What a waste

SEATTLE – Cliff Lee gave the Seattle Mariners everything they’d missed from their star left-hander while he was injured the past month – seven scoreless innings against the Texas Rangers with none of his three baserunners advancing beyond first base.

And in return, the Mariners gave Lee what they’ve done pretty much from the start of the season – nine scoreless innings with nobody coming close to reaching home plate against Rangers starter Colby Lewis.

Lee got the full effect of the Mariners’ paltry offense Friday night, pitching a gem in his first start of the season and then taking a seat along with the other 34,055 at Safeco Field to see when anyone would score.

Five innings later, in the 12th, the Rangers finally did to beat the Mariners 2-0.

“Lee was as good as you can ask,” Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu said. “He was near-perfect.”

Of the offense, which wasted bases-loaded opportunities to win the game in the 10th and 11th innings, Wakamatsu offered a two-word description.

“Pretty anemic,” he said.

It became an ugly finish to something Lee and Lewis had begun with a classic pitching duel.

The Mariners had one runner, Casey Kotchman in the seventh inning, called out for running out of the baseline and another, Ichiro Suzuki in the 11th, thrown out at the plate on a botched suicide squeeze.

In the 12th, the Rangers scored their two runs with considerable help – shortstop Matt Tuiasosopo’s throwing error put runners on second and third with nobody out, then reliever Brandon League’s wild pitch allowed Elvis Andrus to break the scoreless tie. Julio Borbon’s RBI grounder produced the Rangers’ second run.

“You can’t ask the pitching staff to do any more than we did tonight,” Wakamatsu said.

If not victorious, Lee’s debut as Mariners was triumphant nonetheless.

He didn’t allow a baserunner until Michael Young’s single with one out in the fourth inning. And, despite being touched for base hits in the fifth and sixth, Lee was in no trouble at all.

Lewis retired 22 of the last 23 Mariners he faced, knocked out of the game only by his pitch count – 116 pitches – after nine innings.

The Mariners gave themselves a prime scoring opportunity in the 10th when Ken Griffey Jr. rolled a single to shortstop against the Rangers’ infield shift. Milton Bradley followed with a double down the left-field line that sent Eric Byrnes, pinch-running for Griffey, to third.

And then the game crawled to an inconclusive end to the inning.

Working against Kotchman with a base open, Rangers left-hander Darren Oliver threw three pitches and got three visits to the mound – by catcher Matt Treanor before the at-bat, by pitching coach Mike Maddux after ball one, and again by Treanor after ball two.

Turned out a belt-high slider on the outer half was all Oliver needed, because Kotchman tried to check his swing and looped a lazy fly to the edge of the outfield grass that Andrus caught for the first out.

Oliver intentionally walked Adam Moore to load the bases, Wakamatsu replaced Jack Wilson with pinch-hitter Mike Sweeney against right-hander Darren O’Day. Sweeney swung at the first pitch, grounding into a double play

League, who pitched a perfect 10th for the Mariners, retired the Rangers 1-2-3 in the 11th and the Mariners set themselves up with another scoring opportunity in the bottom of the inning.

On the first pitch from Rangers reliever Ben Francisco, Ichiro lined a single to left field. Chone Figgins dropped a sacrifice bunt that turned into a hit, and another huge scoring opportunity, when the Rangers botched the play and nobody covered first base.

Franklin Gutierrez followed with a strikeout – his third of the game.

Then Jose Lopez walked to load the bases.

That brought up who took strike one, then got a good look at ball one – with Ichiro sprinting toward home on what was supposed to be a squeeze bunt. Francisco’s pitch was low and away, but not unreachable. Byrnes leaned but pulled his bat back and could only watch when umpire Jim Wolf called Ichiro out.

Byrnes looked at one more pitch – strike three from Francisco.

“Figgy lays a perfect bunt down, and we know they have trouble fielding the bunt,” Wakamatsu said. “But Guti didn’t get the bunt down and he ends up striking out.”

And what happened when Byrnes didn’t even offer to bunt with Ichiro streaking home?

“We’ll discuss that tomorrow,” Wakamatsu said. “I don’t know what happened.”

Rangers 2, Mariners 0 (12)

Texas	AB	R	H	BI	BB	SO	Avg.
Andrus ss	5	1	2	0	0	2	.270
M.Young 3b	5	1	2	0	0	2	.255
Hamilton lf	4	0	0	0	1	2	.265
Guerrero rf	4	0	0	0	0	0	.333
Borbon cf	1	0	0	1	0	0	.191
Kinsler 2b	5	0	1	0	0	2	.200
Garko dh	5	0	0	0	0	1	.100
Smoak 1b	4	0	0	0	0	1	.130
Treanor c	3	0	0	0	1	1	.231
Gentry cf-rf	3	0	0	0	0	2	.125
D.Murphy ph-rf	1	0	0	0	0	0	.162
Totals	40	2	5	1	2	13

Seattle	AB	R	H	BI	BB	SO	Avg.
I.Suzuki rf	5	0	3	0	0	1	.344
Figgins 2b	5	0	1	0	0	1	.200
F.Gutierrez cf	5	0	0	0	0	3	.326
Jo.Lopez 3b	4	0	0	0	1	1	.226
Griffey Jr. dh	4	0	1	0	0	2	.228
Byrnes pr-dh	1	0	0	0	0	1	.107
Bradley lf	4	0	1	0	1	2	.211
Kotchman 1b	5	0	0	0	0	1	.247
Moore c	4	0	1	0	1	1	.175
J.Wilson ss	3	0	0	0	0	0	.238
M.Sweeney ph	1	0	0	0	0	0	.167
Tuiasosopo ss	0	0	0	0	0	0	.182
Totals	41	0	7	0	3	13

Texas	000	000	000	002—2	5	1
Seattle	000	000	000	000—0	7	1

E—Andrus (4), Tuiasosopo (3). LOB—Texas 4, Seattle 8. 2B—Bradley (5). RBIs—Borbon (8). CS—I.Suzuki (4). RLISP—Texas 2 (Gentry, Garko); Seattle 6 (Jo.Lopez, J.Wilson, M.Sweeney 2, Byrnes 2). RMU—Borbon. GIDP—M.Sweeney. DP—Texas 1 (Andrus, Kinsler, Smoak); Seattle 1 (Figgins, Kotchman).

Texas	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	ERA
C.Lewis	9	3	0	0	1	10	2.76
Oliver	1/3	2	0	0	1	0	2.25
O’Day	2/3	0	0	0	0	0	0.00
F.Francisco W,3-3	1	2	0	0	1	2	6.30
N.Feliz S,4-5	1	0	0	0	0	1	5.40

Seattle	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	ERA
Cl.Lee	7	3	0	0	0	8	0.00
M.Lowe	1	0	0	0	1	1	2.89
Aardsma	1	0	0	0	0	2	2.79
League L,3-2	2 1/3	2	2	1	1	2	2.63
White	2/3	0	0	0	0	0	1.04

IR-S—O’Day 3-0, White 1-0. IBB—off Oliver (Moore), off League (Hamilton). WP—M.Lowe, League. T—3:14. A—34,055 (47,878).