Mariners avoid sweep with disjointed win over Angels

Ryan Divish, The Seattle Times on Sep 17, 2026

Published in Baseball

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ANAHEIM, Calif. — If a random baseball fan happened upon Angel Stadium on Wednesday night, looking to watch a Major League Baseball game, the Mariners and Angels would have offered a pretty solid encapsulation of how and why both teams will finish the 2026 season with losing records.

In terms of execution or precision, it was lacking in almost every way.

The Mariners, who cemented their losing season 24 hours earlier, managed to play less worse than the Angels, picking up a 7-2 victory to avoid being swept in the three-game series.

Seattle will have Thursday off in Denver before opening their final road series of the season — a three-game set at Coors Field vs. the Rockies.

When Zach Neto mishandled J.P. Crawford’s hard ground ball to short on the first play of the game, it was, perhaps, a sign of things to come.

But really it was the starting pitchers, who set an ugly tone to the game.

Neither Mariners starter George Kirby or Angels starter and former Mariner Yusei Kikuchi made it through five innings. Both pitchers worked 4 ⅓ innings and combined to throw 192 pitches while allowing seven runs on 10 hits with 10 walks and five strikeouts.

Kikuchi allowed five runs on five hits in his outing, while Kirby allowed just two runs on five hits. They each issued five walks.

For Kikuchi, walking five batters in a game is surprising if not unexpected. But Kirby walking five batters in a game?

In the previous 144 starts of his career, he had never walked more than three in an outing.

It was just the fifth game in this MLB season where both starting pitchers issued at least five walks each.

But somehow none of those five free passes issued by Kirby came around to score.

The Mariners picked up two runs off Kikuchi in the first inning. Cal Raleigh drove in the first of three runs on the night with a sac fly, and Josh Naylor added a ground ball through the right side for a 2-0 lead.

Given an early lead, Kirby gave up a leadoff single to Neto and walked Mike Trout and Wade Meckler to load the bases. Neto scored on Vaughn Grissom’s sac fly to shallow left field, taking advantage of a weak throw from Randy Arozarena. Kirby was able to get out of the inning without any further damage when J.P. Crawford grabbed a line drive off the bat of Moisés Ballesteros and stepped on second to double off Meckler.

The Angels tied the game in the second when Adam Frazier’s single one-hopped off Arozarena’s chest and another poor throw allowed Denzer Guzmán to score from second.

The Mariners took the lead for good in the fifth.

With one out, Kikuchi walked Arozarena and Dom Canzone. Raleigh put the Mariners up for good, lacing a 112-mph double to left to score Arozarena.

With runners on second and third and one out, the Angels intentionally walked Julio Rodríguez to load the bases and bring Naylor to the plate.

Naylor hit a ground ball to Grissom at first that had the potential to be an inning-ending double play. But Grissom’s throw to second sailed into left field, allowing two runs to score.

Seattle tacked on two more runs in the sixth off reliever Sammy Peralta.