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Everyone in the AL West is 2 games behind Seattle. Well except for Seattle, of course. They're not 2 games behind themselves so let's not get ahead of ourselves. Oakland will try to cut that deficit in half, and win the series, today behind Sonny Gray.
Gray is opposed by Erasmo Ramirez, who sounds like the model of a car: The Erasmo. "Better gas mileage than the Nissan Phallica, better safety record than the Toyota Concerta, named #7 car of the year 3 years out of 5 by Car & Driver magazine! The 2014 Erasmo: Change up your style!"
He does have a good changeup, and he threw it a whopping 30% of the time in 2013. That's right: about 43% fastballs, 16% sliders, 10% curves, and 30% changeups, meaning that despite sitting at 90-93MPH Ramirez throws his fastball less than half the time -- which is unusual.
Absent from today's lineup is struggling RFer Josh Reddick and his .100 batting average. However, Daric Barton is in the lineup to provide your endless-make-the-same-point-you've-made-a-trillion-times controversy. Color me disappointed that Derek Norris once again sits; he needs to be in the lineup more often, in my ever-so-humble opinion.
Mariners:
