Melvin takes a risk with Guardado’s knee

PEORIA, Ariz. – What’s worse, the lump in the Seattle Mariners’ throats or the twinge in Eddie Guardado’s left knee?

Given that Guardado is trying to make an impression as the Mariners’ new closer, and that the team already has one key member of its bullpen hurt, everyone felt something in the sixth inning of Friday’s exhibition game against the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Guardado was pitching to Josh Kroeger when he felt a pain in the knee. Neither Guardado nor the Mariners are saying it’s serious, but he will be examined by a doctor today.

“I’ve been feeling it, but today was a little bit worse,” Guardado said. “You get pumped up being out there. I threw my slider and that’s when I really felt it.”

Manager Bob Melvin and trainer Tom Newberg bolted out of the dugout when Guardado felt the pain with two outs in the sixth inning. Guardado talked them into letting him get the final out, which he did a few pitches later.

“It’s a little dicey leaving him in,” Melvin said. “You don’t want him to get hurt, but it’s something he seems to know how to deal with so we were prepared to give him a couple more pitches.”

Now the Mariners must see if a second important member of their relief staff will miss any time. Right-handed setup man Rafael Soriano strained an oblique muscle last week and was expected to miss about a month.

Guardado is scheduled to pitch again Monday.

“We’ll monitor it,” Melvin said. “If it’s still bothering him, he’s definitely not going to go back out there.”

Guardado, who has dealt with knee discomfort in previous seasons with the Minnesota Twins, said if this were the regular season he wouldn’t miss any time.

“It just affects the pushoff leg,” he said. “We’re just going to cut down on (fielding drills) and ice it and exercise it and see what happens. I’ve got to be smart about it and be ready for April 6.

“It’s frustrating. You come to a new team and the last thing you want is to be in the training room.”

Now batting third: The lineup for today’s game against the Padres will feature a look that Melvin has promised: Ichiro Suzuki batting third.

“There is no reason not to take that assignment,” Suzuki said through an interpreter. “I will welcome it.”

Melvin said before spring training that he would experiment with different lineups, and this will be his most drastic departure from the norm. All he wants is for Suzuki to be himself.

“I’d tell him, ‘Don’t change your game,’ ” Melvin said. “He has the ability to, but I don’t want him to.”

Batting third isn’t unfamiliar territory for Suzuki.

Lou Piniella shook up his lineup early in the 2002 season and batted him third in three games in Baltimore, and Suzuki responded with a 4-for-5 game his first time out.

“I’m sure he’s up for the task,” Melvin said.

Suzuki was clicking in the leadoff spot Friday with a triple in his first at-bat, plus a walk and a towering fly out to right field.

“His last time up, if it’s in the middle of the season, he probably takes that pitch out of the ballpark,” Melvin said. “He had three very good at-bats in basically his first start after getting just one at-bat yesterday (in the charity game against the Padres). In watching him take his at-bats right now, he seems like he’s taking a few more pitches. He hasn’t swung at a first pitch yet.”

Eager to play: Two and a half hours before his first start of spring training, Jamie Moyer was in the trainer’s room eager to be stretched. The trainers weren’t ready for him.

“He was in here at 10:30 this morning, and I told him we’ve still got an hour before he needed to do that,” trainer Rick Griffin said. “He really wanted to get out there.”

Moyer admitted his anxiety even though he has done this for 20 years in pro ball.

“I was chomping at the bit. Rick was laughing at me,” Moyer said. “You’ve worked out all winter, you’ve been here for two weeks, so let’s get this thing going. I think it’s the competition. I’m anxious to see where I am. Now I have a gauge.”

Moyer gave up three hits and two runs in two innings, dinged only by Matt Kata’s high-fly home run near the left-field foul pole in the first inning.

“Health-wise I feel great. Pitching-wise, I’m not that far away,” Moyer said. “Now it’s just a matter of building endurance. I threw some curveballs, I threw a couple of decent changeups, I threw a couple of bad changeups. I did some things I wanted to do.”

Search for a lefty: Now that exhibition games have begun, so has the competition for the situational left-hander job in the bullpen. Melvin’s challenge is to find the right situation to evaluate the lefties.

With multiple substitutions occurring in the first few innings of the early spring games, it’s not easy to find lefty-on-left matchups.

“It’s a crapshoot,” Melvin said. “Once you get the starters going a little bit longer, if you can get them in there as the next guy, then you have a shot. You want to see the lefties on the lefties.”

It’s not all bad when they face right-handers, though.

“You’re never going to bring a guy into a situation where you know he’s just going to get the left-handers, so it’s good to see them get some right-handers out as well.” Melvin said. “Once we get a little longer (into the exhibition season), we’ll try to get those matchups.”