3 Up, 3 Down: Chris Flexen Keeps Damage to Minimum, Gets Little Run Support in Mariners' 3-2 Loss to Twins

Chris Flexen gave the Mariners 5.0 solid innings of work, but their offense sputtered for the second game in a row to lose their series opener against the Twins on Monday night.

The Mariners are now 1-3 on their current homestand, dropping Monday night's series opener against the Twins by a score of 3-2.

For the second day in a row, it was a tale of two units for Seattle. The pitching staff put together a good enough outing to win, but the offense provided too little support to push across the finish line. 

After being limited to just one hit in Sunday's shutout loss to the Red Sox, the Mariners recorded just four hits and scored an unearned run against Twins right-handed starter Chris Archer, who entered the game with a 3.65 ERA and a 4.92 FIP. They added two more hits on the night, including a solo home run, but were unable to mount a rally in the eighth and ninth innings against Minnesota's bullpen, despite getting runners on base. 

The Mariners will now look to stave off a second consecutive series loss on Tuesday night, with right-handed pitcher Logan Gilbert (6-2, 2.41 ERA) taking on fellow righty Joe Ryan (5-2, 2.28 ERA) at 7:10 p.m. PT.

But first: let's look back on the action from Monday night and go over Seattle's three best and worst individual performances from the uneventful loss. 

3 Up

RHP Chris Flexen

You probably just shouldn't pitch to Twins outfielder Byron Buxton, who entered the game already worth 1.0 fWAR in the month of June. But that's what Flexen did to start this game and he paid the price, serving up a 91.8 MPH, middle-middle fastball that Buxton deposited over the right-center field wall for a two-run blast in the first inning. After that, however, Flexen settled in a bit, limiting the damage to just the two runs over his 5.0 innings of work. In all, he surrendered seven hits while striking out five, walking two and tallying a game-high 15 swings and misses. 

C Cal Raleigh

Raleigh continues to stay hot at the plate, leading the Mariners with three hard-hit balls on the night. Only one of them—a double into the right-center field gap—resulted in a hit, however. Nevertheless, Raleigh's process looks the best it has at the major league level and the results are starting to show for it. He is now fourth amongst all major league catchers in fWAR (0.5) since the start of June, slashing .242/.324/.576 with 159 wRC+ over that span. 

OF Taylor Trammell

Trammell was 0 for his last 18 before hitting a solo home run off Twins right-handed reliever Jharel Cotton in the seventh. It's his second dinger of the season and 10th of his young career, going 423 feet out to right-center field at an exit velocity of 105.2 MPH. He also walked, bringing his slash line up to .250/.346/.523 through 53 plate appearances. Still a very small sample size, but the signs are encouraging and it was nice to see him bounce back from a minor slump in a big way. Yet he was still pinch-hit for in the bottom of the ninth, even though the Twins were throwing right-handed reliever Emilio Pagán and the Mariners had the right-handed hitting Dylan Moore (.182/.333/.318 versus righties) on deck. An interesting move by manager Scott Servais, to say the least. 

3 Down

RHP Sergio Romo and LHP Ryan Borucki

Taking over in the seventh, Romo got his first matchup, second baseman Luis Arráez, to line out to center field. But after that, he fell victim to a weak single into left field by Buxton and followed that up with a five-pitch walk to shortstop Carlos Correa. As a result, Servais popped out of the dugout and motioned his left arm to the bullpen, calling upon left-handed reliever Ryan Borucki to face fellow lefty Max Kepler. It did not work out, however, as Borucki served up an RBI single to Kepler, which proved to be the deciding run in the game. Certainly not what you want to see from your "lefty specialist."

3B Eugenio Suárez

Suárez continues to sputter following his strong road trip, going 0 for 4 on the night with a pair of strikeouts. He's put together some truly awful at-bats through the first four games of this homestand. 

DH Abraham Toro

If you thought Suárez's night was rough, Toro fared even worse. He, like Suárez, went 0 for 4 in the game but added a third strikeout to his final tally, going down swinging on all of them. If the Mariners had a decent selection of in-house options, it would be about the time to talk about demoting the struggling Toro in order to help him find his swing. But they really don't right now, so it appears likely the 25-year old utility infielder will have to try and figure it out on the fly.