Dunn quality again, both Kyles homer as Mariners top Rangers, win fifth straight
The wins keep coming for these young Mariners. With Sunday’s 4-3 victory at T-Mobile Park over the Rangers, Seattle pushed its current winning streak to five games.
The Mariners have now won 11 of their past 15, and are sitting at 18-22 with 20 games to go in this abbreviated season.
Again, the Mariners got a quality outing from their starting pitcher, rookie Justin Dunn, paired that with two homers from the Kyles, and held on late in this most recent victory.
“We’ve been playing some really good baseball down this last couple stretch of weeks, and starting to get the results that we want to see, and I think it’s all starting to come together,” Dunn said during a postgame video call with reporters.
The 24-year-old right-hander delivered his third consecutive quality start — and fourth in his past five outings — working around some early walks and traffic to leave the game with a 3-2 lead.
Though his string of 13 consecutive scoreless innings spanning three starts ended in the second, and this start was less efficient than his previous two, Dunn grinded out another productive outing, allowing just a two runs in his six innings on a pair of solo homers.
The Rangers managed little against him otherwise, and he never trailed. After his offense spotted him a two-run lead in the first, Dunn never gave it up.
“I thought Justin Dunn did a nice job,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said. “I thought he was a little shaky, wasn’t real sharp the first couple innings, got the double play ball the end of third, and then I thought he got on a nice roll the fourth, the fifth and the sixth inning throwing a lot more strikes.
“That was the issue early on, just had some 0-2 counts and couldn’t put people away. ... So, give him a ton of credit for for righting the ship and getting it going in the right direction, and having a real quality outing for us. He’s learning. Today was one of those days. He wasn’t on his A-game so to speak coming out of the bullpen, took him a little while to get going, but it was really important to get him through six.”
Joey Gallo pulled a towering homer to the third deck in right — measured by Statcast at 433 feet with a 114 mph exit velocity — to cut the lead to 2-1 in the second, and Leody Taveras sent another solo shot to right in the fifth to make it 3-2 at that point, but that was all Dunn relented.
He allowed four hits, four walks, and recorded three of his four strikeouts in his final two innings, finishing at 93 pitches. All three of his wins this season have come against the Rangers.
After the first few innings — all four of his walks came in the first three — Dunn said he refocused on attacking hitters.
“I think in the first three innings there it was me trying to think that they were going to be more aggressive, and trying to place balls where I thought they wouldn’t be looking and ... trying to pitch for the strikeouts, because I was getting ahead fine, but kind of got into my own way a little bit there trying to make the perfect pitch,” he said.
“Those last three innings, I went back to what I did the first two times against them. It’s just attacking the zone and letting my stuff play, so I guess that’s on me for trying to do a little too much in the beginning, but glad I could kind of settle it in.”
The Mariners wasted little time in giving Dunn a cushion. J.P. Crawford and Ty France drew back-to-back walks to lead off the first inning against Texas starter Jordan Lyles, and despite a double play ball, the Mariners capitalized on the early mistakes when Kyle Seager roped a two-run homer to right center.
Seager finished 2-for-4 with the homer and a single. His base hit in the fourth — hit No. 1,226 of his decade-long career with the Mariners — moved him into fourth place in club history among hits leaders, passing Jay Buhner.
“It’s very humbling,” Seager said of the milestone. “I’m extremely proud. I’m extremely honored to be in that company. That’s extremely elite company and I’m very proud to be part of that.”
The other Kyle — rookie outfielder Kyle Lewis — tacked on a solo homer in the fourth. The 424-foot blast to straightaway center was his ninth of the season as he continues to make his case for American League Rookie of the Year.
The Mariners’ defense kept the one-run lead in tact with two outs in the seventh, when it appeared a Taveras double to center might score Derek Dietrich, who drew a walk from rookie reliever Anthony Misiewicz, from first with two outs. Lewis knocked down the sharp liner to keep the ball from rolling to the wall, picked it up and heaved it to Crawford as Dietrich rounded third. Crawford quickly relayed the ball to catcher Joe Odom, who placed the tag and held on despite Dietrich barreling in at a full sprint and knocking him over.
“Defensively the play the game is the seventh inning, K-Lew cutting that ball off, J.P. great relay throw to the plate, and it’s fun to see those guys in the dugout,” Servais said. “They were about as excited that they executed that play as they are anytime you see those guys hit a home run. It really meant a lot to them. And great job by Odom hanging on to that ball at the plate, too. You’ve got to finish those plays.”
Seattle’s offense added a bit more insurance for its bullpen later in the seventh. After Jose Marmolejos drew a leadoff walk, Dylan Moore entered the game as a pinch runner and stole his team-leading eighth base. He eventually scored on a Shed Long Jr. base hit, evading the tag attempt at home and getting a hand on the plate as he toppled over to give Seattle a late two-run advantage that ended up being needed.
“We run the bases very aggressively, and D-Mo made a great slide avoiding the tag there at the plate,” Servais said. “Not many players can do that full stride. He’s some kind of athletic player.”
Making his second appearance in his new relief role since returning to the club from the injured list, Kendall Graveman was solid again, working around an infield base hit to toss a scoreless frame.
Yoshihisa Hirano pitched the ninth, striking out Jose Trevino before serving up a solo shot to Ronald Guzman that trimmed the lead to 4-3. But, he rallied with back-to-back strikeouts of Dietrich and Anderson Tejeda to end the game and pick up his first save of the season.
This story was originally published September 6, 2020 at 3:56 PM with the headline "Dunn quality again, both Kyles homer as Mariners top Rangers, win fifth straight."
