'Nothing was falling': Mariners can't get much past Oakland defense

SEATTLE -- All that Julio Rodríguez could do was quite literally tip his cap.

A 103.1 mph fly ball to the warning track on Saturday night off the bat looked like it was destined to do damage in the fourth inning of the Mariners’ 8-1 loss to the A’s. But Rodríguez instead fell victim to an over-the-shoulder catch by Lawrence Butler, after which he paused and gave a thumbs-up to Oakland’s right fielder.

It was a good-faith gesture that was also an encapsulation of a frustrating night at the plate for the Mariners, who saw eight of their 11 hard-hit balls land into gloves instead of the bleachers or grass. Rodríguez also paced the game’s exit velocity leaderboard with a 110.1 mph up-the-middle liner that, instead of scorching into center field, pummeled off pitcher Joey Estes’ glove, then shoulder, and led to a putout.

“Everybody has been putting in a lot of good at-bats,” Rodríguez said. “Everybody's swinging the right pitches. Everybody is just hitting the ball hard. I feel like that's a really good positive night -- obviously it doesn't reflect on the scoreboard.”

Seattle finished with just three hits, but their eight hard-hit outs were one shy of their season-high.

A few other notable knocks that were for naught:

• Dylan Moore nearly hit a pull-side homer for the second straight night, but his 99.2 mph, 350-foot fly ball landed just short of the left-field fence in the sixth. Had it gone an extra foot or two, the Mariners would’ve tied the game at 2.
• Mitch Garver saw a 100.6 mph would-be double down the left-field line snowconed in the fifth by third baseman Brett Harris, who dove to his left then rolled over while maintaining control of the ball, which had a .660 expected batting average. Had it landed, Garver would’ve scored on the ensuing double by Jorge Polanco, tying the game at 2-2.

• Luke Raley had a 97.1 mph screamer snagged by first baseman Tyler Soderstrom on a Spiderman-like leap in the third.
• Polanco hit a 101.7 mph flyout to Butler at the warning track to lead off the eighth, though it was immediately after Gabe Speier surrendered a bases-clearing double to Max Schuemann that put the game out of reach.

“[Estes] was in the zone and we were aggressive early,” Raley said. “He didn't even throw that many pitches. But I mean, we hit some balls well, and nothing was falling.”

Aside from Polanco’s 105.8 mph double, Seattle’s only hard-hit ball that dropped was Josh Rojas’ 97.6 mph single in the sixth and Cal Raleigh’s 100.4 mph solo homer in the second, which represented its only run.

It was the 10th homer of the year for “Big Dumper,” who has now gone yard four times since last Sunday, when he hit a dramatic, go-ahead blast in a 5-4 win in Houston.

But there wasn’t much solace for the poor-luck superlatives in front of a ticketed 32,398 at T-Mobile Park -- especially given that Oakland played a completely clean game, and that the Mariners paid for a few costly miscues.

The most dramatic was when Rodríguez was the third out in the sixth when attempting his 10th stolen base while representing the tying run Sliding feet-first -- as he has for most of the past two years after head-first slides led to injuries -- Rodríguez came off the bag and was tagged out by former Mariner Abraham Toro to halt a potential rally while the game was within reach.

“He just kind of kept the tag on it,” Rodríguez said. “I've got to slow down a little bit. ... Because of my body, I just want to stay feet-first and let my bottom half take the burden off the slide.”

Earlier, in the third, a chopping grounder from Brett Harris scooted past Rojas for a single instead of the first out. Harris went on to score the go-ahead run on a two-out knock from Toro off Bryce Miller, whose other run manifested from a leadoff walk to Butler.

Other than that two-spot, Miller put up zeros with nine strikeouts over six innings.

The dagger of the night was a wild pitch by Eduard Bazardo that scored a runner from third base and was immediately followed by a two-run homer from JJ Bleday that created a seven-run deficit.