WASHINGTON -- On a night where the Mariners lost their most productive player to an apparent leg injury, they were able to salvage the potentially big blow with one of their most dominant wins.
Seattle ran away to a 10-2 win at Nationals Park on the shoulders -- or, shoulder -- of Bryce Miller, who twirled a career-high eight innings and rode the run support that was headlined by Dominic Canzone, who started the rout with a two-run triple in the second and added a solo homer in the eighth.
Yet in victory, the Mariners were nonetheless holding their breath on the status of Randy Arozarena, who exited after hobbling off first base when attempting to leg out an infield single in the third.
Arozarena sparked the scoring with a leadoff single an inning earlier, then stole second base and raced home on Canzone’s triple. That ignited a five-spot, which included a sacrifice fly from Miles Mastrobuoni and a massive homer from Colt Emerson, who himself just returned from missing three games due to a back spasm.
On the injury front, the final series of this three-city, 10-game marathon through the East Coast can’t end soon enough. Seattle has already lost two key contributors -- J.P. Crawford (right hand contusion, in Detroit) and Matt Brash (right lat inflammation, in Baltimore) -- during the first two legs of this journey.
As for Miller, he needed just 91 pitches to record 24 outs, with his lone blemishes being a pair of solo homers -- to all-world slugger James Wood in the fourth and Dylan Crews during garbage time in the eighth. He didn’t have as much swing-and-miss early but picked it up as the outing progressed, finishing with seven strikeouts -- while keeping MLB’s second-best-scoring offense at bay.