Mariners' Iwakuma baffles Twins again
SEATTLE -- Their eight-game winning streak behind them, the Seattle Mariners extended a different streak Thursday night.
Hisashi Iwakuma pitched six scoreless innings, and the Mariners rode a six-run second inning to an 8-2 victory over the Minnesota Twins. Iwakuma has now thrown 26 2/3 innings over four career starts against the Twins without allowing an earned run.
The Mariners (49-53) have won nine of 10 games after having the Cleveland Indians snap their eight-game losing streak Wednesday. Seattle is 14-6 in the month of July.
Iwakuma (10-4) gave up just four hits and struck out nine batters, giving him 40 career strikeouts against Minnesota. He has allowed just 11 hits and two earned runs over 13 innings since the All-Star break, and extended he his own personal winning streak to three games.
"I don't know if I'm good (against) this team in general; I'm just keeping the ball down in the zone and being very aggressive with my fastball," Iwakuma said through interpreter Antony Suzuki.
Seattle had to overcome three errors, which left acting manager Robby Thompson a bit less than satisfied afterward.
"As an infield guy, I'm a little disappointed in that," Thompson said after improving to 3-1 as fill-in for manager Eric Wedge, who is at home recovering from a minor stroke he suffered earlier this week. "(Iwakuma) threw more pitches than he should have (because of the errors), but he battled and got through it."
The Twins (43-56) struck out 13 times and didn't score until there were two outs in the ninth inning. Chris Hermann's two-out, ninth-inning double on a 3-2 pitch ended 17 consecutive innings of scoreless baseball for the Minnesota offense, and Doug Bernier followed that with an RBI double off reliever Oliver Perez.
"Their guy (Iwakuma) did what he had to do to shut us down," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said.
Dustin Ackley had three hits for Seattle, while rookie teammate Nick Franklin hit a three-run homer to highlight the Mariners' second-inning rally.
Minnesota used four relief pitchers after Kevin Correia (7-7) struggled through his shortest start since 2010.
Correia could not get out of the second inning, during which he faced all nine Seattle batters while giving up seven hits and six runs. The big blow was Franklin's homer, which came after three consecutive RBI hits.
The season-high six runs Correia allowed in 1 2/3 innings raised his season ERA to 4.56.
"First time that we've seen Correia have a hard time," Gardenhire said. "He just couldn't get the ball where he wanted to. We'd set up outside, and he'd throw it over the middle. We'd set up inside, and he'd throw it back over the middle."
Seattle's 6-0 lead seemed to be in pretty good hands considering Iwakuma's career against the Twins.
Iwakuma got into a little trouble in the third inning, when two singles and a Franklin error loaded the bases with one out. However, the right-hander got out of the jam with a strikeout and a Clete Thomas groundout.
The Mariners added two more runs in the bottom of the fifth, taking an 8-0 lead on RBI doubles by Henry Blanco and Ackley.
NOTES: Minnesota has a 20-32 road record, but it had won four of its previous five away from Target Field before Thursday's game, the opener of a four-game series. ... The Mariners have won five of the six series they've played in July. ... Seattle C Mike Zunino came out of the game in the fifth inning, with Blanco taking over as a defensive replacement. Zunino took a foul tip off his left wrist earlier in the game, marking the second time in three days that he has been hit in the wrist by a foul ball. Thompson said after the game that X-rays came up negative but that Blanco was likely to start Friday. "We'll follow it up (Friday) and see how (Zunino) feels," Thompson said.
