After a brutal August that saw the M’s play numerous playoff contenders and spend a lot of time away from home, playing the A’s at home was supposed to be a cakewalk pie stroll. Spoiler alert, it was not! The phenomenon of cruel nature that is the 2026 Seattle Mariners once again exerted itself, and the Mariners managed to drop the series to the corpse of the A’s roster. It took Bryan Woo’s heroics to prevent a sweep.
A series win the M’s took from Texas, but a sweep they needed to kindle their flickering
playoff odds, which sit at 6.2% as of Thursday night. They come to Sacramento in need of, essentially, perfection.
Two bad, bad teams on display this weekend. Neither team is above average in anything except the Mariners starting pitching, barely. Two bad offenses, two bad defenses, a bunch of bad pitching.
From last week’s series preview:
The biggest reason why the Athletics have struggled so much since June is because their lineup has been absolutely gutted by injuries; Brent Rooker (knee), Shea Langeliers (knee), Nick Kurtz (thumb), Tyler Soderstrom (hip), and Jacob Wilson (shoulder) have all succumbed to season-ending injuries. Those five are the core the team was building around so to have all of them sidelined at once has been a huge blow. There have been some positives despite all the struggles. Zack Gelof has been the team’s best hitter when he’s been on the field — he’s missed a bunch of time with a handful of minor scrapes and bruises. The demise of Lawrence Butler has been greatly exaggerated as well; since June 10, he’s put up a 131 wRC+ with nine home runs.
Probable Pitchers
Updated Stuff+ Explainer
- Stuff+ scores for Mariners starters
From a previous series preview:
Jeffrey Springs has managed to survive pitching in Sutter Health Park by generating a ton of weak contact. His .255 BABIP was the ninth lowest among qualified pitchers last year and it’s even lower this season. He allows a ton of contact in the air and all that elevated contact hasn’t turned into damage like you might expect. It’s mostly just weak fly balls that are easily caught. He’s also throwing a little harder this season, though his strikeout-to-walk ratio is almost an exact mirror of what he posted last year. His best pitch is still his changeup and that’s what allows him to run a slightly reverse platoon split.
After a decent start to the season, Springs has been absolutely terrible over the last three months; since the beginning of June, his ERA is over eight! The last time he faced the Mariners, though, he went seven scoreless.
From a previous series preview:
The Athletics top pitching prospect entering the season, Gage Jump made his major league debut at the end of May — against the Mariners no less — and has pitched through an up-and-down rookie campaign. He’s shown flashes of brilliance at times, but he’s also been prone to big blowups that spiral out of control. He’s got three different breaking balls that make up the bulk of his pitch mix with a four-seamer as the foundation and a sinker and changeup to round out the repertoire. His low arm angle helps his fastball play up from an already impressive 96 mph from the left side, giving the pitch excellent movement across both planes. Right now, he’s much more of a thrower than a pitcher, filling the middle of the zone with his hard stuff and spraying his secondaries around the edges of the zone. That lack of command is the one thing holding him back from truly bringing the entire package together.
Jump has a bright future ahead of him. However, he’s been getting hit hard, much of it on the fastball, a pitch that should by the metrics be a killer. He should be fun to watch.
From a previous series preview:
Jacob Lopez was a surprise last year. Never regarded as a top prospect, and a throw-in in the Jeffrey Springs trade a few years ago, he had a stretch of 13 starts last summer where he ran a 2.64 ERA and a 3.08 FIP. He ran into the Mariners on August 24, allowed nine runs, and was placed on the IL with an elbow strain the next day. His raw stuff just isn’t that impressive; his fastball barely averages 90 mph and a slow looping slider is hardly optimized for whiffs. Still, some deception in his throwing motion allows his stuff to play up a bit.
After a rough start to the year, Lopez has been a much more solid starter in the second half:
ERA (first half | second half): 6.83 | 2.75
wOBA: .380 | .286
Opponents’ Slash Line: .293/.381/.495 | .209/.288/.350
Hopefully Lopez can find one last first-half outing in him.
The Big Picture:
If you’re still paying attention to the standings, the Mariners gained a game in the Wild Card standings with their series win this week. They’re now closer to that final Wild Card spot than they are to the top of the AL West.
The Astros play in Tampa Bay and the Rangers play in Arizona this weekend. The Twins and Guardians meet up this weekend and we’re rooting for Minnesota even though they’re technically ahead of Seattle in the standings. Anything to bring that third Wild Card spot down below .500. The Orioles and Blue Jays also matchup this weekend and we’re just rooting for chaos in that series (but probably a Baltimore series win).
