The Mariners dropped an ugly 8-0 decision to the Detroit Tigers at T-Mobile Park Tuesday night, a loss that stings even more with newly-acquired reliever Seranthony Dominguez getting absolutely shelled in his M’s debut. Talk about a brutal welcome to the Emerald City, right? This isn’t how we wanted to kick off the first of three against Detroit, especially when these games matter.
Offense Went Absolutely Cold
Our bats were nowhere to be found against Detroit’s Troy Melton, who was lights out for seven scoreless innings, only giving up three hits. Can you believe it? The M’s hit just two balls hard off him, and didn’t even sniff an extra base hit. On 18 balls put in play, our average exit velocity was a dismal 82.5 mph. Melton was in real trouble just once, in the fourth. Randy Arozarena singled and then Julio Rodriguez worked an eight-pitch walk, getting a man on with one out. That’s a huge moment, right? But what happened? Melton struck out Josh Naylor, then got our own Cal Raleigh swinging with a nasty splitter. That was the chance, and we just couldn’t capitalize. Melton leaned on his splitter and cutter, with his four-seam fastball hitting 96 mph, even ringing up 98 a lot. He looked like an ace, and we had no answer.
Pitching Crumbles Under Pressure
Emerson Hancock, our right-hander, gave up Riley Greene’s 16th homer in the fifth inning, a 403-foot shot that left the bat at 104.9 mph. Greene had been in a 0-for-15 slump, and Hancock served up a first-pitch changeup that got absolutely destroyed. But the real gut punch came in the ninth. Seranthony Dominguez, who we just acquired, was making his Mariners debut and it was a disaster. He faced six hitters, got only one out, and gave up four runs. Gleyber Torres blasted his seventh homer, a two-run shot to left, and then Dillon Dingler followed that up with his 24th homer to right-center. Dominguez was chased from the game, just like that. This isn’t what you want to see from a guy you just brought in to boost the bullpen. The Tigers ended up scoring eight-plus runs for the sixth straight game, tying a club record from 1927. Ouch.
This 8-0 shutout loss at home means the Tigers actually pulled even with our M’s, and they’re now just 1.5 games back in the standings. They also climbed to five games back in their Central Division. We need to turn this around, starting with the next game in this series at T-Mobile Park. We can’t let them walk all over us twice.
This article was created with AI assistance and published under Seattle On Tap’s editorial standards. See our Editorial Policy.
Originally reported by Yahoo Sports.
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