BOSTON – Midway through their season, the Seattle Mariners are on pace to win 84 games, have produced two All-Stars and went 5-4 on a trip that some fans thought might ruin their year.

There have been games they won that they probably should have lost, and games they lost they probably should have won.

Nothing in the first 80 games, however, was quite as galling to the team or its manager as the Sunday loss to the Boston Red Sox, who came from behind to beat Seattle, 8-4.

Ahead 4-3 going into the seventh inning after Brandon Morrow had given them six solid innings, three Mariners relievers – Miguel Batista, Mark Lowe and Sean White – combined to give up five runs with two outs.

That will produce a kicked water cooler and a great many muttered obscenities. Manager Don Wakamatsu was asked if he’d had a dog, would he have kicked it?

“Yes,” he said.

Well, there you go.

“We put ourselves in position to win, as we have most of this trip,” Wakamatsu said. “Morrow did a nice job, took a step forward today. Without Batista and Lowe, wouldn’t have done as well on this trip as we have. We wouldn’t have gone 5-4 without them.

“Sometimes, games like this happen.”

In 2008, they came around regularly and helped Seattle lose 101 games. This season? Not so much.

“We’re pretty solid late in games,” Lowe said.

What happened after Morrow threw 98 pitches – the last one 98 miles an hour – and handed off to the bullpen? And why didn’t he go back out for the seventh?

“I think around 100 pitches is where they want me right now, considering how little I’ve pitched,” Morrow said. “If they’d asked me, I’d have gone back out.

“But I was tiring, and when you sit on the bench between innings, that’s where you lose it. I’d gone as far I as I could. I thought it was my best game this year.”

In relief, Batista got a quick out then walked J.D. Drew and gave up a single to Dustin Pedroia. Kevin Youkillis flied out, and all the Mariners needed was that third out of the inning.

Five runs later, they got it.

“The guys just lost command in that inning and couldn’t get it back,” Wakamatsu said.

Batista threw three fastballs in a row to David Ortiz – all of them balls. Why didn’t the Mariners simply walk Ortiz and go after the next hitter, Jason Bay?

“I wanted Ortiz to put the ball in play, because 60 percent of my outs are ground balls,” Batista said.

Catcher Kenji Johjima called for a fourth fastball – in – and Batista threw it. Ortiz clubbed it into right field, tying the game at 4. The Mariners went to Lowe, who had pitched well on the trip, working four innings, allowing only one run.

Lowe walked Bay to load the bases, walked Jacoby Ellsbury to put Boston ahead, 5-4, and gave up a single to Mark Kotsay that scored two more runs and left Ellsbury at third base.

Wakamatsu pulled Lowe went to White. On a slider down and in to Jason Varitek, Johjima had the ball glance off his glove and roll to the backstop.

Passed ball. Another run.

White struck out Varitek for the third out.

“They grabbed the momentum and we couldn’t stop them,” Wakamatsu said.

Morrow chose to look at the positives.

“We just went on the road to play three of the best teams in baseball – the Dodgers, Yankees and Red Sox – and went 5-4,” Morrow said. “We probably should have won the first game in New York and maybe this one. That’s a pretty good trip.”

Wakamatsu agreed: “A lot of people thought this was the part of the schedule that would ruin our first half. It didn’t, and I’m proud of these guys.”

As they have done often this season, the Mariners fell behind early – two solo first-inning home runs allowed by Morrow – and played well enough to go ahead. Ronny Cedeño’s three-run triple past a sliding J.D. Drew in right field in the fourth inning put the Mariners up, 3-2.

With one out and the bases loaded in the fifth, Ryan Langerhans got an insurance run in with a sacrifice fly, but that was all the Mariners could do with that threat.

It put them ahead, 4-2. Morrow handed off after six, 4-3.

If the bullpen had held, Seattle would have been 43-38 after 81 games. Instead, they flew home 42-39. After 81 games a year ago, they were 31-50.

“This is a special season, and it’s a fun team to play with,” All-Star pitcher Felix Hernandez said. “We’ve surprised people all season.”

This time, they surprised themselves, not by going 5-4 on what might be their toughest trip of the season. They were surprised they lost – and they weren’t happy about it.

That in itself might be the biggest change between 2008 and 2009.

larry.larue@thenewstribune.com

blogs.thenewstribune.com/mariners

BEFORE THE BREAK

The Mariners have a seven-game homestand before the All-Star break:

Today-Wednesday: Orioles

Thursday-Sunday: Rangers

July 13-15: All-Star break

MARINERS INSIDER

Read the latest on the Mariners from News Tribune writers Larry LaRue and Ryan Divish at:

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