got to work around it. And that's why it doesn't concern me too much, because the work ethic on this team is really good.”

Across MLB, punchouts are slightly down -- the league average K rate is 22.3%, down from 22.7% last year -- but this year’s rate is still on pace for the sixth-highest in the divisional era (since 1969).

The Mariners are above the 2024 league average, at 28.3%, as six of their players -- Cal Raleigh, Mitch Garver, Jorge Polanco, Julio Rodríguez and Mitch Haniger -- have K rates among the 23 highest across 157 players qualified for the batting title.

Polanco is on the IL with a right hamstring strain that he re-aggravated last weekend in Washington and had a .595 OPS prior. Garver made his first start at catcher for the Mariners on Wednesday in an effort to get his bat going from a .583 OPS. Haniger has started more in right field than Seattle would’ve hoped at this point, based on personnel needs. Those three were the Mariners' biggest offseason additions, injected to replace the club’s most strikeout-prone hitters.

Moore has cooled since his scorching start to the month, now 4-for-25 since his two-homer game in New York last week. Same for Luke Raley, who is in a 2-for-24 stretch and missed Thursday’s game with lat soreness. Rodríguez has shown signs of a turnaround, but as recently as last week was dropped in the lineup due to inconsistency.

The Mariners need at least a few of their regulars to be clicking at once, otherwise pitchers like Gilbert on Thursday won’t have much margin for error.