Mariners vs. Rangers: It’s the Spider-Man Pointing Meme
The Mariners and Rangers have shared many similarities to begin the 2025 season, yet Seattle enters this weekend’s intra-divisional matchup with a record of 5-8 while Texas holds an early American League West lead at 9-4. Through 13 games each, though, both teams have heavily relied on their pitching, lost multiple key players to early-season injuries, sport negative run differentials, and find themselves in the bottom-three of MLB in batting average on balls put in play. Additionally, five of the Rangers’ nine wins and all but one of the Mariners’ wins so far have come in one-run games.
Basically, something has to give this weekend. Here’s a look at how the pitching matchups line up.
Game 1: RHP Bryce Miller (0-2, 5.73 ERA) vs. RHP Jacob deGrom (0-0, 3.38 ERA)
It’s only been two starts, but Miller’s second full season in the majors hasn’t kicked off the way many envisioned. He’s struggled with walks so far, issuing five free passes in 11 innings pitched, and has generally found himself in too many deep counts and long at-bats due in large part to some uncharacteristically shaky fastball control. This isn’t a necessarily promising “get-right” opportunity for Miller on paper either, as the Rangers currently boast a .329/.397/.671 slash line with 16 runs against him in four matchups. Corey Seager and Josh Jung have particularly torched Miller in the past, combining for three home runs, a double, and three walks in 13 plate appearances.
This will be the third time the Mariners have seen deGrom since he signed with the Rangers prior to the 2023 season, but while they’ve put up a .259 batting average against him in 12.1 innings, they’ve only been able to manufacture one earned run off of him — a solo home run by Josh Rojas, who’s no longer in Seattle. In general, deGrom doesn’t have much experience facing any of the Mariners’ current hitters, with Donovan Solano and Jorge Polanco tied for the most head-to-head matchups against him with six. It will be interesting to see if Mitch Garver finds his way into the lineup despite not getting much action versus right-handed pitchers so far this year; Garver has only faced deGrom in two at-bats, but has taken him yard on both occasions. Given that Polanco’s lingering side issue requires him to DH against right-handed pitchers, however, it’s unlikely that Garver will get the nod.
Game 2: RHP Bryan Woo (1-0, 3.75 ERA) vs. RHP Kumar Rocker (0-1, 7.88 ERA)
Outside of a fourth-inning blowup during his last start against the Giants, Woo has been stellar to begin the year and has once again almost exclusively been doing it throwing fastballs. But despite the fact that usage falls right in line with Woo’s gameplan over the majority of his 42 career major-league starts, it comes as a bit of a surprise given what we saw out of him this spring. It appeared as though he was gearing up to throw his secondaries with a bit more regularity, but the sweeper he deployed often in camp and was even his most-used pitch in one of his spring starts has only been thrown eight times so far this season. It’s hard to imagine this will be the start he suddenly breaks it out for, as the Rangers have hit the breaking ball well but have struggled to the tune of -1.3 and -4.1 runs above average against four-seam fastballs and sinkers, respectively.
It’s been a tale of two starts for Rocker, who got jumped for six runs in three innings by the Reds in his first appearance of the year then bounced back with a solid five innings of one-run ball versus the Rays his last time out. The one constant between those two starts, however, has been his inability to strike hitters out despite running a 44 percent whiff rate with his slider. It’s not hard to identify what the issue is, though; his four-seamer and sinker are generating whiff rates of just 5.9 and 3.7 percent, respectively. Meanwhile, per Sports Info Solutions, the Mariners are dead-last in contact rate on pitches inside the strike zone (77.6 percent, the only team in MLB below 80 percent) and have an overall whiff rate of 13.9 percent, which is the second-highest mark in the game right now. How that plays out will be fascinating to watch.
Game 3: RHP Logan Gilbert (0-1, 2.55 ERA) vs. RHP Nathan Eovaldi (1-1, 2.29 ERA)
Gilbert has only pitched in T-Mobile Park so far and will do so again for his fourth start of the year on Sunday. Seattle’s 27-year old righty has seemingly found another gear in the early going, striking out 25 batters in 17.2 innings pitched while walking just three. His splitter has been especially devastating for opposing hitters, generating nine whiffs on 15 swings against the Astros his last time out and boasting a 57.8 percent whiff rate in total this year. Historically, he’s handled the Rangers very well in his career, especially in Seattle. In two home starts last year, he held Texas hitters to a .160/.176/.320 slash line while giving up four earned runs on eight hits and a walk with 16 strikeouts.
Eovaldi has gotten off to an equally great start in 2025, but he’s struggled mightily over the course of four starts against the Mariners during his time with the Rangers. Punching hitters out hasn’t been the issue in those starts, with Eovaldi tallying 24 strikeouts in 17.1 innings, but Seattle has tagged him for 16 runs on eight walks and 16 hits, including five home runs. Julio Rodríguez and J.P. Crawford has two of them, and given what the Mariners’ offense has looked like and the way Eovaldi has thrown the ball so far this year, Seattle’s odds of winning this one might hang in the balance of its ability to put one or two balls over the fence.
