This thing was going pretty well for one and a half innings, then it completely went off the rails as the Twins racked up 28 hits in beating the Mariners 20-7.

Christian Bergman couldn’t get out of the third inning, giving up 9 runs in the process.  When you tack that onto the 4-inning, 10-run performance he had against the Nationals, that Thinking Face emoji starts to rear its insufferable head.  True, those are just two starts, but he’s seemingly made a career out of being fantastic in some appearances, and then outright abysmal in the rest.

This year, so far he’s had the 2 abysmal starts.  He’s also had 4 really terrific ones, with a couple other so-so performances that at least kept the Mariners in the ballgame.  So, most of the time, he’s good.  But, every so often, he’s the worst, and I feel like that’s a problem.

It’s still early, and if I had to guess – if the Mariners were forced to make a decision today – they’d stick with Gallardo over Bergman.  We’re still probably a week or so away from Felix returning, and with this start against the Twins fresh in their minds, I have to think that now it’s a contest between Bergman and Gaviglio (who gets the start tonight).

Of course, knowing the Mariners, just as soon as Felix comes back, someone else will get injured, making this a pointless exercise.  The point is:  if you would’ve asked me yesterday morning at this time who the Mariners SHOULD keep:  Bergman or Gallardo, I would’ve said Bergman 100 times out of 100.  Now?  Ehh, I have doubts.

It wasn’t just his fault that the Mariners gave up 20.  The bullpen decided to shit the bed all at once, as opposed to slowly, over the course of many days, which I appreciate.  Casey Lawrence didn’t have it, which leads me to believe Emilio Pagan is about 8 or 9 days away from getting called back up again.  Scrabble REALLY didn’t have it, but at this point, who cares?  He’s been great when it’s mattered.  We even saw Chooch Ruiz pitch an inning of relief, giving up just a solo homer.

The offense did enough to win on most nights, but this obviously wasn’t most nights.  They also had their opportunities, but couldn’t cash in, going 5 of 19 with RISP (whereas the Twins were 12 of 21).

Probably the weirdest thing about this game is that the Mariners only gave up 2 walks, and they were both given up by our catcher in the 8th inning.  Meaning, the Twins scored their runs by and large by pounding the everloving shit out of the Mariners.  You don’t see blowouts like that very often.

But, it’s over and done with; now it’s time to move on to the next one tonight.