Mariners Observations: What stood out from opening day win

SEATTLE – Baseball season is back, and the Seattle Mariners are back to their winning ways on opening day.

Recap: Polanco, Arozarena HRs lift Mariners over A’s 4-2 in opener

The Mariners knocked off the American League West-rival Athletics 4-2 Thursday night in front of a boisterous T-Mobile Park crowd. With the win, Seattle improved to 30-19 all-time on opening day, the best mark by an active AL team.

Here are four things that stood out from the victory.

Hip, hip Jorge!

Jorge Polanco’s first season with the Seattle Mariners was a disappointing one, but he was the hero of Game 1 of the 2025 season.

Polanco finished 3 for 3 on the night with a pair of singles and the go-ahead two-run home run that put the Mariners up for good in the bottom of the eighth inning. For reference, he didn’t have his first multi-hit game of 2024 until May 1.

Jorge Polanco gives the @Mariners the lead in the bottom of the 8th! #OpeningDay pic.twitter.com/jObUfN2B9P

— MLB (@MLB) March 28, 2025

When the Mariners traded for Polanco before the 2024 season, the hope was that he would come in and be a difference-making bat in the middle the lineup. He certainly wasn’t that, but a good start to 2025 might be just what he needs to regain the form he showed in Minnesota, where he had a .780 OPS over 10 seasons.

Considering the questions facing the M’s infield coming into this season, a rebound from Polanco is one of the things the team needs most to get back to the playoffs.

Small ball doesn’t work out

It’s known that under manager Dan Wilson, we’re going to see some more of an old-school baseball approach from the Mariners and less of the analytics-driven decisions the team has typically leaned on in recent years. But that can come at a cost at times, and it appeared to Thursday night.

One of the Mariners’ best opportunities to get on the board came in in the sixth inning when Randy Arozarena walked and Luke Raley singled to put runners on first and second with one out for Polanco, who had two of Seattle’s three hits at that point.

Polanco laid down a sac bunt – his first since the 2020 season – to move runners to second and third with two outs. But Rowdy Tellez ended up striking out looking on a filthy sweeper on the outside corner from A’s starter Luis Severino for the final out.

6️⃣ shutout from Sevy

6 IP
3 H
0 ER
4 BB
6 K pic.twitter.com/GUZnwR8OVO

— Athletics (@Athletics) March 28, 2025

The Mariners trailed 1-0 at the time, so the bunt put the go-ahead run in scoring position and gave Seattle a chance to tie on a wild pitch. But it also took the bat out of the hand of a player who had two hard-hit singles off the pitcher in two at-bats.

Julio shows patience

Chasing pitches outside of the zone has been a problem for Julio Rodríguez throughout his first three big league seasons. The fourth-year slugger has ranked in the bottom 19th percentile in chase rate in each of his three previous big league seasons, including posting a 37.3% chase rate that ranked in the 6th percentile last season.

It’s an incredibly small sample size, but Seattle’s star center fielder showed some patience at the plate Thursday that could be a positive sign for his 2025 campaign.

Related: Here’s the Mariners’ 26-man roster to open the season

Rodríguez worked full counts in each of his first two at-bats, laying off some close pitches and breaking balls moving away from him off the plate. He ended up working a walk in his second plate appearance, which included taking a couple of high fastballs just off the plate and outside sweepers that have given him trouble in the past. He also didn’t swing at either of the two pitches off the plate in his third at-bat, although there was one bad swing on a sinker that ran well inside in his fourth plate appearance.

The 24-year-old Rodríguez clearly has all the tools to make a push to be the best player in all of baseball, but his ceiling has been hurt by his lack of plate discipline. If Thursday’s at-bats are a sign of things to come, this could be the year he finally puts it all together at the plate. And remember, we’re talking about a guy who still has a career OPS above .800 and is averaging 26.7 home runs per season.

Gilbert dazzles

Ace Logan Gilbert picked up where he left off in 2024 and delivered a dominant outing in his first-ever opening day start. However, his efforts weren’t rewarded and he walked away with a no-decision.

Gilbert retired 13 of the first 14 batters he faced before leaving a first-pitch slider over the middle of the plate to A’s first baseman Tyler Soderstrom, who promptly deposited the hanging pitch over the center field fence for a solo shot in the fifth inning. But that was Gilbert’s lone blemish on the day.

The right-hander was efficient with just 83 pitches thrown to get through seven innings of two-hit ball with eight strikeouts. He got 16 whiffs along the way, including nine on the 14 splitters the A’s swung at.

Gilbert also appears to be ahead of where he was at this point last year with his velocity. He averaged 95.6 mph on his four-seamer, up 0.8 mph from his first start last year.

Seattle Mariners news and analysis

• Seattle Mariners’ Dan Wilson breaks down his opening day lineup
• Watch: M’s legend Ichiro fires 84 mph first pitch to Dan Wilson
• Gilbert and Raleigh: From 2018 M’s draft picks to opening day battery
• Salk: The big Seattle Mariners questions on opening day
• Why Randy Arozarena is ‘enormous’ X-factor for Seattle Mariners

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