'Physical rust' leads Woo to rough return from IL

ANAHEIM – Before Friday night’s game with the Angels, Mariners manager Scott Servais said the hope was that right-hander Brian Woo could “get us relatively deep into the game.”

In his first start off the injured list, where he’d been since June 25 with a right hamstring strain, Woo wasn’t quite able to do that. He battled command issues that ramped up his pitch count and forced him out of the game after 3 1/3 innings, allowing nine hits and four earned runs, walking a pair and striking out one. He threw 66 pitches (44 strikes), but couldn’t find a putaway pitch, allowing four hits in two-strike counts.

Seattle would lose the game, 6-5, in 10 innings on a walk-off homer from Willie Calhoun (his second homer of the night), but that wasn’t the whole story of the game.

The Mariners had a great chance to win the game despite Woo’s early exit due to a superb performance from the relievers who came in after him.

Trent Thornton, Collin Snider, Gregory Santos, Ryne Stanek and newly minted All-Star Andrés Muñoz provided 5 2/3 innings of scoreless relief, allowing just one hit among them and striking out nine (a season high for the relief corps). It was the bridge the offense needed to get close to the finish line, which in this case was a 10th-inning go-ahead RBI ground-rule double off the bat of Mitch Garver.

Calhoun’s walk-off blast against Austin Voth spoiled the chance of a victory, but the bullpen left a strong impression nonetheless.

“It was really good,” said manager Scott Servais of his stable of relief arms. “Unfortunately, their bullpen was pretty good, too. You’ve got to add on there [in the 10th], but our guys were great. And Voth has been really good for us this year, he just made a mistake.”

The Mariners have reaped the benefits of a starting staff that leads the Majors in quality starts with 56. By extension, their bullpen finished Friday with just 292 innings pitched -- the fewest innings of any club this season.

Even Woo, who was making just his 13th start of the campaign, has four quality starts of his own under his belt.

Due to this almost daily expectation of greatness, Woo was visibly frustrated with his outing, though he said he didn’t feel any rust from his time between Major League appearances.

It also wasn’t a velocity issue, as Woo’s four-seam fastball averaged 94.9 mph, up a tick from his season average of 94.7, while his sinker was also slightly above its season average of 94.5 mph.

“I think it’s more of the flow of the game,” Woo said. “More mental than it is physical, getting back to good consistency, good commitment. Good aggressiveness. I think that’s more than it is a physical rust.”

Friday’s circumstance, then, was a rarity – and one the club nearly overcame anyway.

• Ty + Polo + J.P. + Cal = CRAZY way to escape a jam

Julio Rodríguez powered a two-run homer in the first inning to get the scoring started, a 106.3 mph blast over the wall in right field that gave Seattle a quick 2-0 lead over Angels All-Star Tyler Anderson. Rodríguez would finish the night with three hits, though a key strikeout in the 10th prevented the Mariners from plating some insurance runs.

Cal Raleigh, who’s been on an absolute offensive tear this past week, mashed a two-run homer of his own in the third. With the long ball, Raleigh became the first catcher in MLB to have five home runs in a four-game span since Seattle's Tom Murphy in August 2019.

What’s more, Raleigh is the second catcher in MLB history to reach 20 homers and five stolen bases before the All-Star break, joining Carlton Fisk in 1985.

But a 1-for-7 performance with runners in scoring position limited the offense as a whole, which didn’t score after the third inning until Garver’s double in the 10th.

As a result, Seattle’s lead in the AL West shrunk to one game over Houston, with two more games left in Anaheim before a short respite for All-Star week festivities.

Nonetheless, Servais maintains a mood of optimism in the Mariners’ clubhouse.

“Just not quite enough tonight,” Servais said, “Gotta get back after it tomorrow, focus on winning the series here and ending strong before we go to the break.”