Make that five straight wins and two consecutive sweeps for the Seattle Mariners. Felix Hernandez, the reigning Cy Young Award winner completely dominated a Padres lineup that had only managed two hits the night before. Hernandez tied his career high of strikeouts in a game as he fanned 13 Padres hitters over eight innings of work.
The Mariners got on the board first in the top of the second inning after Ichiro hit a grounder up in the middle that ended up scoring Brendan Ryan from third. Carlos Peguero added to the Mariners lead in the top of the third inning when he hit a double deep into center field that scored Justin Smoak and Miguel Olivo.
Ryan hit a double in the seventh inning that drove in two more runs and extended the Mariners lead to 5-1, effectively putting the game out of reach for the Padres. Franklin Gutierrez hit an RBI single up the middle in the ninth inning, adding on an insurance run for the Mariners.
Despite being two games under .500, the Mariners are now in third place in the AL West and only lie 1.5 games back from the first place Texas Rangers.