On their way to an 8-4 victory tonight over the A’s, the Mariners proved that there really are gaps and holes to hit at Safeco Field. All it takes are a few balls in play.
The Mariners finished with 16 hits, one short of their season high (July 27 at New York), and one more than they got the entire Tampa Bay series over the weekend. They also scored twice as many runs tonight as they did in the three games against the Rays.
A few notes:
• Just a few hours after saying Charlie Furbush needed time to build his pitch count before he could start, manager Eric Wedge named the newly acquired left-hander as Wednesday’s starting pitcher.
The Mariners had spent a couple of days discussing their options for Wednesday’s game, which would have been Eric Bedard’s turn to start before they traded him Sunday to the Red Sox.
Left-hander Anthony Vazquez was one consideration, and he was scratched from tonight’s start with Class AAA Tacoma. Wonder what his range of emotions was like today?
Instead, the Mariners will go with Furbush, whose last start was July 14 for the Tigers when he allowed nine hits and four earned runs in 2 2/3 innings against the Royals. He threw 79 pitches in that game. The Mariners acquired Furbush on Saturday (along with outfielder Casper Wells, minor league third baseman Francisco Hernandez and a player to be named later) in the trade that sent starter Doug Fister and reliever David Pauley to the Tigers.
Furbush is 1-3 with a 3.78 ERA in 18 games this season, two of them starts with the Tigers.
• The more we watch rookie Dustin Ackley, the more we realize what a beautiful thing it is to watch a hitter with a clear idea what he wants to do with an at-bat. He went 2-for-4 with a three-run triple in the Mariners’ five-run second inning, a double and a run in the fourth and a walk in the fifth.
Ackley leads the team with a .311 average and his four triples are twice as many as anyone else (Ichiro Suzuki and Brendan Ryan have two each).
• Third baseman Chone Figgins’ status is day-to-day after he injured the hip flexor in his right leg when he made a dive into third base attempting to tag out Jemile Weeks in the first inning. Figgins doubled in the second and played the field in the top of the third, but was replaced by pinch hitter Justin Smoak in the bottom of the third.
• Rookie right-hander Blake Beavan pitched his fifth quality start in five outings, tying Michael Pineda for the most quality starts for a Mariner to begin a major league career.
• Justin Smoak wasn’t supposed to play tonight as Wedge tried to give him a second straight day off to clear his head and work on his swing mechanics amid a terrible hitting slump. Smoak, however, pinch-hit for Figgins in the third inning and drew a walk, then followed with a single, double and fly out, scoring two runs.
“He swung the bat well all night long, but the most impressive swing to me was from the left side (on a single in the fifth off A’s starter Trevor Cahill),” Wedge said. “He stayed on a breaking ball and squared it up.”
• And finally, center fielder Franklin Gutierrez looked like … well … Franklin Gutierrez.
He glided across center field to make three running catches, including one with a full layout dive to catch Hideki Matsui’s slicing liner to left-center in the third inning. He also hit an RBI double in the second inning and is batting .265 over a 10-game stretch since July 21.
“He’s been more fluid with his swing, which has freed him up to be a little more aggressive,” Wedge said. “That play in left-center, I didn’t think he had any chance. You can never take that guy for granted in center field.”
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