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49-0 in football is kinda like 7-0 in baseball, if you consider a run scored to be like a touchdown. Which for the M's it pretty much is. But this is now several games this homestand in which the M's have scored 5+ touchdowns. And, though it doesn't feel like it, they're an Elias game away from a plus score against the Giants-Astros-Royals. An even score is already in the bag. What do the Giants and Royals have in common?
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Yesterday we brought up the odd Mike Zunino batting average. Today let's notice the odd Seth Smith slugging percentage. It's .472. You realize this is Safeco Field? The Mariners' team slugging average, entering Tuesday, was exactly .372. What do .472 and .372 have in common?
Smith is a fine ballplayer. He's having his finest season. Notice that.
Actually, in 2014 and 2015 he has had his two finest seasons, with 130 offensive performances ... despite ... no, because of? ... playing on weird ballfields in San Diego and Seattle. Could be that, like Raul Ibanez, he's a late bloomer who's also a good fit for this stadium.
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If we had told you, in March, that --- > the June Mariners would have:
And you didn't know anything but those four facts, with the rest TBD, what winning percentage would you have forseen? The whole of the 2015 Mariners has been way less than the sum of its parts.
But a big part of that has been the bad luck hitting. Again tonight: Seager with two (was it three?) .750 BABIP shots that were at people. Nelson Cruz tore the CF's glove off with a flyout. Coupla others.
By the way, Grumpy boldly predicted that Nelson Cruz had not "dislocated his pelvic bone." Baseball buzz is awesome. There he was, standing in the batter's box with a dislocated pelvic bone and a pulled cerebral cortex. Cruz, that is, not Grumpy.
* on SSI means we know, we know, Egbert. Don't bother. Nobody cares about the quibbles. ;- )
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Brad Miller has been, for about a week, in a really alarming fielding slump. We're not referring to the ball he muffed to his backhand side. We're referring to the yips he has on every single ground ball. His center of gravity pops up on him. What's going on with Chris Taylor? Seriously, somebody look it up and tell us?
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Cool that Edgar fixed Dustin Ackley so quick. Everything werewolf swung at was a mortar shot. Everything he swung at was also in that fan-shaped sector from power alley to power alley. He looked like Ideal Johnny Damon again.
The homer bounced on top of the fence, but it was also 395 feet. When Dr. D was a kid, saying "a 400-foot homer" was like saying "an 80-yard touchdown pass." That baby was on a low line and it was SMASHED.
In the postgame, Ackley really did give Edgar a bear, er, werewolf hug. "He told me to get greedy," referring to the 5th inning. It was a "good feeling in the dugout" playing behind Montgomery. Good feelings are a big part of sports. For them even more than for us.
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Likely, Dr. D will be absent on Wednesday and Thursday. One of you amigos chip in with an article mebbe? :- ) Just in case some odd reader wants to use the comments area on a lark. This Shout Box is a blessing and a curse. It's the monster that ate Cleveland.
We kid. Each morning, Dr. D gets up to discover that his fave website lives and breathes with or without actual writing on it. Wacky and wunnerful webbing, ain it.
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Mike Blowers pointed out that it would be nice to give Mike Zunino a week off to re-boot his head. And then he pointed out that Zunino is so good behind the plate, and it's so important to win tomorrow, that you have to play him. "So Mike is just going to have to fight through this." That's a carpeted-clubhouse point of view. Dr. D found it interesting.
Blowers relayed the other guy that Edgar has been working with a lot, in addition to Ackley, was Mike Zunino. If Zunino gets on a roll too, I guess we call it the Senor Dobles Cafe. One marquee left and one right.
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A fun fact: BJOL referenced a series of Big Unit starts in 1999, from June 25 to July 15. In those five starts, he won 0 games, despite a 1.12 ERA. Averaged 8.0 innings, 12 strikeouts, 2 walks -- practically five straight shutouts. Won none of them. The D-Backs lost consecutive scores by 1-0, 2-0, 1-0, 2-0, and 3-2; the Unit personally lost 4 of those games. The most frustrating 5 GS, 0 W in 150 years of baseball history.
Know what else happened on July 15, 1999? It so happened that Jamie Moyer opened Safeco Field that day. It might seem that Felix doesn't get enough run support, but ...
Randy went 0-4 in those 5 lockdown starts, but it turned out okay for him. He was 17-5 in his other starts and the DBacks won 100 games. Imagine throwing near-shutouts for almost a month straight, for a 100-game winner and losing every game. Big leaguers know how to put the past behind them, I guess.
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Last night we wrote, "They play better than we do." Tonight the M's had like a 3:2 strikeout ratio against the Royals' 10:0 and all the guys inside baseball are smiling gently and thinking, "That's just baseball. It's a long season."
In the Shout Box we had guys guaranteeing a loss. But that's the way to ride out offensive problems: get excellent pitching. There's nothing wrong with outpitching the other guys. Earl's Eighth Law: momentum is only good as that night's starting pitcher. You do realize we don't make those Earl laws up.
Go Roenis,
Dr D
So, I know that some of portion of Ackley's performance last night was probably mental, confidence vs. a pitcher he's hit well against in the past, but as I said in the shouts, the ball SOUNDED different off the bat AND his swing LOOKED different. Maybe Edgar sprinkled magic fairie dust on him? I really hope this is what we see from Ackley going forward.
I guess we'll find out how much of it was Edgar dust and how much was just one against a pitcher Ackley owns in a way few hitters own any pitcher.