Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - Has the Gap Between the Mariners and Astros Closed?

Episode Date: April 18, 2022

Hosts Ty Dane Gonzalez and Colby Patnode recap the Mariners' impressive series win over the Astros and discuss whether or not the gap between the two teams has closed.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 | @CPat11For more of Ty and Colby, check out their Patreon: patreon.com/controlthezone/Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts! 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.

Oh, it's good to be home. The Mariners scored 18 runs in two games. We'll ignore the other one and took two or three from the defending AL champs who quite frankly didn't look that great, at least offensively. We're going to get into all that and more on today's episode of Lockdown. Mariner's Colby. Hit it. Locked on Mariners. Your daily Seattle Mariners podcast. Part of the Locked on podcast network. Your team every day. It is Monday, April 18th, 2020, and this is the Lockdown Mariners podcast brought to you by Bet Online. Bet Online has you covered all season long with more props, odds, and lines than ever before. Bet Online, where the game starts. Thank you for making us your first listen of the day. We are free and available on all platforms. I'm your host, Tadine Gonzalez, joined as always by my co-host, Colby Patnaud.

Be sure to follow the show on Twitter at L.O. underscore Mariners. You can follow me at D-Dayton-G-N-Z-L-Z and Colby at C-P-E-E-P-A-2-1. Apologies for the low audio quality today. I had to do for this on my laptop. Hopefully we'll have things back to normal tomorrow. In the meantime, be sure to also check out our Patreon where we talk about the Mariners even more. And also get into some non-baseball talk twice a week, visit patreon.com forward slash control the zone. For more information on that, if you are interested in, if this is your first time joining us here, welcome to the show.

If you like what you hear, give us a follow or subscribe wherever you're listening to this. And if you're watching us on YouTube, hit the subscribe button, turn on the notification bell. Give this video a thumbs up and tell your friends to come check us out. We greatly appreciate it. So the Mariners got their 2022 home slate off to a roaring start on Friday with the home opener against the Astros 11 to 1. Bats lit things up. Marco Gonzalez had a stellar performance, especially coming off of a rough outing in Minnesota, where he only went two innings. Marco and this one went seven eights, four hits, one and run, six strikeouts, no walks. Colby, what did you see out of Marco?

Yeah, I was kind of, kind of a vintage Marco in the case that it was just a bulldog appearance. It's, Marcos never going to while you with stuff. But this time he came out, he threw a lot of strikes. He got ahead early, didn't walk anybody, was able to find the change up. That was a critical pitch. We talked about that last week, how he needed the change up against these Rites. It was the second most thrown pitch in this game. You threw it for strikes.

He was able to locate it outside of the zone. He induced a ton of weak contact off of that pitch. It was set up nicely by the sinker. And Marco was just able to avoid any kind of hard contact. He only gave up three hard hit balls. He was working the corners really, really well. Benefitted a little bit from a wider strike zone, particularly off the inside corner to Ritey's,

but he took full advantage of it and continued to pound that location. And then he was out low and away with the change-up, and he got a ton of weak contact as a result. So Marco just kind of doing what Marco does. He goes right after guys when he's feeling good. He goes after guys. He can get guys to expand the zone because of his, control and the changeup was was the best we've seen it in a little while it was just kind of

vintage marco it's just sinker change up mixed the cutter and the curveball in there a little bit just to keep guys off balance and and just kind of go out there and grit your way through and he was never really in any danger it was the third inning or the fourth inning where he uh where he gave up a hit and then he hit a batter um but after that i mean nothing nothing really even close um to doing him in and even the run he gave him gave up was on a chinty little single up the middle. He was very good in this outing. And it's a perfect bounce back outing.

And, you know, a good reminder to those who maybe want to jump the, you know, jump the shark after one start for Marco Gonzalez. This guy's been your most consistent starter. I mean, he has a longer track record than Robbie Ray. Certainly longer than Brash, Flexen, and Gilbert. So, yeah, let's not, let's not jump off the deep end here when it comes to Marco. I don't expect this every time out, but this is a lot closer to what you're going to get than the Minnesota start. And honestly, the Minnesota, this is kind of the two ends of the spectrum for Marco, what you get.

Most of the time, he'll be somewhere in the middle of this. And that's just who he is. He's a really good number four and a pretty decent number three. And when he pitches like this, he can beat anybody. So, you know, let's good reminder not to just give up on guys after one rough outing or after, you know, a bad slow start to the season. Marco was as good as you could possibly be on Friday night. Yeah, the concerns over to start in Minnesota were overblown. You know, that's, you know, you're going to get that kind of Marco maybe three, four times a year, maybe, maybe. You're also

probably doing this, Marco, about the same amount of times per year. You know, Marco is typically more of that middle of the road, you know, give you six, seven innings of three run ball, and, you know, that's usually what you're going to get. You know, but instead, you got, you know, the complete opposite end of the spectrum from where he was in Minnesota. And this was one of his best starts ever in his career against the Astros. He, this is only the second time in his career that he's allowed fewer than two runs in a game to the Astros. And he was on it. And he was on it, you know, and obviously the Astros not at full strength with Yorda and Alvarez missing.

They've also been struggling to start the season off in general. But, you know, this is still a good lineup, one that, you know, competed, you know, that won the American League last year. You know, obviously lost Carlos Correa, but still just a really deep lineup still. And he handled it well. Now, the bats, of course, were kind of, you know, kind of overshadowed Marco on this night because the bats pretty quiet on the road for the most part. They still were able to score, you know, four plus runs in multiple games, but still, you know, they left a lot on the table in those games as well, especially against, you know, mediocre at best pitchers. But they went into this one with a good plan, and they were able to take advantage of a fairly favorable matchup against Jake Oda Rizzy.

Jesse Winker got the scoring started off with an RBI single, and then Adam Frazier may have been the star of the offense. I mean, everyone was kind of clicking in this one. I believe Jared Kelnick was the only starter that didn't record a hit in this game for the Mariners. Adam Fraser, though, four of five, or four for five, with everything but the home run for the cycle. He got a triple, he got a double, he was hitting into the gap with power. That is something that we not really accustomed to seeing from Adam Frazier in his career, but it was his best game in a Mariners uniform by far. only one home run in this game too, which I think is kind of notable, considering the fact that they did score 11 runs of this game.

A. Oh, Hino, Swares, and Garbage Time pretty much two-run shot. It was 9 to 1 at the time. That made it 11 to 1 for the Mariners. Would you see out of the bats who stood out to you the most? Yeah, I mean, I think the easy answer here is Frazier. Four for five, like you said, a home run shy of the cycle, four RBI, you know, some really surprising pull power. You know, Frazier is not a slap hitter like Nick Madrigal. I mean, he's going to pop, you know, 10 to 12 home runs, but it's just not a big part of his game. And on that cold of a night to drive the gap like that multiple times is pretty good sign from Frazier, who we talked about this.

He had a really rough road trip in terms of bad hit luck. He easily should have had three or four more hits. So Frazier is in a really good spot. Yeah, like you mentioned, everybody, except for Kelnick got a hit. But Kelnick walked. He had an RBI sack fly, and he had two hard hit balls. And Kelnick continues to look a little bit better and better each day. You know, it should have had a stolen base, but Maldonado is ridiculous.

I mean, just perfect throw to get him. So, yeah, even Kalnick contributed quite a bit here. So Tom Murphy, I just, Mariners catchers. Saturday was, I believe, the first time the Mariners didn't have their catcher reach base, at least in the game. And Cal Raleigh still had more hard hit balls than anybody else in the Mariners lineup against Furlander. So Mariners' catchers, they're getting it done. So, yeah, top to bottom, it was a really good performance. A couple of encouraging hits from Mitch Hanager, even, who went up the middle a few times beat the shift.

Proceeded to strike out and two of his other three-out bats and on not great game plan. approaches, whatever you want to call them. But, you know, take what you can get. Jesse Winker had a couple of base knocks, including the first RBI of the game. So, yeah, and then Suarez, like you said, going deep to right center field, just clearing the fence. That is incredibly impressive for a right-handed bat, particularly in April in Seattle to go opposite field like that. I mean, heck, we saw Kelnik hit one that just kind of died. Yeah.

And he's a lefty. That's a pole. That's a pole guy. Waker two yesterday. Yep. So just really, you know, really good, solid at-bats. This game was won and lost on the single stat here. The Mariners struck out four times and walked eight times.

Meanwhile, the Astros, they walked a grand total of zero times, and they struck out eight times. Mariners control the zone, right? They dominated the zone, which is not only the name of a great podcast, but their offensive motto. So to quote Scott's service, they won the line of scrimmage. They won the strike zone.

And it showed. And they've scored at least one run in all but two innings this time around, which is something I'd been asking for for the road trip. Just scored three different innings. Well, this time they scored in six. and they just look great. It was just top to bottom.

It's hard to imagine the offense looking better than that. And like you said, it wasn't that they were just, you know, they hit a couple of three run home runs and there you go. It was just consistent, keep the line moving. Everybody had quality at bats. And it just, you know, it was, there's just nothing that the Astros could do. Brayu gave up two runs. Baez gave up three runs.

Wanco gave up two runs. They scored on every single pitcher. They hit every pitcher hard. They made every pitcher work. And this is this is kind of the breakout game that we had talked about last week, looked like it was coming because the approach was so, so good. This is what we were kind of expecting at some point. Didn't know if it was going to be on Friday, but it's awesome that it was.

Yeah, for sure. And, you know, like you said, they moved the line. They made Oda Rizzi work. It was absolutely everything that they needed to do. It was everything that they had, you know, that we were hoping that they would do on this road trip and, or on the, that road trip and now finally came together now that they got back home and maybe even a little better weather and a roof helped with that effort as well. So we're going to be talking about

yesterday's game because like I said, we're going to ignore Saturday's game. We're just going to forget that that ever happened. But real quick, want to remind you this episode of Lockdown Maritors is brought to you by Bilt Bar. This is the time of year that, I've pretty much given up on all of my New Year's resolutions, but not this year. I'm second to my resolution to eat right thanks to Bilt Bar. It almost feels like it's not really a resolution because I actually enjoy eating them. All Bilt Bars are covered in 100% real chocolate. They are low calorie, high protein, so replace your candy bars with these.

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Check out the Lockdown Now podcast. Recaps of MLB games with analysis from your local experts, taking fans through the season like no other network. It is free and available wherever you get your podcast just like us. So again, let's forget Saturday ever happen, at least the game. We do need to talk about something that did happen on Saturday, though. Mitch Hanager landed on the COVID-I-L. He will be out for at least the, well, he missed Saturday, he missed Sunday.

He's going to be out for at least the next three games now. And we'll see what happens from there if he's able to, you know, test negative and go through all the protocols for that to get back out on the field. Hopefully he's doing okay at home, feeling okay. Not really sure how that's going on. But Colby, how does this impact the Mariners? I mean, we've already seen it a little bit so far in how they're going to handle it, which is basically Jerich Lick's going to play in right field, Jesse Wicker's going to play in left,

Buleo is going to be in center, and they're just going to use the DH with Toro or Frazier or Therens or Murphy or Raleigh, whoever. But if this is more of a long-term thing, if Mitch is going to have to miss more than the five days that he has to miss, how does this impact the Mariners down the road? Yeah, short term, not too much. Long term, it would be a pretty serious blow. And I mean, I believe Mitch is vaccinated, which is why he's allowed to come back as soon as he is.

But we don't know how this is going to linger. Swares went through a tough bout with this, and we were told that the recovery from this, even though he didn't miss many games, was harder on him than the recovery from his shoulder injury. So we don't know how these things, you know, how this particular, you know, virus is going to affect Mitch long term. It might not really have any impact on him. So we'll see. But, yeah, for now it's just, you know, Suarez is either DHA in or he's playing third. And then the D.H is going to be Toro or Terence, more than likely one of those two.

But, yeah, so if it's something that lingers for a couple weeks, the Mariners aren't in a great spot. in this scenario. You know, Taylor Tremel is hurt right now himself. And if they wanted to add a true outfieler like Billy Hamilton or Stephen Susan Jr., they'd have to add them to the 40-man roster and then probably DFA him, whoever they added shortly after neither guy has options left. So if you want to keep those guys around for more of a long-term injury replacement,

then it doesn't really make sense to bring them up. So the marriage are kind of stuck. Kyle Lewis hasn't started rehab games yet. So it's pretty much these three. and then Dylan Moore is kind of your fourth outfielder right now. I don't foresee them going out and panicking and giving Michael Conforto a contract or anything like that. But yeah, it's unfortunate. But in the short term, there's not a ton of impact,

and the Mariners' bats looked okay, you know, on Sunday without him. But, yeah, you want that bat in the lineup. You want the power that he brings. And if nothing else, he lengthens the lineup. So, yeah, it's a blow, but as assuming it's not a, there's no long-term issues, they're going to be pretty, they're going to be pretty okay in the interim. Yeah, so let's get into this game now, seven to two Mariners yesterday. Jose I or Kiti was doing all right for the most part for the for the Astros at first.

They weren't really able to get to them much, but there was some hard contact from Mariners, and finally they broke through. It kind of felt like that was going to. happen. So let's start with the bats here because that's the most exciting thing. We'll talk about Matt Brash, of course, in just a moment. But Thai, France, big three-run, home run. Oppos the field as well. You just talked about when you talked about Suarez, how impressive that was from him. Talk about how impressive that was from France, who is really off to a strong start and making me look pretty good for picking him in our flag week. Yeah. Yeah, France used

funny you look at france's numbers and you recognize that he had like a one for 13 stretch in there which this early in the season probably should like you know be a major blow to your overall numbers and it hasn't been because that's how good france has been aside from that and that that's an incredibly impressive hit it was a fastball up and away and he just drove it into right center field it was a day game so that that does help but it was it was impressive nonetheless he he knew he touched up pretty good it capped off the big five run inning that they kind of just rode to And he just he continues to hit. And then, you know, there's a couple things you can really count on.

It's that Ty France is going to put up numbers at the end of the year. You know, not to be outdone. Adam Frazier also had a couple hits. He's got his average all the way up to 256 now after his bad luck-induced slump on the road. And Jared Kelnick, a couple hits, including a hustle double. My favorite hit of the day, actually, Jared Kelnick's opposite field hustle double. Yeah. going with the pitch, not trying to do too much,

slaps it in the left field with some authority and is able to leg out the double. He's playing more free. He looks just a little bit looser now since the home run. It's really starting to hit the ball a little bit harder. The upbats are getting progressively better as well. It looks like he's starting to settle in. And I mean, we can't talk about the Mariners without talking about Julio Rodriguez, we're required to.

First career RBI for Julio. Congratulations to him. just a one for four day at the plate but he did have three hard hit balls and his swing looked more controlled than it has at any point. It didn't seem like he was overswinging, which did kind of look like that was the case early.

This time he just kind of looked like he was just trying to hit the ball hard instead of trying to hit the ball far. And it appeared to make a difference. So yeah, it's a number of those days. Yeah, it's hard as hit balls on the Mariners, right? Yes, yep, he did. Should have got, should have had two hits.

Should have had two hits. was robbed by Al Tuve in his first step at bat, get the big RBI that kind of got things going, two out RBI, by the way. We got things going in the fourth and allowed Frazier to come up and then France with the big blow after that. Every Mariner, except for J.P. Crawford had a hit in this game, but Crawford did walk twice and he had a great day out in the field, turning, starting, I believe, three double plays in support of Matt Brash. You desperately needed them.

So just again, it's one of those days where the Mariners got contributions top to bottom. This time they did get the big three-run home run. There were some left-on-base issues, but not that many. And again, you just kind of look at what the Mariners did at the plate here. They only struck out three times against the Astros. Meanwhile, Mariners' pitcher struck out 10. So, again, they won the line of scrimmage to quote Scott's service. And as a result, they walk away with a really impressive seven to two victory in a series win over the defending

American League champions. It was it was quite a statement. Yeah, for sure. And, you know, I'm glad that you mentioned Kelnick and his hustle double because that was a favorite play in this game of mine as well. And then they did something that you've been asking for for a while. They hit a double and then followed that up with another double. Abraham Toro finally got on the board. I know. An RBI double. The Abraham Toro revenge series did finally come through. It wasn't off to a great start for Toro, but he was able to make an impact at to some degree at a certain point in this game. Fourth highest hit or fourth hardest hit ball of the day.

Yeah. By the way, Julio had three of the top five, including the top two. Yep, yep. Yeah, it was a good day for everyone. Not a lot of contact in this game, a lot of loud contact in the first game. Not a lot of loud contact against Jeff Rutherlander. Again, we're not going to talk about that. Jesse Winker got robbed of another.

what I thought was going to be a home run, what he thought was going to be a home run, what the catcher thought was going to be a home run, what the home plate umpire thought was going to be a home run, and what Jose Orquitie thought was going to be a home run. And it just died at the wall, right into Jose Series Club. Major League Baseball is definitely doctoring the baseball. They're giving the Mariners the unjuiced balls because Kelnick had one like that against Verlander, and it just kind of died out there. But unlike that, this one, it was a day game.

There wasn't really any win to speak of. There was nothing that should have stopped that ball from going out, except for Rob Manfred. But, yeah. He said just pretty much everybody, everybody contributed. And, yeah, I mean, it's, you know, Mariners restart their streak of catchers getting on base. Luis Terenz checked in with a base knock as well. Just up and down, there was contributions up and down the board.

Jesse Winker didn't have a hit. But again, you talked about, I mean, the poor guy. I just, he just keeps happening to him. And it keeps happening to Jerry. It's at least three times. Yeah, it's at least three times now from Winker. And, you know, and right now he's also missing some pitches that he's popping up. He's just missing them.

So this has just got to be a very frustrating. If anybody needs a day off, it's probably Jesse Winker. Yeah. Just to kind of reset because he's very close to breaking out here. And when he does, the lineup could be something pretty special. I would classify this as a future game. Your big start, Ty France, J.P. Crawford, Louis Terrence, Jared Kellanick, Julio Rodriguez, Matt Brash, Abraham.

The Padres trades really showed up in this game. Andres Munoz. Yeah, And Andreas Munoz had another good inning. We'll just call this the AJ Preller game. And thank AJ Preller for this win. Much appreciated. So Matt Brasch, you just mentioned him. obviously he was in one of those preller trades he was not fantastic in this game that's to put it

nicely very nice of you to say it that way he uh let's say 30 control that's generous sure yeah that's what he and really only maybe only because of the fifth any really yeah a fifth And he maybe bumps it up to a 30 or a 35. Yeah. Yeah, it was... It wasn't good. Let's just call it what it was. Yeah.

Let's say effectively wild, maybe, because he did induce a ton of double plays. Four and a row. Yep. And that's really the only reason that he stayed in that game. And the Mariners ended up only giving up two runs on a two-run shot by Michael Brantley. Yeah. All the damage was done in one swing of the bat, surprisingly. somehow, considering the fact that Brash walked six in this game was visibly amped and also hit a batter as well.

He did strikeout five, did calm down a little bit in the fifth inning. Look good in the fifth, sure. But then the six, yeah, he needed to be taken out. Fortunately, at that point, the Mariners pretty much had the game in hand. It was six to two. they took him out, he had given up the, the Brantley home run. I think he walked another guy or gave up a single or something. And then they, they, they, they, they inked him.

I was, uh, I was pretty surprised with how, uh, Scott Service used his bullpen in this game, by the way. Paul St. Wald was the first guy to come out of the pen, uh, in the, in the sixth inning, uh, instead of, you know, Munoz, instead of a second rider, instead of, you know, really, I just, I didn't expect to see Swald in that situation, but I'm glad that he did that. I think that was good to, you know, look, the Astros are kind of melting a little bit of momentum here. Let's just, let's just nip that in the bud right now. Let's go with the shirt thing. Let's go with Seawald.

Let's shut it down. And let's just get through this inning and move forward. And then Second Rider Munoz and Castillo, they shut down the Astros, the rest of the way. No issues there whatsoever. Nothing got interesting. It was great. The Barriers actually had like a very calm. You know, uninteresting.

Yeah, normal. Just a couple of nice. I mean, the first game was a blowout. I don't know if you consider five runs a blowout for the seven to two. But considering the way that the Astros were swinging the bat this whole series, kind of felt like a blowout, you know? Yeah. I mean, yeah, they put up seven runs in three games.

Three of those came on a Maldonado home run or two of those game on a Maldonado home run. Yeah, the Astros are a team. that's slumping at the plate right now. Altuve was garbage this series. Breggman. Bregman was awful. Tucker was awful. Gurriel hasn't gotten it going yet.

You know, pretty much it was, it was Jeremy Pena. That's kind of the guy. And, okay, so what? So obviously,

again, the Astros, when you play them in May, they'll probably be better. They'll be a tougher task. But we also need to understand that the Mariners, you know, the Mariners didn't have,

mcichanager for the last two games either jesse winker isn't exactly lighting the world on fire right now swores hasn't found his stride yet kelnick hasn't found his stride torro hasn't rodriguez it's not like the mariners are just like clicking clicking on all cylinders right now and oh by the way the mariners didn't get to use their two best pitchers the astros got to use their best um so yeah so are the astros do i still think the astros are better than the mariners yeah on paper sure but i think what this series proves is that the gap has closed somewhat considerably. And that's a great sign for the long-term battle between these two teams. And they're going to play each other 16 more times.

And I expect there to be some fireworks. You know, it was awesome to hear the Mariners fans so consistently boo Jose Altuve. That was impressive. Every at bat, every pitch. Most of the times you boo the guy once and then you just kind of like, okay. Or maybe before the first pitch and then, okay, now we just kind of settle in. every time the ball went in his vicinity there were booze it was pretty incredible

it really was man it was they'd stop and cheer after the strike and then they'd boo again and then they'd wait for the strike and then okay now we boo again and so the mariners would try to play music over like like hey let's let's fire us up yeah make some noise and we cheer and then uh and once the music stopped the booing started again like it was it was impressive to say the least of mariner fans can hold grudges who knows

said anybody ever said nobody ever yeah yeah but let's talk more about the the changing of the guard potentially here or at least maybe what this series said to us in just a moment but real quick a reminder this episode of lockdown mariners it's brought to you by bet online beton.net is your number one source for all your betting stats and sports info find all the latest sports developments league reviews and news, including this year's basketball playoffs and the start of the major league baseball season. Bet online is your continued source for all your sporting wagering information from live betting to playoffs, e-sports, and more.

Head to the website today or use your mobile device to learn more about the trends in action. Bet online where the game starts. So the reason why I'm talking about the changing of the guard thing is because I saw a lot of tweets yesterday saying, look, there it is. Meriters are better than the Astros definitively there, right? Let's calm down, folks. Let's take a chill pill here real quick. I will say this, though.

This series made me realize that I don't fear the Astros that much anymore. I really don't. I really don't. Even though, yeah, they're missing Gorda Ann Alvarez. You look at that lineup. Like I said, it's still deep. But it's not what it wants us. and I don't know if that's just because of the exclusion of Carlos Correa or what?

Or maybe it's just age. Maybe it's just time has passed. These guys are a little bit worse now. Jose Al-Tube specifically seems to be on a decline, right? Because last year was pretty good for him. But you go back to the year before, he was abysmal in 2020. Obviously 60 games, but, you know, he still hasn't looked like Jose Al-Tube. who, you know, in his prime was an MVP candidate.

He's not that guy anymore. Alex Bregman coming off of a wrist injury last year, didn't play a ton last year, looked awful in this series. And look, you know, it's April, right? I'm not going to jump to any conclusions here. I still think the Astros are a 90-plus win baseball team, especially if they got guys like Justin Verlander at the top of the rotations, pitching like the way that he did on Saturday.

They're going to be fine. but I looked at that lineup yesterday. I looked at the lineup this whole weekend that the Astros are running out there at their best. And you throw in Yorna Alvarez into that mix whenever he gets healthy. I'm just not scared of them anymore. I'm really not. I feel like the Mariners have the talent necessary that when they go head to head with the Astros, they're going to give him a run for their money.

And it used to not feel like that. Right. Well, I mean, you got to remember it's not just that they lost Correa. It's that they've also lost George Springer now. They've lost Garrett Cole. Like they've lost a major player each of the last few years. And yeah, Al Tuve, it's 32 years old. And he's better than he showed this weekend.

And he's going to hit. And he's still going to be a good player. But he's not a, you know, he's not the MVP candidate. Alex Brickman, kind of overrated. You know, very good in his own ballpark. But the swing isn't really conducive to much else to dead than dead pole. And he's just kind of, you know, Kyle Tucker was great last year, but he wasn't great before last year.

And is it possible that last year is an outlier? Yeah, I still think Kyle Tucker is going to hit. But yeah, it's possible still. Gerell is another year older. Jeremy Payne has got to go through the league a couple times. The outfield isn't very good outside of Tucker. Sirius, Chas McCormick is a nice player. I like him.

He's fourth outfielder. Jake Myers, when he's healthy, he's fourth outfielder. other Jose Siri. Really? That's your everyday guy? Their bullpen is mediocre at best, and they don't have the ammunition to go out

and get significantly better at the deadline, not without trading from their major league roster. So could the Mariners chase down the Astros? Sure. Do I still think the Astros are going to win the division? Yeah, I do. But yeah, it's like you said. I don't think you look at the Astros on the schedule anymore

and go, boy, we could take one out of three, like just kind of stay above, keep our heads above water here. That would be, don't get swept. I think now you look at it and say that's a winnable series, especially the pitching matchups line up right. Because honestly, the Mariners don't have anything that, or the Astros don't have anything that the Mariners can't match in their own rotation right now. You have Burlander to Ray, you know, Framber to Gilbert or Garcia to Gilbert.

Maybe that's the difference is Garcia or Framber, depending on which one you like more. maybe that's the difference. But Aquiti and Oda Rizzi, that's nothing the Mariners don't have in the back of their rotation as well. So they have a deeper bullpen. They have at least as good of a rotation. And, you know, the Astros have the better lineup. But it is aging. And the Mariners are kind of ascending.

So, yeah, again, I still think the Astros are going to be very good. I still think they're going to win 90 games. I don't think they're a 100-win team. And I think that's a lot of. why the Mariners have a shot here. And again, unlike the Astros, the Mariners have the opportunity to go get significantly better in the middle of the year. And I would expect them to take it, especially if they're playing the Astros as well. And we get into June, July, and they're right there in the thick of things. And based on what we've seen from the rest of the American League

West, that should be the case. Anaheim, again, Joey Otani has a pitchful on Anaheim. Mike Trow just suffered a hand injury. It doesn't seem too serious, but we'll see. And it's Anaheim. that they're going to have injuries. So we'll see how it works out for them. But yeah, the American League West definitely feels more open to anybody but Houston than it has been for the last five years or so. And, you know, if nothing else, this is a series that can instill some confidence. And we'll see where it goes. But the Mariners believe that they can beat the Astros multiple times.

And I believe they can. Yes. And I think fans are beginning to. believe that the gap has never been smaller, not since the Astros started their rise. The gap has never been this small. That's a really good sign for Seattle. Yeah. I'm going to guess one of these two teams is going to be, is going to win the season series,

like 11 to 8 or 10 to 9. Like I don't think we're going to see a 13 to 6 division split this year. So doesn't it kind of feel like they're almost evenly matched? more so I just I feel like the Astros are better like still at the end of the day I think the Astros are better I think if the Mariner's have more higher power and more name recognition but I feel like maybe the Mariners at this point might be more well built when you add in the bonus of the bullpen because the Astros bullpen is not good stop yeah it's I mean it's it's they spent a lot of money well they didn't spend a lot of money on it they spent some resources trying to make it better I mean, we didn't see their best guys per se.

We saw Stannock yesterday, but that's kind of just to get work in. So, yeah, we saw bias. You know, there's Presley. Yeah, Presley's hurt right now, too. So that's a blow. But, yeah, it's, Mariner's bullpen certainly deeper. Like so, the rotation is, I think, at least as good. or if you think the Astros rotation is better,

it's slightly at most. Yeah. And then the lineup, it comes down to the lineup, and the Astros certainly have the track record, but the Mariners have just as much upside. So, yeah, like I said, I think the gap's closed, but I'm not ready to say, you know, game set match, the Mariners are clearly the best team in the American League

West after a weekend series. In April. In April, no less. Yeah. It's a great sign, man. And like I said, it's clear as day that the gap is closed. And we'll see how these guys progressive, somebody gets better, worse, somebody gets hurt. There's a trade.

Like, the teams that we saw this weekend are not going to be the teams we see when this team plays each other in June, July, August, September. Well, actually, did you know that they wrap up their season series July 31st? Really? Yeah. So they do not play the Astros in August or September. Nope. So if they're in a pennant race, right, with the Astros, they're going to have to solely rely on other teams to handle their business.

And remember, guys, head-to-head record is the number one tiebreaker this year. There are no game 163s. So it's some crazy hypothetical where the Mariners and Astros both win 92 games, whoever won the season series, whoever got the 10th win first against each other, they win the division. So keep that in mind, these, head-to-head matchups

carry a little more weight than they used to because there are no more game 163s. Yeah. And that's going to end before the trade deadline because the trade deadline is August 3rd. Yeah, I got pushed up. So yeah, it's, I mean, like, it's possible that the division

could be decided upon by games that were entirely played without the final picture for either of these teams. going to be interesting hopefully we get there man that'd be great if we're having to sit here and say oh man i hope the angels can beat the astros today that would be nice yeah i would love to scoreboard watch for the uh for the sake of the division rather than yeah than a wild card that would be scoreboard watch all of august and september yeah yeah that would be uh that'd be sweet it'd be sweet and uh we're going to be doing a lot of that i would presume on on here we're

going to be doing some scoreboard watching not right now not for a few months more months. We are very much. July 1st. Yeah, yeah. We, I do not care what happens around the league. I,

I, when I was in Toronto for the Blue Jays, Rangers game, you know, I was talking about how I, I didn't like that the Blue Jays were winning because, you know, I'm just a Blue Jays hater. And I got Corbyn Smith of the lockdown

Seahawks podcast, who is a Blue Jays fan, responded to me. He's like, why would you want the Rangers to win? Don't you want the, don't you want the Rangers to lose because of the division? I don't care. And also the.

the Rangers suck. So the Barriers don't have to worry about the Rangers. But also, I do not care what happens around the league in early April. I really don't. Neither do you. It's a long, long season. There's still 152 games to be played from the Mariners alone right now. So we got a lot of time.

There are no priors to be confirmed in any short order. There's a lot of time for a lot of stuff to happen. And, yeah, it's not time to say that the Mariners have crowned themselves A-O-Wos champions either. The Astros are going to be fine. They are going to be very tough. But the Mariners got off to a strong start here this weekend. And hopefully are now on the right track with the Rangers and Royals coming to town tomorrow. Well, the Rangers are coming to town tomorrow.

And then they're going to wrap up this homestand with the Royals. A couple of favorable win-olds. matchups, but certainly a couple of matchups that are going to be difficult for the Mariners as well. They certainly pose their unique challenges. We'll get you ready for the Rangers series on tomorrow's episode of Lockdown Mariners. But for now, that's going to do it for our show today. Thank you so much for joining us here on the Lockdown Mariners podcast for Colby Patnode. I'm Tadang Gonzalez.

Be sure to give us a follow on Twitter at LO underscore Mariners. You can follow me at Dane Gonzalez. that's D-A-N-Z-L-Z and Colby at C-P-E-P-E-N-Z-E-T-L-E. You can also find all that stuff in the description of this episode. And thank you again for making us your first listen of the day, just like you do here every day. Now make your second list of the day. Lockdown MLB. That's where Paul Francis Sullivan and please call him Sully brings you his unique perspective on the major leagues president pass. It's free wherever you get your podcast just like us. So have yourself a beautiful baseball day and we will see you tomorrow. Go Ems.