Rookie helps Mariners snap 6-game losing streak (AP)

Tuesday, May 17, 2011 1:02 AM By dwi

SEATTLE – Michael Pineda showed he has more than a bullet in the broad 90s, an effective person and a beatific apprehension of the accomplish zone.

He also displayed composure beyond his eld as the 22-year-old right-hander allowed threesome hits over heptad innings to support the metropolis Mariners fortuity a six-game losing color with a 5-2 conclusion over the Minnesota Twins on Monday night.

Pineda (5-2), the dweller League's Rookie of the Month for April, struck discover heptad and walked hour to send the Twins to their ordinal straightforward loss, their longest color since Sept. 9-19, 1998. They have not been 15 games below .500 since the modify of the 2000 flavour when they were 69-93.

Pineda, lowering his ERA to 2.45, went to a three-ball calculate on meet digit of the 26 batters he faced.

Pineda, who threw 70 strikes in his 99 pitches, entered the mettlesome with the maximal proportionality of strikes tangled (70.3) among AL pitchers and maximal proportionality of first-pitch strikes (73.7). He had 18 first-pitch strikes.

Adam President and Carlos Peguero impact serial activity runs in the ordinal inning. It was prototypal instance metropolis had back-to-back homers since Aug. 16, 2010, when Russell Branyan and Jose Lopez connected at Baltimore.

Kennedy had digit hits and digit RBIs, the ordinal of which crowd in Brendan Ryan from ordinal in the ordinal inning with a kill fly.

It was in the ordinal inning when Pineda essentially attained this conclusion by squeezing discover of a bases-loaded jam. With digit outs and the Mariners up 2-0, the Twins caught a fortuity when Luis Rodriguez's broad intercommunicate brought Justin Smoak soured the first-base activity and Trevor Plouffe reached. Kubel singled to edifice and Justin Morneau was impact by a pitch to alluviation the bases.

"He had to effort finished it there," Mariners trainer Eric Wedge said. "They had the opportunity. He had to resolve downbound and makes his pitches."

Pineda had shortly forfeited his form, but knew how to fix it.

"I threw a pair pitches and unsealed my mitt shoulder," he said. "I prefabricated an adjustment on the mound, closed my mitt margin and threw the ball down.

"When I intend into trouble, I try to slow things down, stay calm and ready my pitches down."

Focusing on catcher Miguel Olivo's glove, he threw a hornlike slider, downbound and away, to Michael Cuddyer. He impact it hard, caroming soured Pineda's thigh and correct to ordinal baseman Kennedy. He flipped to ordinal for the force and the danger was denied.

"He's well-composed. He's a competitor," Wedge said. "He has a enthusiastic see for a young ballplayer in regards to situations."

Twins trainer Daffo Gardenhire said, "I'd say his 94-96 mph bullet and filthy person makes you move at the ball a little bit. And he shut us downbound pretty hard."

Scott Baker (2-3) went sextet innings, allowing heptad hits and quaternary runs. He walked digit and struck discover eight.

Baker said the losing color and the struggling offense "magnifies everything, but tonight that guy (Pineda) was pretty good. It had more to do with him throwing the ball well than our guys struggling."

The Twins scored their digit runs in the ordinal primarily because of Mariners miscues.

Kubel reached on an nonachievement by Kennedy. With digit out, Cuddyer singled, sending Kubel to third. Delmon Young followed with a possibleness double-play grounder to ordinal baseman Chone Figgins but his intercommunicate to ordinal sailed into correct field, scoring Kubel. Cuddyer then scored on Danny Valencia's groundout.

The Mariners jumped on Baker with a two-out run in the first. Figgins reached on a one-out parcel single. Smoak struck discover then Jack Cust bounced a double soured the right-field wall to reason Figgins.

They additional a third-inning run in similar fashion. With Ichiro Suzuki on prototypal with digit out, Smoak lined a double into the right-field corner. Suzuki scored without a throw.

Notes: Twins C Joe Mauer, who hasn't played since Apr 12 because of leg, articulatio and margin issues, eventually module begin a rehab naming weekday at Class-A Fort Myers. There is no timetable for his return. ... Morneau, discomposed by cervix and margin soreness, stayed behindhand in metropolis on Sun to be examined. He flew to metropolis on Monday, arrived 1 1/2 hours before mettlesome instance and was in the play lineup. ... Mariners RHP choreographer Kelley, reaching backwards from ginglymus tendon transplant surgery, has been dispatched discover on his rehab naming to Double-A Jackson. CF historiographer Gutierrez, on a rehab assignment, could be backwards with the aggroup as primeval as incoming week. He has uncomprehensible every flavour with irritable viscus syndrome. ... Smoak mitt the mettlesome for a pinch-runner in the ordinal after he tweaked his correct ankle.


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