Seattle Mariners Three Stars of Week 1
STAR #1: Yusei Kikuchi
Week 1 stat line – 6 innings pitched, 3 earned runs, 1 walk, 2 HRs, 10 strikeouts.
The Mariners would eventually lose the game 6-3, but it wasn’t due to Yusei Kikuchi’s performance. The hard-throwing lefty threw a gem and really had only two mistakes. Buster Posey in the third inning and Evan Longoria in the sixth inning.
He gave up two long-balls after only giving up three in all nine starts of 2020. For Mariner’s fans though, this is a good sign. If Kikuchi can duplicate this effort going forward, then he’s going to win more games than he loses.
Strangely there isn’t much chatter about Kikuchi’s performance, even though he tied his career-high with ten punchouts. He also flashed much better control in the game issuing just one base on balls over the 25 opposing hitters he faced. An indicator to show his improvement is 25 batters is three more than his career average. He also only fell behind three batters and one of them was the walk.
Overall it was a very encouraging outing for Kikuchi. His next projected start is Saturday, April 10th against the Twins and former Seattle Mariners prospect Michael Pineda.
Related Story: 2021 Mariners comprehensive preview
Joe Swenson is a lifelong Seattle sports fan and owner, producer, director, and award-winning writer for Broken Arts Entertainment (www.brokenartsentertainment.com). He’s also the co-host of In The Clutch available on YouTube.