Sickly Mariners power through, lose 2-1 to Angels

I’m shivering on my couch. I’m wrapped up in three blankets, my head is hurting, and Brad Adam is telling me about a charity auction. This is the sickest I’ve been since the pandemic started, and the Mariners are supposed to face off against Shohei Ohtani.

The bad news started before the game. Eugenio is on the 10-Day IL with a broken finger; we won’t see him make a play again in 2022. And then, right as the broadcast switches to the booth, we find out Julio was scratched from the lineup with lower back tightness. This sucks.

I don’t have the stamina to hang on every pitch of the game. But, like the Mariners tonight, I put up the best showing I can. Sounds guide me through the game. The obnoxious, cloying cheering of the Angel Stadium, Dave Sims and Mike Blowers, clearly broken up about the game, fill me in on what’s happening.

It isn’t going well. The M’s go in order in the top of the first, and in the bottom, Shohei and Trout personally lead the attack. First with a Trout single, then with an Ohtani double off the wall that Winker misplayed. That lapse gave the Angels a lead that they held for the remainder of the game.

Between innings, the commercials threaten to put me to sleep. So I listen to YouTube videos so I have something to focus on. I put on a video about those weird buttons on some power outlets, and autoplay takes over from there. I hear about petty Star Wars arguments, the latest in budget CPUs, and a video about how hard it is for a sword to cut through a spear.

Meanwhile, the game trudges on. The M’s get a few runners on first, but they get erased with no harm done. In the bottom of the fourth, a wild pitch moves Shohei from 2nd to third. He then scores on an RBI groundout, the most boring kind of RBI.

The defense isn’t there either. It’s serviceable, but it’s not the Best Defense in Baseball we’ve come to know. Misplays that don’t count as errors from Toro and Winker are the standouts of this sloppiness. I miss Julio and Eugenio.

I shut my eyes again. I am distantly aware that despite his struggles, George Kirby is dealing. For the rest of his six inning appearance, he allows no more runs, earning himself a quality start.

Unfortunely, Shohei is better. All his stuff his on tonight. This is peak pitcher-Ohtani, and everyone in the building knows it. He ends his game with 8 strikeouts, and just one walk. The Mariners are impotent, powerless to stop him.

In the top of the 8th, with Shohei finally gone, I am jolted to life by a loud crack, and Dave Sims screaming. Taylor Trammell has left the building, and cut the deficit in half.

Abraham Toro, my beloved, earns his nickname by splitting the outfielders, and running himself to second base. Tying run aboard. J.P. works a 6 pitch walk, go-ahead run aboard. For the first time tonight, my chills are from the game, and not my illness. Ty France steps to the plate. Things are looking good. Jaime Barría’s stuff is all over the place. Ty could really get it done here.

He takes the first pitch back up the middle, double play, inning over, hopes dashed.

In the bottom of the 8th Matt Brash holds the Angels at bay, despite hitting Luis Rengifo. A full-count swinging strikeout ends the frame. One inning left.

It does not go well. It needs not be recounted. Suffice to say that the M’s lost to Ohtani and Trout, yet again. As Sims and Blowers recap the game, the loss of the team’s two brightest stars, I decide I’ve had enough and turn off the TV. I am plunged into darkness.