Mariners break out against O’s

SEATTLE – Remember small-ball rallies?

Before they were replaced this season by pretty much no rallies at all, small-ball was the way the Seattle Mariners created castles from the smallest of building blocks.

On Thursday night, small-ball returned to Safeco Field and produced an 11-0 toasting of the Baltimore Orioles.

The Mariners erupted for 13 hits, 10 of them singles. Every Seattle batter had at least one hit, and some prime contributors were players who were around in the days when enough little hits added up to division titles and playoff runs.

The rare power Thursday came from Ichiro, who hit his second home run of the season, and Scott Spiezio, who had a pair of doubles.

Otherwise the damage was done with singles, and in one case a very big walk by Rich Aurilia.

“It’s good to get everybody contributing on the offensive end,” manager Bob Melvin said. “Next-day starters are always saying ‘You could save a few, you could save a few,’ ” but it was nice that we could relax a little bit. And we got a tremendous outing out of Jamie.”

That was starter Jamie Moyer, who scattered seven hits over seven innings before Ron Villone preserved the shutout through the final two innings.

It was the Mariners’ first shutout and largest margin of victory of the season. The victory ended a three-game losing streak and prevented the first Orioles sweep in Seattle since 1997.

Moyer is now 2-2 on the season and 15-2 in his career against Baltimore.

The Orioles starter was Rodrigo Lopez, who came into the game with a 3-1 record and an 0.33 ERA, all of it in relief. Lopez was moved into the rotation to fill the void left by the recent demotion of Kurt Ainsworth to Class AAA Ottawa.

Lopez hadn’t pitched beyond 42/3 innings this season, and within that comfort zone he was dazzling, holding the Mariners hitless for four innings.

He was out of gas when he took the mound in the fifth, although Orioles manager Lee Mazzilli seemed to be the last person in the park to recognize it.

“You try not to think about it, but it kind of has that same feeling through five, where we don’t have a whole lot going,” Melvin said. “But to break through like that…”

The Mariners broke through like this: Edgar Martinez, John Olerud and Dan Wilson opened the inning with singles, and the first run came in when Aurilia worked a walk after battling with a full count.

More runs followed on an infield single by Ichiro, a Spiezio ground out and a Bret Boone single. Finally, Mazzilli walked to the mound and took the ball from Lopez.

Raul Ibañez and Martinez greeted reliever John Parrish with run-scoring singles before the inning finally ended. Seven singles and a walk had totaled six runs, and that was plenty enough.

“Obviously Boonie’s hit drove in two, and Richie’s at bat was really probably the key at-bat of the inning, drawing a walk like that with the bases loaded and battling like he did, fouling some tough pitches off,” Melvin said.

“Maybe this will jump start him too.”

Aurilia – struggling along with a .240 batting average – was just happy to contribute.

“With the trouble we’ve had scoring runs, you’ve got to get on the board there with the bases loaded and nobody out,” Aurilia said. “Of course, would I rather hit a two-run double or a three-run double? Yeah. But you know what: I’ll take the walk to get the rally going and keep it going. We had a string of big hits after that.”

The biggest came in the seventh inning and ended a showdown between Parrish and Ichiro. Parrish opened the exchange with a head-high fastball that put Ichiro on the dirt. Then, he buckled Ichiro’s knees with another one high and inside. But the next pitch was over the plate, and Ichiro sent that one 353 feet into the right-center field seats.

Ichiro had been held hitless on Wednesday, ending a 16-game hitting streak. He bounced back with three hits Thursday, moving to 1,998 career hits combined between the Japanese and American leagues.

Q for a day

Quinton McCracken started in center field Thursday night, only the fifth game he has started this season. McCracken has been the least-used player on the team, having just 13 at-bats entering Thursday’s game.

“Q is part of this team and I feel bad that I haven’t gotten him as many at-bats as I had envisioned,” Melvin said. “When you’re struggling, you have to run your best lineup out there.”