Mariners fail to launch as bats go cold in loss to Orioles

Orioles second baseman Jackson Holliday (7) celebrates with his teammates after hitting a grand slam during the seventh inning against the Seattle Mariners

It may have started on time and finished without interruption, but Wednesday night’s game was rain-delayed in spirit for the Mariners. They could never really get the engine to start for their offense as they dropped the third game of their series in Baltimore, 7-2.

Orioles starter Brandon Young cruised as the Mariners struggled to get the ball in the air. He induced 12 ground-ball outs — a recipe for success against a Mariners team that leads baseball in percentage of runs scored via the home run. At one point, he set down 12 consecutive hitters. When all was said and done, Young worked seven scoreless innings of two-hit ball, striking out five and walking two.

Both offenses struggled to get much of anything going through the first half of the evening. The biggest threat of the early-going came in the third, when George Kirby pulled off quite the escape act. After the Orioles loaded the bases with nobody out to begin the inning, Kirby was able to force a shallow fly ball and strike out a pair to leave all three base runners stranded and keep the score 0-0.

After five innings, the game was scoreless. As it turns out, that was as long as Kirby could hold off the Orioles. To lead off the bottom of the sixth, Pete Alonso drove a 97 mph four-seamer over the wall in right-center to open up the scoring.

The O’s saw the crack in the armor, and they took advantage. Following the Alonso dinger, Colton Cowser drew a four-pitch walk and promptly stole second on the first pitch of the next plate appearance. Leody Taveras, who was briefly a Mariner in 2025, drove him in with an RBI double into the gap, making the score 2-0.

For a moment, it looked as though Kirby might stop the bleeding there; he was able to strike out both Jackson Holliday and Tyler O’Neill to get the first two outs of the inning. However, Blaze Alexander brought in Taveras with a ground-rule double, extending the lead to 3-0. Since the Mariners are dealing with a taxed bullpen, Kirby finished out of the sixth anyway. He’d end the night at 104 pitches, just shy of his career-high at 106.

When all was said and done, Kirby finished with a line that probably doesn’t accurately represent his performance. His velocity was up all evening, topping out at 99 mph with both the sinker and four-seamer, and he struck out 10 Orioles hitters. He also notched a quality start, going six innings and allowing three earned runs, but was given no breathing room by his offense. Eventually, the floodgates opened.

Down several runs, Domingo González was brought in to pitch in relief in the seventh, having been recalled from Triple-A Tacoma earlier today. He allowed a single and walked a pair of hitters before surrendering a grand slam to Holliday, breaking the game wide open.

If there’s a silver lining to this one, González was allowed to eat the final innings, giving the rest of the bullpen a much-needed breather. The Mariners also avoided a shutout by scratching across a couple of runs in the eighth with the result no longer in much doubt.

A series win is still on the table for the Mariners as they close out the four-game set against the Orioles tomorrow with a 4:05 p.m. PDT first pitch. As a quick programming note, tomorrow’s game is available exclusively on ESPN and will not be broadcast on Mariners.TV, so plan accordingly.