As a former catcher, Dan Wilson understands both the hitting and pitching aspects of the game.
“Sometimes when you’re not scoring a lot of runs, you need your pitchers to step up,” said Wilson, the Seattle Mariners manager.
That’s pretty much what happened Friday night as the Mariners took on the Los Angeles Angels, who were hosting their home opener in Anaheim, Calif. Four Mariners pitchers — Bryan Woo, Matt Brash, Andres Munoz and Gabe Speier — combined on a one-hitter as Seattle prevailed 3-1 in 10 innings.
The three-game series between American League West rivals continues Saturday at Angel Stadium.
After nine scoreless innings, Seattle’s Cole Young led off the 10th with a triple into the right-field corner to score ghost runner Luke Raley from second base.
“Obviously, every time in that situation, you want to get the runner over,” Young said. “That was my whole approach in that at-bat, just hit the ball to the right side, get the runner over. Just do a job and let the top of the order do the rest.”
He did more than that.
With two outs, the Angels intentionally walked Julio Rodriguez, despite his .100 batting average. After a wild pitch allowed Rodriguez to take second, Josh Naylor lined a single to right to make it 3-0. It was Naylor’s second hit of the night, surpassing the total of one he had through the season’s first six games.
The Mariners conceded a run in the bottom of the inning, with Raley catching Jorge Soler’s foul ball down the right-field line to turn it into a sacrifice fly.
Young, who is batting .310 with one home run and five RBIs, has been one of the few offensive bright spots for the Mariners, who rank 26th of 30 MLB teams with a .204 batting average. The Angels are 30th at .186.
“The one thing we’ve talked about with Cole is the game doesn’t speed up on him,” Wilson said. “He’s been able to kind of keep that consistent pace to his game, and that plays extremely important in those kind of situations.”
The Mariners welcomed back shortstop J.P. Crawford, who made his season debut after recovering from right shoulder inflammation. Third baseman Brendan Donovan left in the middle of the seventh after straining to beat out a groundball and suffering a leg injury.
“(Donovan) hit the bag kind of funny,” Wilson said. “We’ll assess it (Saturday).”
Angels starter Reid Detmers nearly matched Woo, allowing three hits over 6 2/3 innings.
The Angels’ only hit was a wind-aided pop-up down the right-field line by Oswald Peraza that fell just out of the reach of diving outfielder Victor Robles with one out in the third inning. Woo proceeded to pick off Peraza.
The wind also potentially took a homer away from Mike Trout on a deep blast to left-center field in the sixth.
“I thought I got it,” Trout said. “I might have hit it a little off the end of the bat, but …”
Saturday’s pitching matchup is scheduled to feature a pair of right-handers in Seattle’s Emerson Hancock (1-0, 0.00 ERA) against the Angels’ Jack Kochanowicz (0-0, 11.25).
Hancock, who pitched six hitless innings in his season debut against the Cleveland Guardians, is 0-0 with a 3.52 ERA in two previous appearances against the Angels, including one start. Kochanowicz is 0-2 with an 8.03 ERA in three career starts against the Mariners.
–Field Level Media
