Mariners Game #53 Preview: May 28, Pittsburgh at Seattle

Marco Gonzales will try to lead the Mariners to a season-high three games over .500 this afternoon. On the other side, Seattle gets its first look at Luis Ortiz. His 12.1% walk rate ranks 234th among 247 starters with at least 30 IP over the past two seasons (Bryce Miller ranks first; George Kirby fourth). We’ll see if the Mariners lineup can take enough pitches to take advantage of that.

Lineups

Murphy will catch today, with Cal DHing. So long as the Mariners don’t have a great DH solution, I don’t see the harm in trying to get Cal more time off his feet. They wore him into the ground last year, and even with the MRI coming back negative, it’s pretty alarming that they had to do an MRI on his neck in the first place.

Caballero gets another start against a righty, a development I’m strongly in favor of. As I said on Meet at the Mitt recently, the quality of Cabby’s at-bats really ought to be rewarded. I think giving him more playing time is consequently a good message to send to minor leaguers.

On the Pittsburgh side, I think there’s a non-zero chance this is Carlos Santana’s last game in Seattle, so folks at the game, please give him the send-off he deserves. It sometimes makes me sad Mariners fans never got to give Denard Span the farewell applause he so richly deserved. Let’s not screw that up that chance here. It’s also almost certainly Andrew McCutchen’s final game in Seattle, and while he means less to Mariners fans specifically, he deserves a fond send-off too.

Game Info

First pitch: 1:10 PT
TV: ROOT Sports
Radio: 710 am and mariners.com
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OTD in Mariners History

1988: The Mariners set what is quite possibly the dumbest MLB record I’ve come across recently: most infield assists in a nine-inning game (22).

1997: Randy Johnson strikes out 15 Rangers in a 5-0 win over Texas.

1998: Amidst a 5-2 win over the Devil Rays, Edgar Martinez hits the lower catwalk at Tropicana Field in Tampa Bay, becoming the first player to do so.

2014: The Mariners beat the Angels 3-1. Mike Zunino had all 3 RBIs and caught Howie Kendrick trying to steal. Felix threw a gem of 8.2 innings with 9 strikeouts. At 116 pitches, Lloyd McClendon pulled Felix for Fernando Rodney, who recorded a three-pitch strikeout for the save, his 13th of the 48 he’d accumulated that season.

2022: The Mariners beat the Astros 6-0. Julio was 3 for 5 with a stolen base.

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