The Seattle Mariners had a chance to turn a great weekend into a perfect one on Sunday at Safeco Field as they hosted the New York Yankees in the final game of a short three-game series. On Friday and Saturday night, the Mariners rallied to come from behind and steal wins in the first two games of the series, the last of which came in a 12 inning thriller. But on Sunday, it wasn’t to be as Jason Vargas struggled early, lasting only three innings and giving up six runs in the process.
There was no comeback to be had on Sunday as the Seattle offense struggled, only mustering one run on a Justin Smoak solo shot to left-center in the sixth. By then, the Yankees were already up big after scoring seven runs in the first four innings and chasing Vargas from the game after the bullpen was stretched to its limits on Saturday night.
Nick Swisher got the scoring started for the Yankees with a solo home run in the top of the second to give New York the early lead. The wheels fell off for Vargas in the third as five runs came around to score with two outs. Robinson Cano’s single brought Curtis Granderson in, Andruw Jones’ double cleared the bases, scoring three and a Eduardo Nunez triple brought in one more run to push the New York lead to 6-0. Mark Texeria added another run for insurance in the fourth with a single that scored Granderson.
C.C. Sabathia was superb for the Yankees, throwing eight innings while allowing just one run on five hits while striking out five and walking three. Jeff Gray was solid in relief for the Mariners, pitching four innings while allowing just one run on one hit. Gray and Chris Ray combined to throw six innings of solid relief while saving the rest of the bullpen after Saturday night’s 12 inning marathon.
The Mariners took two of three from the Yankees and sit at .500 on the year with a 26-26 record. Seattle is just a game and a half back of the AL West leading Texas Rangers, but also sits in a tie for fourth-place in the closely-grouped division. All told, it’s hard to consider the weekend, and the week that preceded it, anything but a success.
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