Ichiro goes hitless in quest for ninth straight 200-hit season

ANAHEIM, Calif. — There were positive things said after this game about the Mariners staying competitive and getting a good outing from their starter in a series they treated with utmost importance.

This made the end result, a 3-0 loss to the Los Angeles Angels and series sweep Thursday night, all the more distressing. The Mariners did get seven strong innings out of Ryan Rowland-Smith and did play the Angels fairly tough in all three games.

But in the end, it wasn't nearly enough for a team now facing the very real possibility of a sub-.500 season.

"When you don't have your biggest bat in that lineup, you need other guys to pick up the slack," Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu said.

And that's just not happening for a team now just three games over .500 and heading into Texas to face a Rangers squad fighting to make the playoffs. Seattle's bullpen is wearing down after a stellar season and the offense, anemic all year, is particularly challenged in the absence of "big bat" Russell Branyan.

And so, running up against Angels staff ace John Lackey in front of 37,412 mostly hostile fans probably wasn't a recipe for success. Lackey has now recorded his last three shutouts against the Mariners and allowed just five hits in tossing his second complete game in a row.

Rowland-Smith made his only real mistake in the fourth inning, when Torii Hunter snapped a scoreless tie by driving a fastball deep over the center-field wall for a two-run homer. Erick Aybar later doubled home an insurance marker in the seventh and that was it on the scoreboard.

"The last couple of games, the biggest thing for me is getting deep into games," Rowland-Smith said. "When you go deep like that, you know you're going to be in on the decision."

And that he's done, throwing over 100 pitches for a third straight outing and going at least seven innings for the fourth time in six tries. He's given his team a chance to win most nights, but the ballclub has not reciprocated.

Rowland-Smith has just one win the last month, failing to claim victory in four "quality starts" of at least six innings pitched, three earned runs or fewer allowed during that stretch. That's largely because of nights and entire series like this one, in which the Mariners, losers of five in a row, went 0 for 18 with runners in scoring position.

Ichiro went hitless for the second time in three nights here, striking out twice and finished 1 for 13 in the series. In the past, Ichiro has admitted to putting enormous pressure on himself to try to continue his streak of eight consecutive 200-hit seasons.

Now as he tries for a record ninth — he's four hits shy — it could be that he is feeling even greater heat than before, with swarms of Japanese media members covering his every move on this road trip.

But it wasn't all Ichiro.

"I saw some guys take some over-aggressive hacks, but there's no excuse for it," Wakamatsu said.

This game ended in just 2 hours, 2 minutes.

The Mariners scored only two runs total before the ninth innings of the three games combined. They have scored just seven runs the past four games dating to a loss in the series finale at Oakland.

Seattle got a two-out double from Bill Hall in the second inning, another from Ken Griffey Jr. in the fourth and yet another from Kenji Johjima in the sixth. But Lackey nailed the third out without fail on each of those occasions.

And on the rare occasions the Mariners did get the leadoff hitter on, double-play grounders by Mike Carp and Jose Lopez helped Lackey out of trouble.

"That just kind of squashed any momentum we had," Wakamatsu said.

And now they head to Texas, facing the prospect of a return to Seattle as a mere .500 team after being on the winning side of the ledger most of the season. That is, unless this offense can find a way to score in Branyan's absence.

"For us to compete as we go forward here," Wakamatsu said, "we're going to have to do something to manufacture runs."

The Mariners have been talking that talk much of the season. And now, unless they can walk the walk, they face the prospect of that same season ending a lot more quietly than it began.

Geoff Baker: 206-464-8286 or gbaker@seattletimes.com