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M's run totals seven games in:  9, 5, 12, 6, 6, 10, 6.  Which totals 54 runs, divided by 7? equals 7.7 per ballgame.  But which is more difficult?  Running seven straight games with 5+ runs, or averaging 8?  That was the question posed by the 2001 M's, who scored 5 runs in scads of games... 

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1927 New York Yankees' game run totals at the same pernt .... WOW!  NICE!  8, 10, 9, 6, 5, 14, 3.  Totalling 55 runs for 7.9 per ballgame.  Baseball history had no clue that the '27 Yankees' early blitzkrieg was an airhorn signalling their intent to finish 110-44 (109 even by Pythag), which woulda tied them with the '06 Cubs and '01 Mariners at 116 runs over a 162-game span.  

Of course you and I can only dream about the spectacle of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig facing off Chris Sale, but we know what would happen in a matchup with the '19 Mariners:   he’d be left for dead after four or five Back Leg Specials.

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1976 Big Red Machine game run totals after a week-plus:   11, 13, 9, 6, 5, 7, 11.  Wow ANOTHER epic blizzard of runs to open the season LOL.  Sixty-TWO runs in seven games?  Boy, did Dr. D ever have a boyhood hobby that made up for all the times he wound up in the hospital after backyard skateboard tricks.  So that's 8.9 runs per game.

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1930 Cardinals' first seven games:  8, 13, 0, 11, 4, 4, 8 on their way to 1,030 runs.  So that's 48 runs or 6.9 runs per game.

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The moral of the story is, of course, that if you spend the season's first week scoring 7 runs per game, especially against disproportionately good SP's, you're going down in history as one of the greatest ballclubs ever to take the field.  It's simple logic.

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I have reasonably and fairly made my case that the 2019 Mariners are a planet-busting juggernaut, but ... was still curious how the 2001 Mariners stacked up.  Hmmmmmm ... thusly:  5, 1, 10, 9, 6, 4, 5 = 40 runs, 5.7 average.

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WHY?

Once in a while Cindy goes into "Dr. D" mode during a game, which amuses her and annoys me greatly ... typing this sentence I see the implications of that sentence.  Anyway, tonight she axs me during the game, "To what do you attribute this scoring?"  

Goood!  Question!  First of all, Gentle Denizen, what's YOUR theory?  The Mariners as a team are now at about 300 plate appearances, which is supposed to be the number of trials ----- > at which batting average and OBP "stabilize."  Hey, I know how you guys think:  the team BABIP is only .293.  

On the other big luck stat, HR/f, they are only #7 in the majors at 17.9%.  That will drop to about 11%, but then again that 18% is supporting an 8 runs per game cash flow and nobody said the bare minimum for 107 wins was 8 runs per game.

RISP (.316/.423/.667) and "strand rate" also come into play.  "Strand rate" is number of runners left on base, normally 70%.  I'm sure the M's have a great strand rate.

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So your theories are going to fall into, or fall outside of, or overlap with, LUCK and NON-LUCK theories.  Obviously the M's scoring will fall from 7.7 runs per game.  But this is a baseball world that predicted 3.7 for them ...

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The Mariners are #2 in "chase rate" so far.  Also, I've been simply amazed at how many barrelled-up balls have gone into the power alleys -- L and LCF for righties, R and RCF for lefties.  They are hot, but they are also locked in grimly, treating every down like it was 4th-and-inches.

The M's hitters are playing as well as they can possibly play, and while it lasts, this is one pokey who's going to enjoy it.

BABVA,

Dr D