I could rail on the offense for getting just one hit – a Danny Valencia triple that would score on a sac fly – in a 2-1 defeat in 10 innings; I could complain about a bullpen that just isn’t very good right now; I could lament this team squandering a massively impressive start out of Ariel Miranda (7 innings, 1 run, on 4 hits and 2 walks, with a career-high 9 strikeouts), when this team can ill afford to squander ANYTHING at this critical juncture of the season; but this boils down to running into the buzzsaw that is Jose Quintana:  a good pitcher who should probably be better, who seemingly destroys the Mariners at every turn (even though the numbers, in actuality, don’t bear that out), another lefty in a long line of lefties that have managed to confound our New & Improved offense this season.

It’s a bummer, but what are you gonna do?  This offense is absolutely capable of more against a guy like Quintana, but for whatever reason it just didn’t have it.  I blame Tuffy.

Edwin Diaz returned to the land of the living, pitching two very strong shutout innings in relief of Miranda, to get us to the aforementioned extra innings.  Tony Zych came in for the tenth, hit the first batter he faced, and wouldn’t you know it?  That guy came in for the game-winning run off of a double hit by Melky Cabrera.  Zych left a low and inside curveball to Melky, who didn’t whiff; very poor placement of a pitch to a left-handed hitter, if you ask me.  But, you know, that’s the story of this bullpen’s 2017.

That’s 3 out of 4 pretty good performances out of Ariel Miranda.  Last night, he got a little bit of the Felix treatment from this offense, but if he keeps doing what he’s doing, he’ll be more than fine.

Mitch Haniger had a bit of a setback in his recovery and his rehab assignment is being pushed back.  We seem to be on track for James Paxton to head out after this weekend, which is encouraging.  I’m tired of seeing TBD show up in the upcoming probable starters.