MINNEAPOLIS — For so many games this season, they’ve watched their pitchers make their minimal run support stand up with their sheer dominance on the mound.
And roughly 24 hours earlier, they looked feckless and overmatched, being held to one run on three hits while striking out 14 times.
But in a game where the starters didn’t dominate and the bullpen wasn’t completely lockdown, the Mariners’ offense — that much-maligned group of largely underachieving hitters — was the sole reason for Seattle’s 10-6 victory over the Minnesota Twins.
Ten runs? From the Mariners?
Indeed, for the second time this season, Seattle reached double figures in runs scored.
But it was how the Mariner scored the bulk of their runs — eight runs over the final three innings — that was most impressive.
It started with more late-inning heroics from a player who was scheduled for a sort-of day off.
When the Mariners’ starting lineup for Tuesday’s game at Target Field was released early in the afternoon, Cal Raleigh was not in it. It’s happened a few times this season.
But neither Raleigh nor manager Scott Servais expected it to be an evening of rest for the Mariners starting catcher.
“He will probably end up in the game tonight,” Servais said pregame.
He did more than just appear in the game.
Down 4-2 and looking listless at the plate for the previous four innings, the Mariners managed to load the bases against Twins reliever Jay Jackson with one out.
Servais couldn’t call on Raleigh fast enough to pinch hit for backup catcher Seby Zavala.
Following the scouting reports, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli brought in lefty Steven Okert to force the switch-hitting Raleigh to bat from the right side, which was supposedly his less successful side.
But those reports should probably change.
Raleigh smashed 3-2 slider from Okert into the upper deck in left field for the Mariners fourth pinch-hit grand-slam home run in team history and a 6-4 lead.
The Mariners bullpen couldn’t keep the two-run lead. Tyson Miller gave up a run in the bottom of the seventh.
Seattle then lost the lead and a reliever in the eighth inning.
With one out and Max Kepler on second following a leadoff double, lefty Tayler Saucedo got pinch-hitter Austin Martin to hit a ground ball to the right side. Ty France fielded the ball well away from first and flipped the ball to Saucedo as he was running to cover the bag. Martin dived headfirst for the bag while Saucedo made an awkward attempt to step on the bag and avoid him. It left him writhing in pain on the ground.
Seeing that everyone was looking at the injured Saucedo and time had not been called by the umps, Keple raced home to tie the game. Saucedo had to be helped off the field.
Perhaps the baseball karma gods took a disliking to Kepler’s heads-up play because Seattle reeled off four runs in the top of the ninth inning as the Twins fell apart.
Dylan Moore led off with a triple and later scored the eventual winning run on Josh Rojas’ single. But Seattle added more than a few insurance runs, loading the bases with no outs. Mitch Haniger drove in a run with a sac fly, Rojas scored on a wild pitch and Ty France added an RBI single.
In what will likely be his last MLB start for the foreseeable future, Emerson Hancock gave the Mariners an uneven outing. He battled to make it through four innings, allowing four runs on four hits with two walks and no strikeouts.
Over his last two outings, which included a loss to the Braves where he failed to go four innings, Hancock pitched a combined 7 2/3 innings with nine runs allowed (six earned) on nine hits with six walks and four strikeouts.
His teammates gave him a 2-0 lead in the second inning. Haniger led off with a solo homer into the upper deck of left field and Moore came up with a two-out double to score Luis Urias.
But the Twins answered in the bottom of the third, scoring four runs all with two outs as Hancock allowed a single, walked a batter, gave up an RBI double to Trevor Larnach and then served up a three-run homer to Ryan Jeffers.
With right-hander Bryan Woo ready to return from the injured list, the Mariners are expected to option Hancock to Triple-A Tacoma in the coming days and reinsert Woo into the starting rotation.