Mariners Slug White Sox 8-3 With Former D-Back Assistance
SEATTLE, Wash. – That’s how you take care of a last-place opponent in the heat of a playoff race.
The Seattle Mariners took the cellar-dwelling Chicago White Sox to school on Tuesday, beating them by a healthy 8-3 score as Bryan Woo had an excellent outing while two thirds of the starting lineup ended up with base knocks.
Tuesday’s performance was highlighted by Eugenio Suárez’ first home run with the 2025 Mariners, but as per usual, plenty of other Mariners went deep on the night. The team also put together runs in the field to chase White Sox starter Davis Martin before he could record an out in the sixth.
Mr. Consistency
Mariners starter Bryan Woo put recent shakiness behind him on Tuesday as he worked seven innings of one run ball while striking out nine and walking none. It’s exactly the kind of outing that the Mariners were looking for from their newest All-Star.
Early into Tuesday night’s game, it looked like Woo’s struggles with the home run ball might continue. Just six pitches into the ballgame (all of them four-seamers), Lenyn Sosa jacked one of his offerings well into the Mariners bullpen. That pitch was a fastball right down the middle, something that Sosa was probably sitting on.
But Woo buckled down. Just one batter reached base in the second through seventh innings, including none from the third through seventh, as he retired 16 straight. As usual, he was pumping mostly fastballs into the zone, but he mixed it up with the occasional secondary pitch, usually a sweeper to righties and a changeup to lefties.
The Seattle hurler’s performance was impeccable in those later innings. The White Sox looked completely stumped at the plate, switching between striking out and sending weak fly balls for easy outs. Woo had thrown just 83 pitches through seven innings.
But with Seattle getting out to a seven-run lead by the top of the eighth, Mariners manager Dan Wilson decided to give Woo some rest and brought in Casey Legumina in relief.
It was a very welcome return to form for Bryan Woo, who had struggled in some of his recent outings post-All Star Break. He has now opened the 2025 season with 22 straight starts of six innings or more, a franchise record.
M’s Miss Early Chances
Despite the eight-run final showing, Seattle actually had a chance for more. This shows the advantage of having the current lineup: it’s of a caliber the Mariners have not seen in a long, long time. I’ll circle back to that point later.
The M’s had a chance to strike back in the bottom of the first. Although the first two men went down quickly, Julio Rodriguez and Josh Naylor both found the outfield grass to put runners on first and second for Eugenio Suárez. But the Mariners third baseman did not have the chance to drive them in; Rodriguez tried to snatch third after White Sox catcher Kyle Teel slightly bobbled a catch. But Teel easily recovered and threw Rodriguez out by 15 feet.
Another two-runner chance presented itself in the bottom of the third as the first two men reached with nobody out. But Davis Martin was able to stay a step ahead of the next two men up, mixing speeds to mess with Cal Raleigh’s timing and getting him to ground a sinker into a double play and getting Rodriguez to swing at two cutters away for quick strikes. Although Rodriguez adjusted and made contact two pitches later, it was a changeup low in the zone that went to short for the third out.
What Else But Dingers?
When you’re looking to get the 2025 Seattle Mariners going, the best way to do it is with the home run ball. Seattle has hit the third-most big flies of any team in MLB this season, only behind the Yankees and Dodgers. And that’s counting most of the year when Suárez and Naylor were still with Arizona.
Dominic Canzone was the one who returned the favor to the White Sox with a solo home run of his own, blasting a ball to right field with two outs in the bottom of the second. Canzone has quietly put together a pretty strong campaign this season for the M’s, accruing a .296/.351/.500 slash over 154 plate appearances for Seattle in 2025.
But what this crowd really desired was a return to form for Suárez. After Naylor led off the fourth by reaching base on an error, Martin left a first-pitch cutter out over the plate for the Mariners third baseman.
Suárez got all wood on his swing and launched the ball on a high arc to left field. His first Mariners homer of 2025 landed in Edgar’s Cantina to an ecstatic uproar from the 30,868 spectators in T-Mobile Park. It was his 37th home run on the year, tied with Aaron Judge for fourth-most in MLB.
Marine Layer Blues
Two straight Mariners had would-be homers robbed by Seattle’s notoriously thick evening air in the bottom of the fifth. First was Randy Arozarena, who drilled a high liner into right field with a man on and nobody out. The ball left the bat at 102.2 miles an hour at a 24-degree launch angle. According to StatCast, balls hit at 102 miles per hour and a 24-degree angle go an average of 377 feet – which would be a home run to straightaway right in T-Mobile. But due to the air resistance, the ball went just 346 feet and stayed in the yard.
Cal Raleigh was air resistance’s next victim. The Mariner catcher blasted a ball to straightaway right field – even closer to the line than Arozarena’s – at 104.2 miles per hour and a 24 degree launch angle. StatCast’s average for 104 miles an hour and 24 degrees is 388 feet, but the ball went 331 feet for a flyout due to a combination of air resistance and topspin.
Raleigh in particular did not have Lady Luck’s favor on Tuesday. His first time up, he had whacked a hard liner down the line that went well over the fence but 10 feet foul.
In any case, it appears his slump has deepened in the past few days. Raleigh is just 1-16 over four days in August with 12 strikeouts and two walks.
Late Production Secures Lopsided Win
The sixth inning was not very kind to Martin. Although he had dealt a decently respectable five innings of three-run ball up to that point, he walked Naylor and Suárez on 10 total pitches to begin the sixth. The two Diamondbacks-turned-Mariners executed a beautiful double steal that didn’t even elicit a throw from Teel.
The turnaround was quick. Jorge Polanco took advantage of a drawn-in infield to shoot a soft grounder into center field, scoring Naylor and Suárez and bringing Seattle’s lead to four runs. At that point, White Sox manager Will Venable yanked Martin out of the game and sent in lefty Tyler Gilbert.
Chicago’s reliever took a bit of time to settle in, as his very first pitch got away from Teel and advanced Polanco to second while the following three were nowhere near the plate and Canzone reached base. Crawford grounded into a fielder’s choice and soon stole second – a move that netted Seattle a run, as Cole Young’s following groundout scored Polanco from third instead of being a double play.
Bryan Hudson came on for the seventh, but just like his two predecessors, he faced heavy struggles. Rodriguez knocked a one-out single and Josh Naylor sent a hanging sweeper deep into the right field seats. Just like that, the Seattle lead expanded to 8-1.
Although Casey Legumina and Jackson Kowar both struggled in their respective innings of work – Legumina with a bases-loaded jam and Kowar with two home runs – the White Sox didn’t ever mount a threatening attempt at a comeback, so Seattle completed the 8-3 victory.
SoDo Sluggers
As I said before, this is a lineup the likes of which haven’t been in Seattle for a while. Every single man on the starting nine except for Cole Young came into Tuesday’s game with an above-average OPS and above-average wRC+.
When Cole Young is your weakest guy out there, your lineup is in pretty good shape. His .250/.322/.353 slash line is more than serviceable for the ninth best guy on your team. And when you look at how Young is trending, it’s clearly in the right direction. Over his last 30 games, his slash is .247/.346/.387 – a sustained run of above-average batsmanship.
Having a lineup this deep affords a lot of advantages. Even if some of your most important players like Cal Raleigh are slumping, the rest of the lineup can pick up the slack. Crawford as an eight-hole guy is an incredible disruptor for an opposing pitcher’s flow. Even during his slumps, he’s always a tough at-bat, and to have a guy like that near the bottom of the order ensures that the other team’s hurlers never get a break.
And you can miss chances without it being the death knell for a game. Seattle had two really good opportunities to score in the early innings that they didn’t cash in on, but because of the caliber of the guys up and down the order, they still scored eight in their other chances.
Over the first 109 games of the season, the M’s averaged 4.5 runs per game. Over the past five games since trading for Suárez, that number is 5.4. Obviously, that’s an unsustainable high, but it goes to show how much of an impact plugging all the offensive gaps has on a team’s hitting.
The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.
On Deck
Seattle improved to 61-53 with their Tuesday night win and maintained pace in the AL West chase, still three games back of the Houston Astros. They also remained three and a half games back of the red-hot Boston Red Sox (who won their seventh straight on Tuesday) and kept the Texas Rangers a game and a half back of Seattle.
The M’s gained ground against the Yankees, who now sit in the third wild card spot a game behind Seattle and just a half game ahead of Texas.
Two more games remain against the White Sox this week. Wednesday’s game will see M’s hurler George Kirby (6-5, 4.13 ERA) go up against Chicago pitcher Jonathan Cannon (4-8, 4.77 ERA), while Thursday’s matinee will feature Seattle’s Logan Gilbert (3-4, 3.45 ERA) against the White Sox’ Shane Smith (3-7, 4.25 ERA). After that, Seattle will round out the homestand with a three-game set against the Tampa Bay Rays.
