Ball breaker game thread

[Hanjag]

Good game and Houston should shove in and give-up something in their top 10 for EE.

[D-train]

The 2010 team had 101 HRs led by Branyan with 15.

This team has 125 HRs with EE, VB and Mitch all with at least 15... and its June 9th.

[D-train]

The 2014 pitching staff gave up 554 runs. This staff has given up 420 so in order to beat that this staff would have to give up 133 runs or less in the next 93 games. About 1.5 per game.

[D-train]

Idiot Sims just said Bautista's previous big league experience was 2011 and then listed a bunch of other years. Bautista was 16 yo in 2011. So Sims was looking at some other Bautista's bio and is too dumb to realize it.

[Petert]

Just joining this after a day of trail clearing on Hood Canal. Nice to see a laugher (almost), and Edwin with two bombs. This Manhattan will be a very nice one, indeed.

[Happy as hell]

Today’s game felt like the old days—April 2019.

[Juliooooo]

We better trade EE and LeBlanc quick, lest our pick ends up back in the teens for next year.

[Hy Feiber]

If they trade him for a bag of peanuts like they did Bruce I’ll be mad.

I say keep him.
Period.

[DavidGee24]

Mariners win! We're HEROES!!!

[IStillLoveTheMs]

Games like this are pretty frustrating when you see the massive drop off this team went through.

Most teams that have the record the M's look like they don't even carry a pulse. Look at Marlins... look at the Royals. The M's aren't as bad as these teams. The M's talent isn't as bleak... what the hell went on psychologically?

You look at this lineup and wonder how can we this far under .500?:

Haniger .778 OPS
Santana .825 OPS
Vogelbach .921 OPS
Encarncion .888 OPS
Seager .797 OPS
Beckham .770 OPS
Narvaez .803 OPS / Murphy .950 OPS
Gordon .679 OPS + 12 stolen bases

Then you ask, what the fuck happened to Mallex Smith? How does a player fall off the deep end so fast?

Then you look at the pitching...

I mean... how does Marco pitch to a 7.61 ERA over 7 games...? How does Kikuchi pitch to a 14.47 ERA over his last 3 starts? How does that happen? What is it about coming to the M's where Kikuchi has a 2.80 career ERA in Japan and as soon as he hits American soil he needs to change his wind up? Why does this shit keep happening?

I knew our bullpen wasn't going to be great... but how can one team have so many players just completely lose the ability to throw a baseball the second they put an M's uniform on?

Here's a crazy stat... did you guys know that RJ Alaniz, Dan Altavila, Shawn Armstrong, Jesse Biddle, Parker Markel, Nick Rumbelow, and Hunter Strickland have produced: -2.1 WAR in just 22 innings of work? How is that even possible?

Add Swarzack and Mike Wright to the equation and it gets that much worse.

Something needs to change about pitchers coming here and just completely forgetting how to throw a baseball. There is no excuse for what Kikuchi, Leake and Marco are doing. They should all be pitching in the low to upper 3's ERA wise at worst. Leblanc seems to have figured it out with the opener which is great... but I never envisioned him pitching better than like a 4.2 ERA and that's fine out of our #5. The other 3... there are just no words or excuses for how bad they've been.

I know my thoughts aren't that organized here. I'm just really frustrated as a fan. I see us put up these big totals against the Angels this weekend and wonder what could have been if it weren't for our pitching falling off the rails...

UGH WE JUST SHOULDN'T BE THIS BAD.

The crazy thing is I think when healthy, this team actually has a chance to be pretty darn good. But we won't get to see it because of play of a few individuals who absolutely blew it.

Our bullpen is finally leveling out. If Marco and Kikuchi can get their heads out of their asses our rotation isn't great, but passable. Our lineup is as solid as they come. But it's too little, too late because we're about to sell off. And it's frustrating.