DETROIT -- The Mariners won’t win any prizes for beating a Tigers team with the worst record in the Majors, but they were plenty happy to head out of the Motor City with a 7-2 victory on Thursday afternoon.

After dropping a 3-2 decision on Wednesday, Seattle returned to its Detroit dominance with a 14-hit performance. Austin Nola was one of two Mariners to tally three hits, and Dylan Moore launched Seattle's only homer of the day.

• Box score

The Mariners wrapped up the season series with a 6-1 advantage over the Tigers and head to Toronto for the second leg of a three-city trip with a 50-72 record. It was just Seattle’s third win in its past 12 games, while Detroit has lost 25 of 33 since the All-Star break to fall to 36-82.

Here are three things to like from the Mariners’ first series win since sweeping a four-game set from the Tigers in Seattle at the end of July:

Mallex making things happen

Mariners leadoff man Mallex Smith has had his ups and downs this year, and he displayed plenty more of the former than the latter in this one, going 3-for-4 with a run and an RBI and swiping two bags to hike his Major League-leading stolen-base total to 34.

Smith also engineered a first-inning double play by catching Victor Reyes off first base on a fly ball by Miguel Cabrera. But the speedy right fielder also wasn’t able to cut off a hit to the gap in the fourth that rolled to the wall and was scored a triple for Reyes; later that frame, Smith overthrew the cutoff man to allow the Tigers to take an extra base on a single.

“Mallex has a tendency to make a lot happen, no matter where he is on the field,” said manager Scott Servais. “Offensively, he did some good things. The quality of his at-bats has been really good. In the outfield today, maybe not quite so good. But today’s game was about our offense kind of covering up some of the other mistakes we made.”

The Mariners seem to feed of Smith’s buoyant nature, and he continued his second-half bounceback by getting on base four times and causing havoc.

“We’re just having fun, enjoying playing with one another and feeding off each other’s energy,” Smith said. “We took a tough loss and turned around and got a win. That’s nothing but team chemistry and just playing hard.”

Seager’s surge continues

Kyle Seager’s resurgence continues to carry a Mariners offense that has struggled in the second half. The veteran third baseman’s two-run double in the third extended his hitting streak to nine games, during which he’s batted .406 (13-for-32) with five homers and 12 RBIs.

Seager feasted on Tigers pitching this year with a .393 average (11-for-28) with four homers and 11 RBIs in seven games.

Seager’s double to left continued his growing trend of hitting the ball well to the opposite field, which is a payoff from the offseason conditioning program he undertook to allow his body the flexibility to open up and drive pitches against defensive shifts that hounded him the past two years.

“I wasn’t physically able to separate like I needed to and didn’t have the ankle mobility and thoracic mobility. I just got too tight,” Seager said. “That was the whole point of this winter, and right now, it’s definitely working.”

After missing the first two months following hand surgery and then getting off to a frigid start, Seager has hit .375 over his past 20 games to hike his average from .186 to .242. He credits hitting coach Tim Laker with helping him drive the ball more to left field as well.

“He’s really good,” Seager said. “He’s got me in better positions, where if you catch it a little deeper, you’re able to actually hit it with authority that way and keep it down. There’s been a couple line drives that way that I’ve been happy with.”

Opener strategy proving successful

When the Mariners first started experimenting with the opener role in front of Tommy Milone and Wade LeBlanc, they ran out a handful of relievers who got hammered in the first inning and put the team in early holes.

But former Braves starter Matt Wisler has greatly solidified the opener role in the past few weeks. He threw a scoreless first ahead of Milone on Thursday, and he now has yielded just three hits and no runs over seven innings in his first five opener opportunities.

Even with Wisler’s emergence, the Mariners’ ERA for the 23 1/3 innings in which they’ve used an opener (20 attempts) is 7.71. But take Wisler out of that equation, and it’s an unwieldy 11.02.

“It’s a good role, and I’ve started a lot in my career, so it’s an opportunity and something I’m kind of used to,” said the 26-year-old right-hander, who was acquired from the Padres on July 4. “It’s a little different in that you’re not worried about seeing guys a second time. You go out and try to get three or six outs, whatever they ask, and hope for the best.”

The Mariners will use an opener again in Friday’s series opener against the Blue Jays in Toronto, and Wisler said that he’ll be ready if called upon. Servais said it’s possible they’d use him in back-to-back days after throwing just 11 pitches against the Tigers, but no decision has been made yet.