Look, all I’m saying is MAYBE Ryan Cook isn’t the guy you want on the mound to face Mike Trout. Also, MAYBE just walk Mike Trout’s fuckin’ ass every single time he steps up to the plate, because this shit is getting ridiculous. He’s in Barry Bonds In His Prime Minus All The Steroids Allegedly territory, where at this point as long as it doesn’t mean the go-ahead run comes in, I’d walk Trout with the bases fucking loaded!
And even then … I mean, do you have another set of at-bats coming up? Maybe walking in that go-ahead run is better than the alternative of him clearing the bases?
He’s fucking Superman, what can you say? I hate him. I wish he was on any other team outside of the A.L. West (in which point, I’d probably love him). He’s like Griffey in his prime, minus all the personality. The fact that he isn’t the biggest superstar on the planet is ridiculous, because I’d venture to say he’s better at baseball than any other guy is better than everyone else in any other sport (aside from LeBron, of course).
Or, I dunno. Maybe he’s just this great against the Mariners, and he’s a little more mortal against the rest of the league. 31 homers is the most against any team he’s faced in his career; 81 RBI is the second most against any team behind the 86 he’s hit in against the Rangers; 9 triples (tied for the most; again with the Rangers); 93 runs are again the second most (Rangers, 103). I guess Texas has a claim in this argument. Also, Trout’s 117 career strikeouts against the Mariners are the most against any team, but I would argue the lion’s share of those came against Felix in his prime.
Anyway, that’s all preamble to say Trout had 2 more homers last night, after having hit 2 homers on Monday. He’s already at 23 homers on the season, and 5 of them have come against the Mariners. Also, his slash line in 5 games is .636/.680/1.545; so if it feels like Mike Trout has fucking obliterated the Seattle Mariners this season, take whatever you’re feeling and quadruple it.
I should point out that the Angels have lost both of those games, so if we’re going to beat the Angels every time Mike Trout hits 2 homers in a game, then sign me up!
On Monday, Wade LeBlanc gave up back-to-back solo homers in the first and didn’t look to be long for this world. He managed to gut his way through 5 innings, keeping them to just those 2 runs, and allowing the Mariners to overtake them. Nelson Cruz matched Trout homer for homer, hitting a game-tying 2-run bomb in the bottom of the first, then a go-ahead solo homer in the fourth. Ryon Healy hit the game-winning 2-run home run in the fourth as well, and the Mariners were able to hold onto a 5-3 victory. Ryan Cook gave up the second Trout homer in this one, spoiler alert.
Aside from that, the bullpen was rock solid on Monday, going 4 innings and giving up just the 1 run. Bradford and Pazos both took care of business, and Edwin Diaz got his 24th save of the season, no problem.
On Tuesday, Mike Leake’s only blemish was a solo homer to Trout in the fifth. He went 6 innings, giving up that 1 run on only 4 hits and 3 walks, with 4 strikeouts. Both Haniger AND Healy hit 2 homers apiece to pace Trout in this one, which is pretty cool. It’s been a while since the Mariners brought their big boy sticks to the ballpark. Haniger hit a solo homer in the first to take the lead; then a 2-run homer in the bottom of the fifth to RE-take the lead. Healy’s homers were both of the solo variety (in the sixth & eighth), and Segura tacked on an RBI double in the seventh. Trout’s 2-run homer (again, off of Cook) made it a 1-run game temporarily, but we put them away late by the score of 6-3.
Again, aside from Cook, the bullpen was great. Pazos got us out of the 7th, Colome took care of business in the 8th, and Diaz got his 25th save of the season … oddly enough by striking Trout out swinging.
This obviously puts the Mariners in a better position. We were 1-2 against the Angels heading into this series; after today, we can be no worse than .500 against them. We’re 0.5 games up on the Astros for the division, and a whopping 6.5 games up on the Angels for the second wild card.
I know I made a lot of noise about how difficult June was looking, but with Tampa shitting the bed, and now the Angels losing a lot of important players to injury, the nagging doubter in my brain wants to poo-poo what the Mariners are doing. But, this shit is seriously impressive any way you slice it. If we’re all going to boil this season down to how the Mariners play against the Red Sox and Yankees, then feel free to be my guest. I mean, odds are we’ll have to play one of those teams in the wild card game, and the other of those teams in the ALDS (if we get that far), so we better figure out a way to either beat them or avoid them. All I’m trying to say is that this is pretty fun, and let’s keep the ball rolling!