SEATTLE — Taijuan Walker has found his groove for the Seattle Mariners. Walker struck out a career-high 11 while pitching into the seventh inning in a 6-3 win over the Houston Astros on Saturday night.

SEATTLE — The Seattle Mariners are looking to the past to reinvigorate the worst hitting team in baseball, hiring Edgar Martinez as their hitting coach on Saturday and reassigning Howard Johnson to the minor league system.

SEATTLE – Roenis Elias rebounded Friday from the worst start of his career by shutting down that same opponent that delivered a severe spanking just five days ago. Elias worked into the eighth inning as the Mariners opened a key weekend series against first-place Houston – as key as they get, maybe, in June – with a 5-2 victory at Safeco Field.

SEATTLE — Roenis Elias settled down after a first-pitch home run, allowing four hits over seven-plus innings, and Mark Trumbo drove in three runs to pace the Seattle Mariners to a 5-2 victory over Houston on Friday night, ending the Astros’ five-game winning streak.

SEATTLE – It isn’t just a snooze-susceptible attack the Seattle Mariners need to address. Their concept of re-gifting requires some work. One night after capitalizing on a defensive misplay for a victory, the Mariners reversed roles Thursday night in a 7-0 loss to the San Francisco Giants at Safeco Field.

SEATTLE – Well, what’d you expect Wednesday night when the pitching match-up at Safeco Field was Felix Hernandez and Madison Bumgarner? This was an absolute dandy and it turned, not surprisingly, on a defensive misplay. A catch that should have been made and wasn’t. The Seattle Mariners turned that into two runs.

SAN FRANCISCO — J.A. Happ hit his spot the first time he faced Matt Duffy only to watch the ball leave the ballpark.

Here was Taijuan Walker taking another step Monday night toward becoming the dominant pitcher the Seattle Mariners have long envisioned.

HOUSTON – Mike Montgomery’s first career victory Saturday came in his eighth professional season and after a winding road through three organizations for a pitcher once viewed as one of the game’s top prospects. “It means a lot,” he said. “I spent a while in the minor leagues. Everything happens for a reason. There’s a lot of good baseball (in me). I’ve been through a lot and thrown a lot of innings. I found some different things.

HOUSTON – By the fourth inning, defeat was a given for the Mariners. Really, the only questions for the last five interminable innings of Sunday’s 13-0 shellacking at the hands of the Astros were these: When or would Seattle get a hit?