Mariners' rotation produces bloated ERA on 2-5 road trip

LOS ANGELES -- The Mariners’ road woes continue, and at this point, they are not exclusively limited to Bryan Woo.

The right-hander’s glaring splits away from T-Mobile Park remain the prevailing theme of his season -- compounded further in Thursday night’s 6-2 loss at Dodger Stadium, when he surrendered five runs in five innings.

But no, Seattle’s struggles on this exhausting, 2-5 road trip that began in Arlington extended much further. The Mariners are now 23-34 in away games this season and 0-8-1 in their past nine road series.

“It's up to us,” Woo said. “The front office and coaches and everybody has put enough into the product on the field. It's time for us to do something about it. There's no more wanting this or doing that. Like, it doesn't really matter. You've got to show up on the field one way or another.”

There’s been a convergence between the well-chronicled, summer-long scuffles of Seattle’s lineup and a newer trend that’s become increasingly alarming -- the state of its entire six-man rotation.

Over these seven games, Seattle’s starters were tagged to an 8.49 ERA and 1.74 WHIP over 35 innings. Of the 33 hits they surrendered, 23 were for extra bases, including 10 homers.

Combined, the Rangers and Dodgers had a .336 batting average, a 1.003 OPS and a 41.3% hard-hit rate (anything 95 mph or higher) against Mariners starters.

Each starter had one turn through, with Woo the only among the group to pitch twice, having been bumped up to Thursday when Bryce Miller necessitated an extra day. Miller will start Friday vs. the Twins, when the Mariners open a nine-game homestand, their longest of the season.

The rotation’s depth gave the Mariners the flexibility to make that adjustment, though there’s a strong possibility that the club deals from that group ahead of Monday’s Trade Deadline.

Yet the alignment tweak also exposed Woo to another road start. He fell to 1-8 with a 6.71 ERA away from T-Mobile Park, compared to 6-0 with a 2.20 ERA at home.

“The most important thing is to keep that belief in one another and the team, the group, the possibility,” Woo said. “You've got to hold on to it. Once you lose that, then you're done.”

Sure, Seattle’s bats have rightfully been the center of unflattering attention -- especially at the outset of this trip, when the club parted ways with assistant hitting coach Bobby Magallanes. And they coughed away the chance to bail Woo out in the sixth, when they finally created some discomfort for Dodgers starter Roki Sasaki.

Cole Young led off with a triple, then Randy Arozarena drove him in with a double to the wall. That set up a bases-loaded jam for Cal Raleigh, who drew a five-pitch walk to make it a 5-2 game and, all of a sudden, knocked the uber-talented-but-oft-rattled Japanese sensation out of the game.

And there was still only one out. But Rob Refsnyder struck out on three pitches while pinch-hitting against lefty reliever Jack Dreyer. Then on the very next pitch, Weston Wilson grounded out on a bang-bang play, when Mookie Betts’ throw sailed wide and forced Freddie Freeman to make a leaping grab-and-tag at first base.

The Mariners went quietly the rest of the way.

“I just feel like every year brings its own thing,” said Julio Rodríguez, who went 0-for-5. “I feel like baseball, it's a sport that's always going to test you. It's always going to test you in many different ways. So I just feel like it's definitely a challenge that we're facing as a team, but you've got to find a way.”

Outside an exhale of relief from Dominic Canzone’s late-innings homer on Saturday in Arlington, and a gut-check thriller on Monday in Los Angeles, there were few -- if any -- bright spots over this past week away from T-Mobile Park

The Mariners entered this road trip a half-game behind the Rangers for first place in the American League West but return home in third place, 2 1/2 games back -- but essentially, it’s 3 1/2 games, as Texas clinched the season head-to-head after the Mariners dropped three of four last weekend.

Elsewhere, the lurking Astros (55-55) climbed into second place and back to .500 for the first time since April 7 on Wednesday.

There is a Deadline looming, and the Mariners will add.

But as Raleigh said this week, including himself in his account, “it’s going to be up to this core group here to decide, ultimately, where this team ends up going.”