Locked On Mariners - Daily Podcast On the Seattle Mariners - M's Score A's Against Oakland in Home Opener

Episode Date: August 1, 2020

A little over a week into the abbreviated season, the Mariners won their first home game, and now have an even .500 record. Which hitters have been hot, who's been cold, and how has the starting rotation looked? D.C. answers those questions, as well as taking a look at how the rest of the American League is doing. 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.

This is Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Here's your host, D.C. Lunberg. Thank you very much, Joey. Welcome again to Locked-on Mariners. It is Saturday. It is the weekend, the high temperature in the Lilac City. We're done with temperatures in the 100s for the time being. Currently around 86 degrees at time of recording at 1 o'clock p.m.

on Saturday, August 1st. What a relief. Again, welcome to Locked-on Mariners. Ladies and gentlemen, of course, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Please be sure to download, rate, and subscribe to this program on Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app that you personally care to use. Ask your smart device to play Locked-on Mariner's podcast or Locked-on-N-N-N-N-N-O-N-N-Badness, any of the wonderful shows here on the Locked-on podcast network or T-L-O-P-N or, of course, T-Lopin, as I like to say. Also remember that you can follow this program on Twitter. We're on Twitter, ladies and gentlemen, at L-O-U-U-U-Skore merrers,

and I am personally on Twitter as well at D.C. underscore Lundberg, that is L-U-N-D-B-E-R-G, for those scoring at home. Mariner's home opener was yesterday night, yesterday night, last night, ladies and gentlemen, a 5-3 victory over the Oakland Athletics. And starting pitcher for the Mariners was Taiwan Walker, coming off a shaky outing against Houston actually looked okay through the first part

of the batting order, fell apart in the fourth and gave up a big inning as the starting pitchers had been prone to do. However, last night, ladies and gentlemen, no big inning given up by a Seattle Mariners starter. That did not come until the eighth inning against the bullpen.

Taiwan Walker looked great, ladies and gentlemen. Line for him on the day, seven innings pitched. One hit. Two walks, eight, strikeouts. Fastball was there and he went more to his curveball than he did in his previous outing and to that point Scott Service said something on that note. Let me find it. Here it is. This is a quote from Scott Service. When we had him, Taiwan Walker, back in 16, he was very

reliant on the fastball. Some nights he'd have a curveball, some nights he didn't and didn't really have much else after that. He has a much better understanding of how to use his pitches, and it's not just hit or miss on a given night, end quote. That's encouraging if he's mixing his pitch as well, if his curveballs improved, his off-speed stuff has improved as well. Maybe a different Taiwan walk. In fact, absolutely a different Taiwan walker than the Mariners saw a few seasons ago when he

was traded to the Diamondbacks as part of the Mitch Hanager deal. Also of note is that Kyle Lewis continues basically to be Kyle Lewis. This kid's unbelievable, ladies and gentlemen. He is now hit safely in all eight ball games the Mariners have played. He has six straight multi-hit games. He is tied for the league team lead in RBIs with eight. He shares that lead with Kyle Seeger, the Kyle Connection, as I've been calling it, or as Locked-on A's host Jason Burke called them the killer Kyle's.

I'll continue to use the Kyle connection because I do not want to rip off a colleague here at the Locked-on podcast network. Even though his name for them is better than mine, I will let him continue to use that one. But the Kyle connection came up strong again. Kyle Lewis, two for four yesterday. And Kyle Seeger drove in two runs. He was one for three with a walk. Kyle Lewis so far is hitting 455 on the season. Kyle Seeger 290.

Evan White's not off to the best start. He's hitting 167, and he's tied for the American League League in strikeouts with 13. Kyle Lewis also shares that league lead in strikeouts with 13. That's not a necessarily good thing, although you cannot argue with a 455 batting average and OPS of 1.136. Since moving to the lead-off spot, J.P. Crawford has done a great job. On the season, he's hitting 393. Two more hits last night, two for four.

four with two runs scored, a strikeout, and a season OPS of 1.086. And he is the type of leadoff hitter. He's got a little bit of extra base punch. So when he steps up to the plate as the first batter, he's got a chance to give you a 1-0 lead right off the bat, so to speak, no pun intended. Let's see here. Austin Nola also returned to the starting lineup last night after missing the previous

few games Joe Odom filled in for him, as did Joe Hudson. You know, neither of them are great options of the major. league level and especially in Odom's case, I think it showed. Although Odom has a very, very good reputation as one of the better pitch framers in the minor leagues when he was there. So the defense is there for him and the defense is there for Evan White. And that's one thing that he can rest on.

I think it was Dave Sims who made this point on the radio, or it may have been Aaron Goldsmith. I don't remember. Even if White is not hitting, he can always rely on his glove. Defense really doesn't slump. And speaking of the defense, that's kind of one thing that's, not been great for the Mariners so far this season. They're botching some routine plays.

They're making some spectacular plays, but as a team, they're really not making the routine play. J.P. Crawford just threw one away the other day, and it led to a beginning. Shedlong misplained an easy one, and it led to a beginning. They're not connecting on double plays real well.

Some of the throws are going into right field, or maybe that just happened once, so that's a little bit of hyperbole. I apologize for that. They're missing cut-off men. They're not fielding cut-off throws. they need to come together more on team defense if they really want to sustain the streak that they're on because it was a 5 to 3 win. It wasn't 10 to 7 or whatever they did against the Angels a couple of times.

I think they hung a 10 spot and an 8 spot on the Angels, and you cannot really expect to do that every night. Dylan Moore, however, he's hitting at 385. He's got popping. His bat too. He hit one in Anaheim. That was pretty impressive. One for four last night with a run scored. Dee Gordon's been getting some playing time in left field. He's hitting at 231. Again, these are small sample sizes, but the whole season is a small sample size. Brian Shaw also pitched one inning last night to relieve Taiwan Walker. He's the one who gave up the big inning, and it was more, you know, he got hit hard again,

it looks like, two hits, three runs, all of them earned a walk. He hasn't been real impressive. Taylor Williams did earn his second Major League save, and also you see his second as a Mariner. One inning pitch, they gave up a walk. So there's your pitching line for the Seattle Mariners last night. Among some of the position players that did not play last night, Jose Marmaléjos, 143 batting average. He's been swinging the bat much better than that.

He's just been barely missing some pitches. And Scott Service has liked the way he has swung the bat, even if the results aren't there yet. His first Major League home run, by the way, the other night was no cheapy. And his three Major League RBIs do come on that. hit. Malick Smith is hitting an 059. Not very impressive. Daniel Vogelbach has the one hit on the season. And he's kind of back to his old ways into being a little bit too patient at the plate and letting some hitable pitches go by and he's been getting himself into some tough counts lately. He has got to

be a little bit more aggressive as he was towards the beginning of last season. And I think that's where he's going to find some success. He's also got to cut down on the strikeouts. He's so strong that if he touches the ball, it's probably going out of the ballpark. He doesn't need to try to hit the ball out of the ballpark. He has struck out, well, three times this season in 11 at bats. That's not as bad as some other players. But the point still remains. He struck out way too much even last year, and that's got to come down. Tonight's game against the Oakland Athletics, ladies and gentlemen, Mike Fires will start for the Oakland Athletics, author of two career no hitters against Japanese import Yuse Kikichi, who was not impressive in his

last start and wasn't impressive at all, basically the last two-thirds of the season. In my estimation, he is the starter with the most to prove. That will bring us to the Mariners trivia question for the day, ladies and gentlemen, and today it reads thusly, in this young season only eight days old, or eight games old for the Mariners, I should say, how many triples have the Mariners hit? Answer following a word from CBDMD. Gang, it does not matter if you're a professional athlete. Stay at parent, or if you spend eight hours a day in an uncomfortable office chair, it doesn't matter what you do for a living. Everyone needs support to make it through the day. Luckily, our friends at CBDMD have an amazing duo that can help you relax, regroup, and recharge when life gets chaotic.

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Amazing selection, reliably low prices, all the parts your car will ever need. Rock Auto.com. Welcome back to Lockdown Mariners. Once again, your host, D.C. Lundberg. Thank you once again, Joey Martin, or J.M. as we call him. We are back on Locked-on Mariners. First half of the show kind of getting you, well, talking about the Mariners' home opener and kind of an update on how the players have been doing thus far in the short portion of the short season,

eight games into the 60-game season. We're going to get you caught up on what's going around the league. In the second half of the show, we'll start with the American League, and we'll start with the American League West for obvious reasons. The Houston Astros are currently leading the American League West with a 4-3 record. Insert comment here, I suppose. They've had some interesting games against the Dodgers. Joe Kelly was suspended eight games for throwing it, Carlos Correa,

and then taunting the other team. So, anyways, I'm not going to get quite into it right now, since I don't have the time. This is supposed to be a 14, 15, 16-minute show, and if I go off on Joe Kelly, I'll go 40 minutes. I shouldn't say go off on Joe Kelly. It's more going off on the suspension. I could talk for 40 minutes on that alone.

In any case, like I said, the Astros are 4 and 3. They lead the American League West. Only a half game behind are the Seattle Mariners in 4 and 4. Oakland's 3 and 4, Texas is 2 and 4. And L.A., the Angels, they're 2 and 6. They have not gotten off to the best of starts, and they're going to be without Mike Trout for a while, who left at the tail end of the Mariners series

to go be on paternity leave. He is going to help welcome his first child into the world. He's going to be with his wife and his new family for a while. So congratulations to that family. I hope they have a healthy. And I think they're having a son, but I wouldn't swear to it. If they have a son or a daughter, I hope that it's a happy, healthy baby,

and a smooth delivery. I'm rambling. Anyways, back to the Astros. They have Carlos Correa hitting 385. Michael Brantley is hitting 407. He had a hot hand in the Meritor's series, and it looks like he's continued his hot hitting. Martine Maldonado has cooled off a little bit, but he is definitely more of a defensive minded catcher while Brantley is definitely an offensive player.

After the opener, after the season opener, it was announced that Justin Verlander may miss the rest of the season. But then Astro's manager, Dusty Baker, said, no, we're going to shut him down for a few weeks and then evaluate him at that time. So kind of conflicted reporting in that sense. We'll see where Justin Verlander is. Speaking of Dusty Baker, the Astros picked up his 2021 option, so he is no longer the interim manager.

He is now firmly ensconced in Houston. And by the way, all the stats that I'm naming this segment are coming into today, coming into August 1st, 2020. The Oakland Athletics, they're not looking so hot right now. Jason Burke of Lockdonez was on this program yesterday, said, The bats really haven't come around yet. Starting pitching has been hit or miss, but the bullpen's been very good.

And those numbers bear that out. Those numbers bear that out. The A's leading hitter right now is Ramon Luriano. Their center field are hitting at 3.48. He's also got a home run, four runs batted in. And he plays a wonderful center field. He is fun to watch. Their corner infielers, Matt Chapman, Matt Olson,

definitely a gold glove combination at first and third base. Then we move on to the, two and four Texas Rangers, and their offense doesn't look like it's gotten off the Schneide at all. And as a matter of fact, they're last in the American League in batting average. They're hitting 180 as a team, ladies and gentlemen. However, their 357 team ERA is sixth in the league, so they're in the upper half there. Lance Lynn has had two good starts. His ERA is zero in 12 innings in both of those starts.

Kyle Gibson. And it's so tough to judge a pitching step. especially a starting pitching staff with so few games that I'm not even going to bother anymore. The Los Angeles Angels, ladies and gentlemen, I will say they're pitching, they're relief pitching. You can judge relief pitching the same way you can judge an offense because they're in there every day for the most part. They just did not look good against the Seattle Mariners. And offensively, you know, they had their moments.

They had their moments. Brian Goodwin looked really good. He's hitting 450 on the season. He's played in six of the team's games. Wow. He was very, very impressive. He's got two home runs on this season. Shoha O'Hautani also has two home runs on the season. He's only hitting at 148, however. David Fletcher, this guy is one of the most underrated players in the American League. He does not strike out very often, puts the ball in play. These are the players that I like.

David Fletcher, he can play multiple positions for you. And right now he's hitting at 400. He puts the ball in play and he makes things happen on the base pass. I am a David Fletcher fan, ladies and gentlemen. We'll move over to the Central right now. The twins lead the division at 5 and 2. Both Cleveland and Detroit are 5 and 3. Chicago is 3 and 4. That may pick up.

They made a couple of free agent splashes. And they have a rookie of the year candidate on their roster in Luis Robert, or Louis Roberts, for those lazy people at home. Center fielder, good defender. Power bat hitting 296 right now with a home run, a double. Nine strikeouts, though. Fewer than Kyle Lewis. They are hitting 238 as a team, which actually is fifth in the American League.

And pitching-wise, they're not doing so well. That's probably been their downfall so far. But again, the starting pitching, the numbers are terrible. Let's see how they do after a few more times in the rotation. We're running out of time. So I'm going to gloss over the American League East. It's the Yankees so far at 5-1, Baltimore 3-3-3-3, Tampa Bay 4 and 4, Toronto 3-4, Boston at 3-5. I will go over the National League probably on, well, probably on Tuesday since I've got a couple of games to talk about,

a couple of Mariners games to talk about on Monday. We'll just see how time works out. I might be able to talk about that on Monday. We shall see, but I can say this about Monday. I will be joined by guest panelists, Buster Poindexter, Go-Bow-Fragel, and a jar of mayonnaise. Whether we're just talking about the two Mariners games or whether we also go over the National League, it's going to be a great conversation. That's a wonderful panel. You will not want to miss that, so please download rate and subscribe to this program,

so you never miss an episode on Google Podcast, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, or whichever podcasting app that pops into your head. Follow this program on Twitter at L.O. underscore Mariners, and follow me on Twitter as well, ladies and gentlemen, at D.C. underscore Lundberg. Next Mariners game begins in just a couple hours from now, 610 start time tonight. So enjoy that and enjoy the rest of your weekend, ladies and gentlemen. We will be back here on Monday. This is Joey Martin speaking for Locked-on Mariners, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network.