Has the MoJo Returned? The M’s are winning one-run games!

With Jose Lopez jumping on the first pitch offered by Heath Bell for a two-run double in the eighth inning of yesterday’s ballgame, the Mariners won their first series in nine tries.  The two runs provided a one-run margin that J.J. Putz locked down with a scoreless tie, resulting in a 3-2 Mariners victory in the series clincher.  This means that the last two one-run games the Mariners have been involved in- both yesterday’s and last week’s 4-3 win over the Rangers- have resulted in the M’s coming out on top.  The team’s record in one-run games has now improved to 3-9.  It’s still not a very good record, but this trend is encouraging.

What’s also encouraging is that over the weekend the M’s picked up back-to-back victories in games started by Erik Bedard and Felix Hernandez, the first time that’s happened all season.  Of course, due to the anemic run support Felix has received all season, it took Lopez’s late-inning heroics for the M’s to pull out the win, thus keeping Felix with a 2-4 record despite giving up just two runs in seven innings for his sixth quality start of the season.  Saturday’s start by Bedard, however, was tremendous, and reminded us all why the Mariners mortgaged so much in return for unquestionably the best left-handed starting pitcher in the league.  All Bedard did was limit the Padres to two runs while striking out ten over eight innings, and a two-run homer by Adrian Beltre was the support needed for a 4-2 victory.

Yes, the series win did come against the Padres, who are for some reason the M’s “natural” National League rival, so there does need to be some sort of caveat.  Still, yesterday’s win was the team’s first one this season- after passing the quarter mark- in which they scored less than four runs, indicating that the team’s planned strengths of pitching and defense may be asserting themselves.  The series loss dropped the Padres to the worst record in the majors at 16-29, while the M’s have now passed the Detroit Tigers, who are now saddled with the worst record in the American League at 17-27.

Perfect timing, then, for the M’s to hit the road for a three game series at Comerica Park, with  Tuesday’s match-up pitting Justin Verlander against Carlos Silva.  Verlander may have enjoyed success against the M’s so far in his young career, winning all four starts while posting a 2.63 ERA and a 17:4 stirkeout-to-walk ratio in 27 innings.  However, Verlander has gotten off to a horrid start to his 2008 season, dropping seven of eight decisions while posting a 6.05 ERA and a measly 1.38 (33-to-24) K-to-BB ratio in 55 innings.  Verlander has also been the victim of a complete lack of run support, with the Tigers’ supposedly dominating line-up tallying less than 2.5 runs in Verlander’s starts.  Meaning that he will drop such games as his last start, in which he held the Kansas City Royals to two runs over six innings for his second quality start of the year, only to have the Tigers shut out two-zip.  Still, the last time Verlander faced Seattle at Comerica last September, he held the M’s line-up to one run over eight innings in a 6-1 Tigers victory.

Carlos Silva, meanwhile, has a 5-3 career record in Detroit in eleven starts, with a 4.40 ERA and a 35-to-8 strikeout-to-walk ratio in just under 72 innings.  Coming off a six inning, two-run outing in his last start- the extra-inning one-run win over the Rangers- Silva has also had a dominating start the last time he faced Detroit at Comerica, tossing nearly eight scoreless innings in a 2-0 shutout victory by the Minnesota Twins over the Tigers.   While Carlos Guillen (.517 average, 1.583 OPS in 29 at-bats), Gary Sheffield (.316 average, 1.070 OPS in 19 at-bats), and Curtis Granderson (.300 average with two home runs in ten at-bats) have enjoyed success against Silva, he kept this trio in check last September, holding them to two worthless singles in eleven at-bats.

Considering that the Mariners have sent Jeff Clement back down to Triple-A Tacoma- the .397 average he posted earlier in the season didn’t have an immediate translation in the majors- the M’s should post Jose Vidro in the DH spot tomorrow night.  Vidro has hammered Verlander in a small sample size of eleven at-bats, picking up seven hits, including two doubles, for a .636 average and a 1.455 OPS.  Tomorrow’s game will be a pitching match-up decided in the late innings.  Considering the trends of the season, and the fact that J.J. has shown his dominating late-inning form, I’m going with the M’s to come out on top by a 3-2 score, resulting in the M’s first three-game winning streak in a month.  Viva la mojo!