Randy Arozarena turned Saturday night into his own showcase and then into Seattle’s escape hatch.
The Mariners were staring at a loss with two outs and nobody on in the ninth, trailing the Cubs 4-2. Then the rally came together fast. Wilson doubled, Leo Rivas followed with a single, and Arozarena drove the next pitch to center field for a two-run homer that finished off a 5-4 Seattle win.
Before the final swing, Arozarena had already stamped the game. He opened the scoring with a leadoff homer in the first and later made a run-saving play in the third, robbing Miguel Amaya of a home run. By the end of the night, he had gone from setting the tone to finishing the job.
The late comeback also erased a rough turn for Kade Anderson and Dan Wilson, who helped send one of the Mariners’ most anticipated debuts in two decades off the rails. Anderson, 22, looked sharp for much of the night and held Chicago to one run on two hits and two walks with five strikeouts through five innings. But the sixth inning got away from him, and the final two pitches he threw there were costly.
That part of the story raises a bigger question about Wilson’s handling of the game. The Cubs were a brutal matchup for a left-handed starter, entering Saturday first in MLB with a .805 OPS against southpaws.
They were also second with an .826 OPS when facing a starting pitcher for a third time. Still, Wilson sent Anderson back out for the sixth.
Whatever the reasoning, the gamble backfired. The Cubs made him pay, and the decision added another rough mark to Wilson’s handling of the pitching staff.
For Anderson, though, the ending at least left room for optimism. He had mostly delivered on the hype before the sixth-inning trouble, and the Mariners can still give him chances to answer back before the regular season ends.
The win matters plenty in the standings, too. Seattle is now 3.0 games behind the Houston Astros in the AL West, and the door remains open for Anderson to be part of the picture again in October.
In Other News...
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Colt Emersons season has come to an abrupt end with wrist surgery, a tough blow for a Mariners prospect who had been part of the organizations broader infield picture. He is on the 10-day injured list now, and the club plans to move him to the 60-day injured list, a procedural step that gives Seattle some roster flexibility while it waits out the final stretch of the season.
The Mariners are still juggling the infield around J.P. Crawfords impending return, so Emersons absence lands at an awkward time for the depth chart. Even so, the team is expecting him back in time for spring training next year, which at least gives Seattle a clear target as it tries to absorb a painful setback and keep the bigger picture intact. [Read more 🡒]
Mariners May Need A Roster Shakeup After Deadline Bat Disappoints
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Meanwhile, Lazaro Montes has kept forcing his way into the conversation with a huge season in the minors, including 37 home runs and a strong OPS at Triple-A Tacoma. With roster expansion on September 1 looming, the Mariners have a possible path to shake things up if they decide the bat they need is already in the organization, even though no official move has been made yet. [Read more 🡒]
Kade Andersons Mariners Debut Put One Pitch Under Immediate Scrutiny
Kade Andersons first big league start came with the kind of close inspection that follows any top Mariners prospect the moment he reaches Seattle, and the attention only intensified once he was asked to work 5.2 innings and allow three earned runs in his debut. Promoted straight from Double-A, Anderson stepped into a new level where every pitch gets judged not just by results, but by how it moves, how it spins and whether the stuff that played so well in the minors still looks the same under major league lights.
One layer of that adjustment is the baseball itself. The majors use a different ball than Double-A, with changes in composition and stitching that can alter pitch movement, including spin and vertical break, and pitchers making that jump often see subtle changes right away in how their offerings carry or finish. For a young arm like Anderson, that makes his first outing less of a verdict than a starting point, with one pitch in particular now under the kind of scrutiny that can shape the conversation around his next turn. [Read more 🡒]