Seattle's 3-pronged attack: timely hitting, efficient pitching and defense

SEATTLE -- The chatter surrounding the Mariners’ sluggish offensive start has largely centered around capitalizing when leverage moments manifest. With runners in scoring position. With two outs. With late-innings stakes.

Whatever it be, Seattle had mostly struggled in those heftier circumstances -- which is precisely why their pass-the-baton breakthrough in Friday’s 5-2 win over the Cardinals proved that much more encouraging.

AJ Pollock ripped a 103.4 mph first-pitch double with one out into the right-center gap that scored two. Jarred Kelenic followed with a 290-foot sacrifice fly to deep left that scored another. The tie was broken with a three-run momentum shift that was equally efficient as it was rapid.

Those highlights in the fateful sixth inning were headliners -- as was Teoscar Hernández’s 414-foot homer in the fourth -- but the sequences that set them up were just as vital.

Hernández scored on Kelenic’s sacrifice, but he only reached base after Cardinals catcher Willson Contreras dropped strike three -- thanks to Eugenio Suárez and Julio Rodríguez reaching scoring position earlier in the at-bat, also via a passed ball. While on base, Rodríguez recorded his 30th career stolen base, making him the second fastest (152 games) to the career 30-30 club behind only Mike Trout (146).

Rodríguez and Suárez walked against Steven Matz, who to that point was superb, with only four baserunners allowed and 18 whiffs, one shy of a career high. Matz left after walking Suárez, setting Seattle up to do damage against reliever Drew VerHagen.

“The one thing you can do -- 'process' all you want -- there are moments in the game where you need to have the really good at-bat that produces the big hit,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said. “You can't control it once it leaves your bat. Sometimes they make plays on you when you hit the ball hard, but have the good at-bat in the big moment, that's how you win games.”

Equally paramount, Servais said, perhaps tongue-in-cheek, are homers. The Mariners got another big one from Hernández that tied the game at 2 and sent the home dugout into another frenzy with the shiny trident that the team unveiled on Wednesday as its new celebratory prop. Hernández was also greeted by Rodríguez with last year’s trinket, a retro-colored “swelmet.”

“It felt great grabbing it for the first time, especially because it tied the game,” Hernández said. “We got a beginning and just went from there.”

The Mariners entered Friday hitting .256/.366/.393 with runners in scoring position for .759 OPS that ranked 15th -- literally middle of the pack. Yet there’ve been times when cashing in has eluded them. Seattle scored just 11 runs in a three-game sweep vs. Milwaukee and won 1-0 on Sunday against Colorado.

“You just go through stretches in the year where ... you're not playing great, but you're not playing bad,” Pollock said. “And you're just waiting for something that's going to give; eventually the floodgates will open. And tonight, we got some timely hits.”

Also on Friday, the Mariners excelled at the other components of a “clean” game -- good pitching and defense.

George Kirby overcame a two-run double to rookie Jordan Walker in the second and retired his next 11 batters and 12 of his final 13. The key? Better honing his breaking pitches, including his first two strikeouts of the year on his slider -- a pitch he said will be vital in developmentally leaping forward.

“That's a big step for me, just being able to land slider, curveball -- have them respect it from the get-go,” said Kirby, who threw 17 first-pitch strikes to the 22 batters he faced, and only worked into a three-ball count thrice. “That way it gives myself more room to expand out of the zone when I need to. It's huge when I do that, but yeah, it's something I got to work on better for sure.”

After Kirby -- and the offense’s timely breakthrough -- Trevor Gott, Justin Topa and Paul Sewald threw three perfect innings combined. Sewald’s fifth save was secured by an incredible diving play by J.P. Crawford into the outfield grass to throw out Nolan Areando.

“It was just a clean game,” Pollock said. “Hopefully, it's a game we can build off of.”

It’s just one in 162, but Friday represented what the Mariners are capable of when they put everything together.