Well, that took a long time.
The Seattle Mariners lost 10-7 against the Texas Rangers on Tuesday in a game that lasted 3:44 and featured enough pitching changes, base runners and stoppages to fill two games.
But the result was what it has too often been for the Mariners lately: another loss. Since moving to 10 games over .500 with a win against the New York Yankees on August 22, the Mariners have lost 11 of 14 games.
They fell to six games back of the second wild-card spot, the same number of games they trailed at this time last year.
The Mariners also had unfortunate injury news: second baseman Robinson Cano left the game with an injury in the seventh inning. Cano singled and then had a trainer and manager Scott Servais visit him at first.
Cano left the game moments later. The Mariners started James Paxton, who is still looking get back to the groove he had before an injury sidelined him for more than two weeks in August.
He didn’t find that groove against the Rangers.
One way to sum up Paxton’s night: Weird.
He struck out four batters in the first inning, becoming just the 80th pitcher to record four strikeouts in one inning. But he also gave up a run that inning on a weak single off the end of Adrian Beltre’s bat. He had eight strikeouts through three innings but also had already thrown 85 pitches.
He was, all at once, highly effective (eight strikeouts) and also not very effective (six runs, four earned, in 41/3 innings).
Paxton has struggled in his three starts since returning from an injury in early August. He hasn’t lasted longer than five innings in any of the starts.
He’s allowed at least three runs in all three of those starts. And while he has still been able to strike out batters, he just hasn’t been as effective. Paxton had been on a roll before missing more than two weeks in the middle of August. He looked like the pitcher the Mariners had hoped for – and, quite frankly, needed.
On Tuesday, Paxton gave up a two-run home run to Rangers catcher Jonathan Lucroy on his 103rd and final pitch of the night. He left with the Mariners trailing 6-4. The Rangers tacked on another run later in the fifth inning to give them a 7-4 lead.
That’s how the score stood until the seventh inning.
Mariners reliever Arquimedes Caminero allowed a solo home run to Elvis Andrus to start the seventh inning and then walked the bases loaded with one out.
David Rollins kept the game from totally unravelling by getting two fly outs to keep the score at 8-4. The Mariners best chance at a come back was later that inning. They loaded the bases with no outs after a single from Cano, a double from Nelson Cruz and a walk from Kyle Seager. Dae-Ho Lee walked with the bases loaded to score one run. And Leonys Martin drove in one more with a sacrifice fly. But Mike Zunino struck out and Shawn O’Malley popped out, stranding two runners. The Mariners still trailed 8-6. They tacked on another run in the eighth inning thanks to a solo home run from Seth Smith but also allowed another run with reliever Steve Cishek on the mound. It took a long time, but the result never really changed.

RESULTS
Washington    9 Atlanta               7
St. Louis           9 Pittsburgh         7
NY Yankees    7 Toronto              6
Baltimore       11 Tampa Bay        2
Houston          4 Cleveland          3
NY Mets           5 Cincinnati          3
Philadelphia  4 Miamai                3
Milwaukee    12 Chicago Cubs   5
Chicago White Sox 2 Detroit     0
Kansas City 10 Minnesota           3