Houston Astros starting pitcher Justin Verlander throws against the Seattle Mariners in the fifth inning of a baseball game, Saturday, July 23, 2022, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)
AP
SEATTLE
Friday night at T-Mobile Park, the visiting Astros broke the Mariners’ longest winning streak since the 2001 season with 14 games.
On Saturday afternoon, the leaders of the American League West also assured that Seattle’s recent streak of eight consecutive series wins will also end this weekend.
Houston scored a couple of runs in the fourth, picked up another in the eighth and escaped a late Mariners rally to secure both a 3-1 win and a series win, calming the crowd of 43,197 by Seattle backing. to inflict back losses for the first time since late June.
The Mariners (51-44) are now 12 games behind the Astros in the division standings and are trying to avoid being swept by Houston for the second time this season in the series finale Sunday.
Justin Verlander put the Mariners on hold for much of the afternoon en route to his 20th career victory against the club in 36 appearances.
After JP Crawford led off the first inning with a single and Adam Frazier singled with one out in the second, Verlander retired 15 consecutive batters before the Mariners finally broke through in the seventh.
Carlos Santana ended the shutout-call with one out in the seventh when he sent a 100-meter curveball to the right to make it 2-1.
Eugenio Suarez then drew Seattle’s first walk of the game, Adam Frazier followed with a single in the middle and after Verlander struckout Cal Raleigh on eight pitches, pinch hitter Kyle Lewis walked again to load the bases.
But Verlander held the Mariners there and struckout Sam Haggerty on four pitches to end the inning.
He gave up one run on four hits in seven innings, struckout nine and walked two on 101 pitches. He now has 251 career strikeouts against the Mariners.
Houston’s bullpen retired Seattle’s last six batters in a row in the eighth and ninth to end the game.
Verlander’s performance surpassed what was the eighth quality outing of the season for Mariner sophomore starter Logan Gilbert.
Gilbert hit the side in the first and sent Jose Altuve, Jeremy Pena and Yordan Alvarez back to the dugout in order.
He retired the first six batters he faced before Chas McCormick dropped a single to the right to start the third batter. Jake Meyers followed with a bunt and single that gave the Astros a pair of runners with no outs.
Gilbert reacted quickly, adding a fifth strikeout the first time through Houston’s lineup when he got Martin Maldonado to chase an outside fastball for the first out.
Altuve then lined out to JP Crawford at short stop, and Crawford threw to second base to double up McCormick and end the inning.
But Houston regrouped through the order the second time around and broke through in the fourth.
Gilbert swung Pena a second time to open the frame, but walked Alvarez, and back-to-back two-out doubles from Kyle Tucker and Yuli Gurriel gave the Astros a 2-0 lead not long after. .
Dylan Moore probably saved a third run in the next at bat, when he made a diving flyout in the middle on a line drive by McCormick for the third out.
Gilbert worked for a leadoff double to Meyers the next inning, eventually striking out Altuve for the second time and Pena lined out to Jesse Winker in the left, with Meyers stranded on third base.
He retired the last three batters he faced, including Alex Bregman struckout for the second time, completing six quality innings.
Gilbert gave up the two runs on five hits while walking one and striking out eight, but eventually saw his first loss against Houston this season in his third appearance against the Astros.
After the Mariners narrowed the lead to one run in the seventh, the Astros pushed it back to two in the eighth when Altuve and Pena opened the inning with back-to-back singles against Matt Brash and Altuve went on to score on a wild pitch by Ryan Borucki to make it 3-1.
The Mariners were without All-Star midfielder Julio Rodriguez (left wrist pain) for their second straight game on Saturday.
The 21-year-old rookie was scratched for the first pitch in Friday-evening’s series opener, and is considered day by day.
Lauren Smith covers University of Washington athletics for The News Tribune. She previously covered high school sports for TNT and The Olympian starting in 2015, before moving to the Seattle Mariners beat ahead of the 2019 season. She is a graduate of UW and Emerald Ridge High School.
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