Mariners notes: Upton delivers game-tying homer Saturday, Julio is AL’s back-to-back Rookie of the Month

Justin Upton couldn’t simply “wait around” for a primo offering from Oakland reliever A.J. Puk in the eighth inning of Saturday’s game at T-Mobile Park. Brought in as a pinch-hitter when the Mariners trailed, 1-0, Upton searched early for a fastball over the plate, assuming the first pitch of the at-bat would be the best.

Signed by Seattle in late May and called up last month, Upton, 34, tracked Puk’s first pitch – a low-but-center-cut 97 mph heater – before turning and blasting his first career pinch-hit homer into Edgar’s Cantina in left field. The shutout was no more, and Upton’s blast equalized the score at one.

It wasn’t a situation Upton was used to, given the everyday starting role he commanded for so many seasons dating back to his debut for Arizona in 2007. He adjusted his approach when asked to make his first plate appearance in the eighth inning, Upton told reporters on Saturday at T-Mobile Park.

“You have to be ready to hit,” he added. “Sometimes, the best pitch you get is going to be the first one. So you’ve just got to be ready from pitch one.”

It was dubbed by manager Scott Servais as the “biggest swing of the day,” considering Puk’s sizzling fastball and a bending slider Upton was fortunate enough to avoid. He had struggled, admittedly, up until Saturday’s eighth-inning missile, then 5-for-33 (.152) in a Seattle uniform. Though it’s not the first so-called slump in Upton’s big league career, now spanning parts of 16 seasons.

“You just kind of grind through it,” he said. “It’s definitely nice to see a little success from the work I’m putting in.”

Then tied at one, reliever Diego Castillo induced a critical double play to cap a scoreless top of the ninth, and Abraham Toro delivered a bases-loaded, nobody-out walk-off single in the bottom of the frame, scoring pinch runner Marcus Wilson to win, 2-1.

“It’s easy to (overthink) that,” Toro said after the game. “And same thing with the shift,” he added in reference to Oakland’s five-man infield on the game’s final play. “You’re trying to hit where they’re not... I was just trying to get a sacrifice fly up the middle.”

Seattle moved to 38-42 and grabbed a crucial game in what felt like a must-win series against the Athletics, who have nestled themselves firmly in the division cellar. Toro’s walk-off hit pushed the Mariners to 4-2 on the homestand, and Seattle won again Sunday, 2-1, behind southpaw Robbie Ray’s 12 strikeouts and fifth straight quality start.

“You can’t wait around,” Servais said of Upton’s homer. “If it looks like (on) the first pitch you can hammer it, you put it in play. You take a good swing at it, and he did. Good for him. Nice to see him get a big hit like that.

“If he doesn’t get that hit, I don’t know if we’d win the game.”

Injuries to Taylor Trammell, Luis Torrens, and Ty France throughout last week further decimated the offense, resulting in inconsistent scoring and a frustrating lack of offense with runners in scoring position, Servais admitted. Shortstop J.P. Crawford completed his four-game suspension Sunday, though outfielders Jesse Winker (six games) and Julio Rodriguez (two games, pending an appeal) are slated to miss time in the coming weeks.

Along with the Upton addition, Seattle swung a trade to acquire 1B Carlos Santana from the Kansas City Royals to fill the absence of Ty France, who could return by next weekend.

“We have hung in there,” Servais added Sunday morning. “Our pitching has carried us. I do think there’s a lot more in there consistently for our offense to produce more runs. It just hasn’t happened yet. We’ve seen it in glimpses.”

Said Servais after Sunday’s win: “Pitching and defense have been the name of the game.”

Before Sunday’s matinee and series finale with Oakland, Seattle’s pitching ranked tenth in team earned run average over the last seven days (3.67), and sixth in team WHIP (1.13). Rookie starter George Kirby dominated Oakland on Saturday across seven innings of three-hit, one-run ball, and Seattle starters put together a 24-game stretch allowing three runs or less through last Monday, setting a franchise record.

The Mariners play six combined games with San Diego and Toronto next week before a seven-game road slate with the Washington Nationals and Texas Rangers. That takes Seattle, and the rest of the league, to the All-Star break on July 18.

Sunday’s win cut Seattle’s deficit in the AL wild card standings to five games.

“I know it’s officially 81 games today,” Servais said Sunday, “but for me, it’s always been… where are you at (during) the break, and you regroup and go from there.”

JULIO EARNS CONSECUTIVE ROOKIE OF THE MONTH AWARDS

Before MLB released its latest batch of monthly award winners, there was little doubt that Julio Rodriguez, May’s American League Rookie of the Month, would take home the award again.

The 21-year-old phenom officially captured his second consecutive Rookie of the Month honor on Saturday afternoon, now amid a seven-game hitting streak. He became the first Mariner to win back-to-back Rookie of the Month awards since Ichiro Suzuki in 2001, and the first in baseball since Houston’s Yordan Alvarez won consecutive awards in 2019. Both went on to win AL Rookie of the Year.

Rodriguez paced AL rookies in, essentially, every conceivable hitting category, including FanGraphs WAR (1.4), wRC+ (162), and hits (30). He mashed seven home runs in June – the last a line-drive missile to dead-center field at T-Mobile Park on June 30 – and drove in 16 RBI. He reached base 44 times and collected 58 total bases, both tops among AL rookies.

“I’m just playing my game,” Rodriguez said last week. “I feel like that’s my biggest thing. At the beginning of the year, I was kind of all over the place, because I was new to the neighborhood. Getting my feet on my ground, settling in… that’s been my biggest adjustment.”

Rodriguez crushed homers in back-to-back games twice in June, first on June 24-25 at Angel Stadium in Anaheim and then at T-Mobile Park on June 29-30. Wednesday’s two-run blast reached the left-field bleachers perched above Seattle’s home bullpen and came in part of a six-run fourth frame for the Mariners in an eventual 9-3 win over Baltimore.

“I was just trying to find something out and over the plate, because everything was just coming in on me,” Rodriguez said. “He left it middle-down, but I was able to catch it out front.”

Batting leadoff Sunday, Rodriguez crushed a first-pitch homer that gave Seattle an immediate 1-0 lead in the first inning. He wound up driving in both runs in the 2-1 victory after doubling home Dylan Moore in the sixth.

Added manager Servais: “The adjustments he makes, the joy he continues to play with... I just hope that never leaves him. I said it the day we called him up, and I pray to God it stays with him for a long, long time.”

SHORT HOPS

– SS J.P. Crawford received a one-game reduction to an initial five-game suspension for his role in Seattle’s benches-clearing brawl in the second inning of a game with the Angels in Anaheim on June 26. He began serving a four-game suspension Thursday, and can return for Seattle’s two-game series in San Diego on Monday.

— OF Jesse Winker told Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times that his initial seven-game suspension was reduced to six games. MLB allowed the Mariners to stagger the suspensions of Winker (six games), Crawford (four), and Rodriguez (two) to avoid the loss of three starters (and two outfielders) at once.

– C Tom Murphy underwent season-ending surgery Wednesday to repair his left shoulder after dislocating it on a play at the plate on May 6. Seattle was initially hopeful Murphy would return to the team on a road trip in late May before the 31-year-old catcher suffered a “setback” in the recovery process. Murphy had caught a bullpen session and took swings in the cage less than two weeks after the injury.

— There’s an “outside chance” 1B Ty France could return to Seattle’s lineup by next weekend for a four-game home series with Toronto, Servais said Sunday. France, an All-Star Ballot finalist, suffered a left elbow injury when reaching for a throw at first base from infielder Abraham Toro. Oakland’s Sheldon Neuse crashed into France’s arm, which bent backward.

“He’s getting close,” Servais said. “We’ll wait and see how things progress with him (Sunday and Monday).”

— OF Kyle Lewis (concussion) joined Triple-A Tacoma on Sunday for a rehab assignment after taking batting practice and working through baserunning drills at T-Mobile Park earlier this week. The 26-year-old and 2020 AL Rookie of the Year was hit in the shoulder and head by a wayward Jose Urquidy curveball on May 28, and has yet to appear in game action since.

“He’s going to be there for a while,” Servais said Sunday. “He needs to get out and play, make sure he feels good, get the timing with his swing, (and) get out in the outfield.”

— OF Mitch Haniger (high-ankle sprain) remains on schedule to return around the All-Star break, and took part in running drills before Saturday’s game at T-Mobile Park.

– Logan Gilbert’s 220 strikeouts through 40 career games rank second in the franchise’s history. Only Felix Hernandez, who whiffed 233 batters in his first 40 starts from 2005-06, ranks higher.

ON DECK

The Mariners (39-42) meet the Padres at Petco Park in San Diego for the first of a two-game interleague series Monday. After Tuesday’s series finale, Seattle gets Wednesday off before kicking off a four-game home set with Toronto on Thursday.