Maybe Morrison’s not Moronic, but Marisnick is Marinic

Let’s see if I can get this update done before church. Or maybe during church? Shouldn’t be a problem: Gregg Koskela understands baseball fandom.

 

Old Detroit:  W, 10 – 4. .367, .396, .714;  0 ip. 0 er.  Look, Ma, no pitchers! I guess you can do this if you have 8 batters OPSing over 1.000 on the day.  Giancarlo Stanton led the way, now that he’s over his May swoon (hitting .391, .451, 1.022 in June with 8 homers and 5 doubles).

Haviland: L, 2 – 4. (.256, .310, .385; 24 ip, 10 er). J.D. Martinez stood out yesterday with a double, homer and walk in 5 plate appearances. Other high performers (Colabello, Pearce) are not allocated 100%. Archer, Samardzija and Carrasco combined for 19.7 ip, 9 earned runs, but the relievers allowed only one more run in 4.3 innings.

(I didn’t get done before church. Now I’m writing while watching the Mariners.  They’re losing 10 – 0 in the 5th to the no-longer-lowly Astros, Mike Blowers and Dave Sims are clearly miserable, and if I don’t write I won’t be able to watch without joining them. )

Peshastin: W, 6 – 2. .282, .378, .538; 3 ip, 0 er. Hey, look at Logan Morrison!  Two homers in five trips to the plate!  That’s what I was envisioning when I drafted him in the first round of the rookie draft four years ago. That’s what the Cheese were envisioning when they traded away their first round pick three years ago to get him. But instead — according to what I saw on his Twitter feed — he was more than a little moronic.   But then along came the redemptive Pears , and here he is!

Morrison didn’t have a hit today, because the Astros are no-hitting the M’s.   That’s Lance McCullers who did that for his five innings – the new Wolverine, allocated at 0%. Oh, well, the W’s were half brilliant anyway.

On the other hand, Jake Marisnick is back to struggling. His June line coming into today’s game was .077, .107, .192 — maybe the worst in the league for anyone with 20 plate appearances this month. In today’s game he’s going to finish 1 for 5 with a double — that’s all the way up to .200, .200, .400! But his June batting average will still be below .100.  I think of him as an honorary Mariner — Marisnick is pretty Marinic this month.

Cottage: W, 8 – 4.  .340, .340, .553;  15 ip, 5 er. Now that’s a classic good-day line.  Good pitching with a nice round 3.00 ERA, good hitting with a nice high .893.  You do that every day you’re champion of any league. The Cheese pitching hero was none other than the highly-touted rookie Kendall Graveman (8 ip, 1 er).

(The M’s are now down 11-0, McCullers is out of the game, and Austin Jackson — back from the dead! — broke up the no-hitter with a double.)

Flint Hill: W (-1), L 2; 4 – 12.  .271, .300, .313.  According to Fangraphs, Kevin Kiermaier has been worth 2.3 WAR so far this year, good enough for 23rd on the overall MLB leaderboard among hitters.  Yesterday he burnished those credential with a triple, single, and hbp in 4 plate appearances. But Collin McHugh undid all that and more by chulking (3 ip, 8 er).  The two relief pitchers were only comparative reliefs: 1.3 ip, 1 er.

Pittsburgh: DNP, (-3) – (-2);  .229, .325, .372; 7.3 ip, 3 er.  The Alleghenys post-Archie Bradley slide seems to have bottomed out.  The A’s have been pretty stable at about the .515 winning percentage line for a week now. How many think that’s where the Alleghenys will end up?  I didn’t think so.

(The M’s have run up the white flag. Bloomquist is in for Cano in the bottom of the sixth.  Marwin Gonzalez just homered to make it 12 – 0. You know, this is beginning to get interesting in a morbid sort of way. How deep can they bury wretched Mariners?)

Kaline: W 2, L (-1); 7 – 2.  .298, .353, .553;  1.3 ip, 0 er.  The Mariners torched the Astros last night, 8 – 1.  How did the Drive’s Mariner contingent do in that hitting festival? Three for twelve with a walk and double.  That’s only .250, .308, .333.  So the non-M’s did better than Kaline’s M’s, even during an evening of Mariner offensive fireworks.  Hmm.

Canberra: L, 3 – 7. .286, .333, .343; 1 ip , 0 er.  Harper: 3 for 3 with a walk and a hbp. I give in — he’s the best player in the game this year.  If only he had a few more good players around him on the Kangaroos!  (Morrison just struck out on the 10th pitch of his at-bat. Even though he made an out, it was a good plate appearance for him.)

Portland: “W”, 8 – 11.  .308, 357, .436; 5 ip, 7 er. I fell asleep in the last half inning. When I woke up Dave Sims was saying the M’s had been outscored by the Astros in Houston 48-23 over 7 games. How miserable.   The Rosebuds might know a bit how the M’s feel. On good offensive day they still lose because Jimmy Nelson combusted.  On the other hand, there’s good news: Yesterday I said Mookie Betts put himself on the DL by running into the wall.  But I was in error. He’s only supposed to be out a couple of days.  Betts is only batting .182, .250, .333, but that’s better than his probable replacement — Cody Asche, batting .150, .209, .250. Both lo0k rather Marinic, don’t you think?