Rangers Edge Mariners
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SEATTLE — Texas manager Ron Washington grumbled before Saturday night’s game against the Seattle Mariners that the Rangers didn’t have a true leadoff hitter. Then center fielder Leonys Martin went out and proved him wrong.
Filling the leadoff role for only the second time this season, Martin capped a solid offensive night with the game-winning RBI on a two-out single in the top of the ninth inning as the Rangers beat the Seattle Mariners 4-3 on Saturday night.
“He did his job,” Washington said afterward. “He got the game-winning hit. … You’ll see him in there again.”
It marked the second night in a row that Texas (34-34) has beaten the Mariners by a single run. Rangers closer Joakim Soria picked up saves on back-to-back nights for the third time in a span of three weeks.
Martin drilled a two-out pitch from Mariners closer Fernando Rodney just under the glove of diving third baseman Kyle Seager to score Luis Sardinas from second base and break a 3-3 tie.
“It feels pretty good,” Martin said. ” … I’m happy we won the game.”
Martin went 2-for-3 with an RBI and two stolen bases while filling the
leadoff role for only the second time this season.
Yet Washington wasn’t ready to amend his pregame statement that “I don’t have a leadoff guy.”
“Still unsure,” Washington said when asked after the game how he felt about his leadoff position. “I don’t have a natural leadoff guy.”
Rodney (1-3) took the loss, his first since May 13. The Mariners (34-34) have now lost five games in a row.
“We’ve got to find a way to come out of it,” Seattle manager Lloyd McClendon said. “We had a lot of good things that happened tonight, but the one bad thing was that we didn’t get the victory.”
Mariners reliever Danny Farquhar was tagged for three runs in an inning, highlighted by a two-run homer from Texas catcher Robinson Chirinos.
“Danny’s been great for us,” McClendon said. “He just left a curveball up, and the guy took advantage of it.”
Chirinos, whose homer gave the Rangers a 3-1 lead in the sixth, said he was waiting for a curveball and knew as soon as he hit it that the ball was going out.
“I’ve faced him before and I knew at some point he was going to throw that deep breaking ball,” said Chirinos, who has now hit three home runs in a span of 11 games.
Texas reliever Neal Cotts (2-3) picked up the win after pitching 1 2/3 innings without allowing a run. Cotts struck out the final four batters he faced, including all three in the bottom of the eighth, before Soria came on to retire the three batters he faced in the ninth.
Soria’s outing included an impressive stab of a hard liner off the bat of Seattle’s James Jones for the second out of the ninth inning.
After Chirinos had given Texas a 3-1 lead, the Mariners got a run back on catcher John Buck’s RBI single in the bottom of the sixth. Buck’s hit scored Robinson Cano from second base, although the play at the plate was so close that the Rangers challenged the call — it was upheld, pulling Seattle within 3-2.
The relatively new instant-replay rule came into play again in the top of the seventh when umpires overturned a call on what was initially ruled a caught-stealing.
Texas baserunner Elvis Andrus got caught in a rundown and dived back into first base as Mariners shortstop Willie Bloomquist made a diving attempt to tag his foot. Andrus was ruled out by the first-base umpire, but a three-minute, 20-second replay review showed that Bloomquist’s glove never actually touched Andrus.
A bases-loaded single from Cano drove in a run to tie the score 3-3 in the bottom of the seventh.
On consecutive nights, Seattle starting pitchers allowed just one earned run and five hits, but the Mariners have an 0-2 record to show for it.
Texas starter Joe Saunders had a solid outing against his former team, allowing two earned runs and eight hits in six innings, but he did not figure into the decision. He got an inning-ending double play after loading the bases in the third.
The 32-year-old left-hander spent the 2013 season with the Mariners, who declined his contract option in the winter.
Runs were hard to come by for both teams in the early innings, despite several baserunners on both sides. Seattle starter Erasmo Ramirez got a caught-stealing and a 9-4-2 putout at home plate to help bail him out in the first two innings.
Ramirez pitched five scoreless innings, extending his streak to 9 1/3 innings without allowing a run. He allowed three hits and four walks while striking out four.
“He did a great job getting out of jams,” Saunders said, “and I got out of some jams myself. It was just a matter of who breaks through, and we were able to do that.”
Saunders took a sharp ground ball off the bat of Seattle’s Logan Morrison to the midsection in the fourth but was able to corral the ball and throw to first for the third out. Saunders knelt on one knee on the pitching mound for several seconds before trainers came out to check on him. He returned to the mound for the fifth.
