Game 5, Mariners at Giants

marc w · April 4, 2018 at 1:25 pm · Filed Under Mariners 

King Felix vs. Johnny Cueto, 4:10pm

Happy Felix Day! The King’s Privy council finds themselves in first place after a series and a half, and the M’s kick off a series against wild card rivals Minnesota starting tomorrow. For now, they’ve got one more game against the Giants and their struggling offense.

Marco Gonzales pitched pretty well yesterday, generating some weak contact and not walking a batter. As Jake Mailhot at LL wrote, we had a lot to look out for in this start: 1) How did his cutter look? 2) Was his fastball velocity more in the 92-94 it was in the spring, or 89-91 it was last year, and 3) What was the velocity gap between his FB and change up?

The first answer was an unqualified success, as he used the cutter frequently, and got ground balls off of it. It’s not a swing-and-miss pitch, but then, that’s not really Marco’s game. He was willing to use it, he threw strikes with it, that’s success. The other two questions were a bit less positive. He averaged about 90 with his two FBs, and while he used his four seamer more, it’s not like he had more power on it. As a result, the gap between his fastball and cambio was just ~6 MPH. All of that said, he faced a righty line-up and kept them mostly off balance. He didn’t miss bats, but he was successful anyway, ala Michael Fulmer or another contact manager. I’d love to see his velo creep up, but it’s still barely April, so it quite likely will.

One of the very few concerning things to come out of the first week has been Juan Nicasio, the set-up man that was essentially Seattle’s sole foray into the free agent market. He’s shown sharply lower velocity in his first few outings, and has been hit fairly hard. His velo was up a bit yesterday, but he still got hit. Interestingly, he too seems to be on the Marco Gonzales plan: he’s dropped his arm angle this year. I’m hoping this is an experiment that’s not quite working rather than an unintentional sign of arm trouble.

Today, the M’s face Johnny Cueto, who, like Felix, had an exceptional first start. The veteran righty throw a four-seam and sinker, and then makes liberal use of a slider and change. He famously adjusts essentially all of these pitches by varying his delivery from pitch to pitch. He’s down to a near 50:50 mix of fastballs and non-fastballs at this point. With a decent pitch to throw to

Felix’s curve was the star on opening day, so we’ll see if he sticks with it, or features his change up more this time.

1: Gordon, CF
2: Segura, SS
3: Cano, 2B
4: Haniger, RF
5: Seager, 3B
6: Vogelbach, 1B
7: Marjama, C
8: Ichiroooo, LF
9: FELIX.

Comments

7 Responses to “Game 5, Mariners at Giants”

  1. Westside guy on April 4th, 2018 4:49 pm

    Just tuning in… looks like Felix is not having a good day.

  2. Westside guy on April 4th, 2018 5:39 pm

    5-0 Giants in the bottom of the fifth – nobody out. Felix is not having a good day; but, then, neither are the Mariners hitters.

  3. mrakbaseball on April 4th, 2018 5:46 pm

    Well, all the good feelings Felix provided on Opening Night are gone. Yikes.

  4. Westside guy on April 4th, 2018 5:47 pm

    OUCH. Home run into the bay. It’s 8-0, and Felix’s day is done.

  5. Westside guy on April 4th, 2018 5:49 pm

    Yeah, it’s not just the home runs either – Felix walked a bunch of guys too.

    8 hits, 5 walks, 1 strikeout.

    Crap, the homers keep coming too. Come on, Pazos.

  6. WTF_Ms on April 4th, 2018 6:21 pm

    I have been watching since the beginning, and just about everything is going wrong today. At least Felix didn’t get hurt trying to hit.

  7. stevemotivateir on April 4th, 2018 8:17 pm

    Meanwhile, Ohtani continues to impress early.

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