It's been exactly one year since Seattle made a big trade-deadline move, adding ace right-hander Luis Castillo in a deal with the Cincinnati Reds. Safe to say it's a decision that's worked out quite well for the Mariners. Castillo threw six sharp innings, J.P. Crawford connected for a solo homer and the Mariners beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 4-0 on Sunday.
There seems enough evidence at this point that the expectation should be when Seattle and Toronto get together, it's likely to have some wild swings of momentum and be tightly contested. J.P. Crawford and Teoscar Hernández both had two-run doubles as the Blue Jays and Mariners played a game of wild momentum swings, clutch hits and big moments that left the heavily mixed crowd of fans from both teams highly entertained.
Max Kepler scored the go-ahead run on a passed ball in the eighth inning and Minnesota pitchers struck out 14 in the Twins' 6-3 victory over the Seattle Mariners on Wednesday night. Kepler scored from third when a pitch from reliever Andrés Muñoz (2-3) got past catcher Tom Murphy, breaking a 3-3 tie. Kepler also hit a solo homer in the fifth inning off Luis Castillo, and has a six-game hitting streak.
Bryce Miller, Cal Raleigh and a foursome of relievers allowed the Seattle Mariners to salvage something from a disappointing weekend coming out of the All-Star break. Miller tossed five sharp innings in his return from the injured list, Raleigh hit his 12th home run and the Mariners avoided a three-game sweep with a 2-0 win over the Detroit Tigers on Sunday. Seattle got back to .500 with 70 games left in the regular season, but a series loss to the Tigers stymied any momentum the Mariners gained by winning seven of nine going into the break.