Mariners’ losing streak reaches six

MIAMI – The road trip is finally over, but will the losing end? The Mariners believe it will. They’ve said all the right things as the losing streak went from four to five and now six games with Sunday’s 3-2 loss to the Miami Marlins at Globe Life Park. “It’s all right, we’ll get out of this,” said reliever Tom Wilhelmsen, who took the loss. “We are a much better team than this. There is no other way to feel either. We know what we have going here. It’s just a bump in the road.” They aren’t panicking. They aren’t pressing. They also aren’t playing well or winning. And manager Lloyd McClendon was frank about the solution to fixing it. “The only way we are going to snap out of this if our guys start performing a little better,” McClendon said. “It was a great game, but we had some opportunities to get some things done and we just didn’t do it.” The Mariners played with a lead much of the game, getting a run in the second inning on a sacrifice fly from Justin Smoak and a run in the fourth on a sac fly from Dustin Ackley. But there was an uneasy feeling to that lead. With an overworked bullpen, that would have to be used extensively because of starter Brandon Maurer’s pitch limitations, two runs didn’t seem like it was going to be enough. And it wasn’t. Miami finally got to a tiring Maurer in the fifth inning, scoring a run on Donovan Solano’s bloop single to right field to cut it to 2-1. In the eighth inning, talented rookie Christian Yelich led off with a double off the left-field fence off of Charlie Furbush. McClendon went to right-hander Wilhelmsen to get out of the inning. Wilhelmsen got Marcell Ozuna to fly out and then intentionally walked the ultra-dangerous Giancarlo Stanton. But Wilhelmsen’s next walk wasn’t intentional. He issued a free pass to Casey McGehee, not getting called strikes on a couple borderline pitches that McClendon and catcher John Buck felt could have been strikes. “I was wanting to keep the ball low to get the double play,” Wilhelmsen said. “Maybe some guys call them and some guys don’t. I have to look at that and realize he’s not calling them and make an adjustment.” With bases loaded, Wilhelmsen got Garrett Jones to hit a soft ground ball to first base. Justin Smoak fielded the slow hopper and fired home to try and get the speedy Yelich. Home plate umpire Ed Hickox ruled Yelich out. But at first glance it looked as though Yelich beat the throw. Marlins manager Mike Redmond appealed and it was overturned. The run counted and the game was tied at 2-2. “I fielded it and threw it and he must have got a tremendous jump,” Smoak said. “I think that hop gave him time to get there.” Wilhelmsen then gave up a sac fly to Adeiny Hechavarria that scored Stanton and gave the Marlins the 3-2 lead. The Mariners had a good chance to tie it in the ninth. Corey Hart blooped a double into right-center off of Miami closer Steve Cishek to start the inning. Dustin Ackley then hammered a hard ground ball up the middle that seemed like a sure hit. But Hechavarria made a brilliant stop and fired to first to get Ackley. The play did allow pinch runner Brad Miller to move to third. Cishek walked Smoak, but then came back to strike out Nick Franklin and Michael Saunders to end the game.