Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Eugenio Suárez Calls Game as Mariners Win Sixth of Homestand

Episode Date: May 29, 2023

The Seattle Mariners appeared prime to cruise to an easy 3-1 victory with six outs to go and Justin Topa on the mound. Unfortunately, Topa struggled and Pittsburgh forced the game into extras. But thanks to some heroics from Taylor Saucedo and Eugenio Suarez, Seattle clinched a series win. Colby and Ty fight through bad hotel wifi and sickness to discuss Seattle's Sunday afternoon victory.Help us out by filling out our survey!Be sure to follow or subscribe to Locked On Mariners wherever you prefer your podcasts! For questions and other inquiries, email: [e-mail] the show on Twitter: @LO_Mariners | @danegnzlz | @CPat11 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Good vibes only. The Mariners are now three games over 500 for the first time this year. Thanks to A Eugenio Suarez, Marco Gonzalez, Taylor Saucato, and more. Let's talk about it here on the Lockdown Mariners postgame show. Colby, hit it. You are Locked on Mariners. Your daily Seattle Mariners podcast. Part of the Locked on podcast network. Your team every day.

Ahoy, sailors. It is Sunday, May 28th, 2023. This is Tadang Gonzalez and Colby Patent out for the Lockheed on. on Mariners postgame show brought to you by eBay Motors. The championship team is about each player being a perfect fit. And that's the same with your vehicle. So for parts that fit, head on over to eBay Motors and look for the green check. Stay in the game with eBay guaranteed fit.

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The link as well as our social accounts is in the description of this episode. As I said, six to three, the final score from T-Mobile Park this afternoon. Mariners win their series with the Pirates and improved to a record of 28 and 25 on the year. Suarez with a three-run walk-off home run, the first for the Mariners since Cal Raleigh's drought ender against the A's last fall. Colby, you were there at the ballpark this afternoon. What was that moment like when Gino turned out the lights? Yeah, it certainly came at the right time because the Mariners, they attacks their bullpen pretty early. Now, they'd only use Brash for one hitter and CWald, obviously, had to come in and

clean up, you know, Justin Topa's mess and all of that. So if they didn't score there, I think we might have seen Chris Flexen in a tie game and extras. So, yeah, obviously, you definitely needed it. And it was good to see because, I mean, Julio came up and once again, in a big spot, swung out of his shoes and produced a worthless at bat that provided no value whatsoever to the team, kind of starting to become a running theme with him in these big moments. but he's young. I thought maybe we'd actually finally get to see Jared Kelnik just walk it off

because he's had a lot of big home runs and big hits for the Mariners, but they always seem to lose those games like the next inning. So I thought maybe we might see Kelnik, you know, do his thing. But unfortunately, Pittsburgh, a little too smart to try and let that happen. So they decided to go after Gino, who was having a rough day himself. So, yeah, it was obviously, you know, huge. And it was exciting and it was a good crowd today. A good crowd on yesterday.

It was 45,000. I didn't see the exact numbers today, but I'm going to guess it was between 35 and 40. It was pretty packed crowd today as well. So good energy in the ballpark. And obviously, you know, the vibes were definitely down after the wild pitch. And, you know, it's a tie game. And then, you know, Julio's big strikeout. And you're just kind of sitting there like, if this goes to the 11th,

I don't like our chances. And then, you know, Gino did his thing. the rest is history. There you go. There you have it. Mariners again win six to three over the Pittsburgh Pirates and talking about that Julio at bat and the bottom of the 10th.

Look, you know, I know when you go on fan graphs and you filter it for high leverage situations, his numbers actually look pretty good. But strictly speaking about moments where one swing of the bat can end the game, Julio, let's just face it, he has not been clutched. He has failed

numerous times. to produce in those moments to come through in those moments. He still doesn't have a walkoff. He had a chance today a prime opportunity for one. He had a hanging slider in the top of the zone. And instead of just trying to, you know, not do too much with that ball, he tried to plan it 15 rows back and he ended up missing.

And again, if you're going to take a hack like that, you best not miss. Just like A. E. E. E. E. E. Hinae. Svarez, when he got that hanging slider in the middle of the plate today. Just a really disappointing at bat from Julio and one that slightly, because again, they won. So I'm not going to, you know, hold on to this for too, too long. But slightly stains an overall really good day for Julio again, you know,

offensively. He had another multi-hit game, his fifth straight. That, I believe, ties him with King Griffey Jr. And what Alex Rodriguez, I believe, the stat was that ESPN stats and info posted earlier today. So Julio's cooking right now. He's back, like I said. I mean, that's at least what it looks like. And, but it just, that's also what makes.

that at bat in the 10th rather so disappointing. Right. I mean, like you said, he had the two hits today. He also had a screaming line drive that Bay, that I believe that's who was playing center field today. He made a really nice catch on. And I'm not even the JP. Oh, that was just the Julio liner that he came in. Oh, the diving one. Yeah. Yeah, he was great today.

Yeah, he really was had a double two. I think he had a couple hits today, actually. So, but yeah, obviously, you know, and that's the other thing, too, is that we haven't seen Julio take big whiffs and big swings and misses like that in this last week or so. And he's been, it has been pretty good for the last two weeks, but it's really been the start of this homestead where he's really starting to turn it around. So yeah, overall, it's still, you know, a really good series for Julio. He's quietly, you know, picking back up.

He's at 242 now, 743 OPS. So obviously, you know, you want that OPS to be at least 100 points higher. but he's getting there. So overall, it was a really good day for Julio. There's no doubt about it. But yeah, it kind of felt like that was a step back, you know, in that situation because I honestly assumed that they would walk Julio and go after Kalanick. But the fact that they were going to go after Julio,

maybe that tells you a little bit about who teams are more afraid of right now. But we'll see, you know, like I said, it was unfortunate that bat for Julio. It was set up perfectly for him. know, didn't even need a base to win the game. And infield was in. So if you just hit a ball hard on the ground, there was a good shot. He would have gotten the hit anyways. And he just came up empty and just an ugly, ugly at bat.

So, yeah, bummer on that end. But, yeah, bummer on that end. But overall, it was a good game and, you know, a good, really good series for Julio. And that's good to see, obviously, if you're the Mariners. And it's nice to see A. Eugenio finally connect on a ball that left the ballpark because he had, I don't know, three or four balls so far on this homestand that have just died at the warning track to dead center field and this time he just decided he was going to put one in the bullpen for good measure so and hey speaking of balls dying at the warning track the mayor has had quite a few of those especially

early on in this game they were able to sneak two over the wall with julio's uh home run in the first and then cow rollies a little later on but they easily could have had four or five today and just missed them by uh by a couple of feet we're going to talk about one of the um the heroes today one of the unexpected heroes of the day, Taylor Soss Sato, in just a moment. But first, a reminder, this episode of the Lockdown Mariners Postgame show is brought to you by Bilt Bar. If you're like me and want to make healthier snack choices but don't want to compromise on taste, I've got just the thing for you. Built bars and built puffs. Built bars are healthy and tastes amazing.

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Thank you so much for making us your first listen after the Mariners 6 to 3 victory. walkoff victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates as they take this series get to three games above 500 for the first time this season. Up next they're going to be facing the New York Yankees Aaron Judge and the New York Yankees starting

tomorrow and you can catch all the action on the Mariners hometown broadcast with Sirius XM via the SXM app. So Taylor Saucato came into this game. He mentioned that the bullpen was a bit taxed and Sot Cato was one of the few arms left

in that unit. Scott's service goes to him, and boy, did it pay off, but not without arguably the biggest play of the game, which won't show up in the box score. To lead off the top of the 10th, Brian Reynolds singles right up the middle,

and Andrew McCutcheon went back to second base and ends up having to settle to say at third. He only moves up one base. And look, I know that McCutcheon isn't exactly the athlete that he used to be, but there's a pretty good shot that he's scoring on that play if he just runs straight to third. And I mean, you know, maybe it's just a base running blunder or maybe it was actually that deke from J.P. Crawford. It seemed like McCutcheon saw something that made him think that he needed to go back to second.

That was a huge play that that really, that really shaped up, you know, how the rest of that inning went. Yeah, because, I mean, I, yeah, I was. I was in the J-Rod squad. So I saw, I had a pretty good view of it. It just was weird to me. I saw the ball get past the pitcher and I was just like, okay, well, there's a run right off the bat. And then I looked up and, you know, McCutcheon was taking like two or three hard steps back to the bag. And, you know, it's an extras.

Those are the little things that really can add up. And, you know, the pirates right now, they're not playing great baseball. They've won, I think, just six of their last 20 at this point or something like that. And those are the little things. And you don't expect it from McCutcheon because, you know, athleticism or not, that's just bad base running. That's not knowing where the shortstop is. That's not understanding the situation.

That's a move that you would expect from, you know, one of the younger guys on this team, not, you know, a fringe Hall of Fame candidate. So, yeah, it was a big play. Obviously, you know, it worked out well for the Mariners. And maybe it mattered. Maybe it didn't. I mean, you can feel the snowball effective. They score a run there.

And now you're playing from behind instead of tied. Who knows? Maybe Gino still hits the walk off. and they win six to four instead. We don't know for sure, but yeah. So Sosato in that inning, just one hit allowed the one to Reynolds to lead things off. He also had an intentional walk of Rodolfo Castro

after falling behind 2-0. Castro, obviously a really good hitter against lefties so far this year. But three strikeouts for Sosato. He gets Connor Joe, Jack Swinsky, and then key Brian Hayes. He got out of head. head 02 on Hayes with the bases loaded and then Hayes worked a full count, fouled off a couple of pitches.

And all I could think about in that moment was you calling Key Brian Hayes, one of the most overrated players of Major League Baseball. I'm like, he's not good. He's not good. I agree. I agree that he is very much overhypes. But I was just like,

there's the Colby curse. It's going to happen. Yeah. Like he, like, it's so crazy. He is like in a league. Like he might be the best defensive play. at any position in major league baseball insane cannot hit like just if one strikeouts today so yeah of course he

did he was of course he because he's bad he's not a good hitter and people are like oh he's the next big third baseman no he's not no he's like Seattle Jeff serrillo ooh scary so like yeah whatever I like Brian Hayes is a fun player but he is not he's not good let's just be clear about that dude can't hit like so but you Yeah, either way. You know, Saucato, they went after Hayes a couple times pitching around the guy in front of them to get to Hayes. They did that a few times today, and who could blame them? The dude can't hit.

But yeah, Saucato, nine swings today, five whiffs. Like, that's how you limit damage. You also had three called strikes. You know, 20 pitches. Obviously, when you're pitching those big, you know, high leverage spots, you've got to be a little more careful. You got to nibble a little bit. You can't be as aggressive. So pitch counts tend to get pretty high.

But yeah, Sosato, you know, big strikeout, big celebration. But the rest of the bullpen was really good today. With the exception of Topa, Toba struggled, you know, and that's just going to happen. Although nothing hit hard against Toba, you know, that is worth noting. But, yeah, unfortunately, he just didn't have it. Sewell had to come in, kind of try to clean up the mess, the, you know, the passball or the wild pitch, I should say. That's gut-wrenching. But at the same time, when you come into that situation, you're just,

saying, okay, just don't give up the lead. At least that's what I was thinking. So Sewell was really good, but yeah, Saucato kind of steals the show for the bullpen, but another just quality day for the Mariners pitching staff overall. And Saucato, another reliever pickup this off season.

Do you know what I'm about to say, folks? Say it with me. Chills. The putto did it again. All right. So, real quick on that stat that I mentioned earlier on, the milestone that Julio achieved today, this comes again from ESPN stats and info he joins Ken Griffey Jr. and Alex Rodriguez is the only

Mariners age 22 or younger to have multiple hits in five or more straight games so pretty good stretch here for Julio yeah pretty pretty decent company let's talk about Marco um you know I said it on on last night's show it's a it's a coin flip every time we talk about Marco you just don't know what you're going to get out of this guy um and And I'm pleased to announce that, you know, he had probably as good of a start as you could ask for from him against this lineup. I did have the three walks, but only one earned run allowed on three hits or five and two-thirds in his pitch. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to finish the six out after his final walk of the day. Four strikeouts.

I know you were sitting over in the J-Rod squad, but what did you think of Marco's day today? Yeah, he was he was nibbling quite a bit He really didn't want the long ball to beat him He was willing to walk guys and run deep counts To you know try and force them to expand the zone And and you know he did an okay job of that again I I don't feel as great you know Breaking down a pitcher's performance from you know

200 feet away instead of or sorry 450 feet away instead of the you know the television copy so So it just, I noticed I kept on looking up, and his strike to ball ratio was hovering around 50, 50 for most of the day. So he was really trying to force hitters to expand the zone to help him out. And, you know, I think he did a pretty good job. Anytime you go five and two thirds, you give up one. Like, that's about as much as you could possibly hope for Marco against, you know, all non, just terrible lineup. So, and Pittsburgh is not a terrible lineup.

They got some guys who can hit, particularly some Riteys that can hit. They got some pop. So, yeah, I thought Marco did a pretty good job. It was the change-up show today. There are any change-ups on 90 pitches. So, again, it looks like he's more or less ditched the cutter. I suddenly like he throws it too much, and he only threw it 9% of the time or 10% of the time today. That pitch is just garbage, though.

So, yeah, change-up, fastball up in the zone and then the curveball to kind of steal strikes. And the reason it's a coin flip with Marco is that he will not get whiffs. Yeah. Like, he is in the strike zone. Yeah, on 39 swings. like he's just not going to strike you out. So if he is in the strike zone, that ball is getting put in play more often than like just an insane amount of time.

And that, you know, that creates a huge variance in your performance. So, yeah, you never know what you're going to get with Marco. But today I thought he was, you know,

admittedly from afar, I thought he was pretty good, but not great. I thought he was, I mean, good enough, I guess is. Fair.

Yeah, yeah. He threw 90 pitches, I think 56 strikes. Like, that's not a great ratio. It's not terrible. He certainly was better at, you know,

getting ahead in the later innings and he was able to get some, some weak contact. Didn't give up a lot of hard hit balls either. So, yeah, overall he did. It was a good game for Marco and again, you know, you kind of have to grade Marco on a curb,

especially when you try to compare him to the other four meritor starters. But I would say he did his job today and then some. It was, it was a good outing. We're taking tomorrow off for the holiday. So I want to talk a little bit about this Yankees series, because that's going to get underway tomorrow. I think you're going to the ballpark for that one as well, right?

That is the plan as of now. I have not yet bought tickets, but that is the plan. Well, if you see Colby at the ballpark, tell him I said, Ahoy. He'll surely love that. I think I'm going to get a box just to avoid that. Before we talk about the Yankee series, which you can catch on the Marys hometown broadcast with Series XM via the SXM app,

I got to ask, you tweeted about Motop What are your thoughts? I keep on seeing this stuff on the broadcast. Yeah, it's good stuff. I only had a slice of the pepperoni. And it's like on a French bread pizza type of thing. So it comes in like a baguette almost. And so it's only cut into two pieces.

I had one of the one of the pepperoni, lots of unique flavors there. But I had half of the pepperoni bread or whatever they call it. it was very good it was very filling too lots of cheese lots of sauce uh loaded up with uh the you know loaded off with like like italian seasoning basil and stuff like that so very flavorful very good uh would recommend so yeah they keep on showing it on the broadcast and it's apparently a big deal in seattle it makes me very hungry looking at it i got to say that it visually speaking it is very appealing yeah it tastes very good too all right so So Yankees Mariners, Bryce Miller gets Aaron Judge in this Yankees lineup.

What do we think, man? I would say, you know, this is the start where he's going to have to rely on the breaking ball and all that stuff because, you know, the Yankees haven't seen a fastball. They can't turn around. But every time I say that, Bryce Miller just likes to kind of, you know, give me the mind, middle finger and just throw more fastball. So I'm going to assume we're going to see a lot of fastballs tomorrow again. And we'll see if the Yankees are the team that can actually do something with it.

But yeah, obviously, you know, anytime you face Aaron Judge, like you're always wondering where he's at in the lineup. Something kind of interesting happened today. I saw Anthony Rizzo got a little banged up in a collision or something with Fernando Tatis Jr. at first base. I don't know if he stayed in the game. Like I said, I was at the game. So I couldn't. Yeah. I didn't see that either.

So I don't know. Yeah. So we'll see what the deal is with Rizzo. But, yeah, obviously, you know, it's the Yankees. They're a pretty good lineup. You do catch a bit of a break that you're not going to see. see Cole. Cole pitch today.

So you don't see Cole in this, you will see Cortez. And I think Herman gets a start tomorrow. But yeah, the, the Mariners going with Bryce Miller, Logan Gilbert, and George Kirby, the Yankees countering with Domingo Herman, Nestor Cortez, and Clark Schmidt. Cortez, right now pitching more like Mariners, Nestor Cortez, rather than the last two years, Nestor Cortez. So you're catching him at a pretty good time. Right.

But he has a curveball. So I'll be. bets are off. Yeah, but obviously you're looking for Judge. Rizzo is such a great swing and like his offensive profile fits so well in Seattle that I wouldn't be surprised if he had a big series, assuming he's healthy, of course. And then, yeah, Jake Bowers, the return of Jake Bowers. Is he on the Yankees? I had no idea. He's on the Yankees. As of now, as of now, we'll see if you make the trip. Bowers, Rangers stand up. Yeah. Let's go. Obviously, you know, Glaber and as Waldo Cabrera and at last

Check, Harrison Bader was having a great start to his year after being delayed by injury. So, yeah, you're going to have to pitch. But as we seem to say, every single series this year so far, you kind of like the pitching advantage that the Mariners have. You like those matchups for Seattle. Has it mattered this year? No. But are we going to keep saying it? Yeah, probably.

So we'll see what happens. But, yeah, it should be a good series. You know, it's one of those ones you just really hoping to take two or three and keep this, you know, the good vibes going. But because you swept Oakland or, yeah, because you swept Oakland. or yeah, because you swel up to Oakland, because you took the series against Pittsburgh, if you avoid a sweep, you had a tremendous homestand. You're at least seven and three on the homestand, you get you right back in where you want to be. And hey, guess what?

Today, as of today, you are officially ahead of the Angels. You're in third place. There we go. Got to love it. Mariner six and one on this homestead. Yep, yep. Mariners six and one on this homestand. It would be nice to add at least a couple more wins to that tally before they go back out on the road.

that's going to do it for our show again you can catch the yankees and the mariners on the mariner's hometown broadcast with serious xm via the s xm app thank you so much for joining us here on the locked on mariner's post game show for colby pad node i'm tina gzalas be sure to give us a follow on twitter at l o underscore mariners you can follow me at dain g nzalz and colby at c pat 11 that's cpat one one that's cpat one one follow us on instagram and tic talk as well over at locked on mariners that's one word locked on mariners you can also find all that stuff in the description of this episode and thank you again for making us your first listen after the mariners six to three victory over the pittsburgh pirates again we'll be taken tomorrow off for the holiday so enjoy your holiday and

we'll be right back at it on tuesday until then have yourself a beautiful baseball day and good vibes only peace