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Felix Hernandez got lit up bad in Cleveland the last time out with Jesus Montero behind the plate. Tonight, he’ll have a new battery-mate as John Jaso gets to catch him in a regular season game for the first time.

Catching Hernandez and all of those heavily-moving pitches is never an easy task. We saw Montero have some problems in the Cleveland game, giving up a passed ball that led to an Indians run.

Hernandez had problems of his own that had nothing to do with Montero. He could not use his two-seam fastball to any degree of effectiveness. And when a sinker doesn’t sink, that’s bad news for a pitcher — especially Hernandez, who has come to rely on the pitch as his bread-and-butter.

Mariners manager Eric Wedge said the Cleveland game was just a bad day for Hernandez and he’s ready to leave it at that. Wedge expects a much better outing tonight as Hernandez gets prepared to take on Yu Darvish and the Texas Rangers.

“I think he’s a guy who’s at his best when it’s tougher, when it’s tighter,” Wedge said. “He’s one of the best. And when he’s facing good clubs, or in tight situations or when his team needs it most, that’s when he’s at his best.”

Many of you have noted — as has the media — that Hernandez’s four-seam fastball seems to be down a couple of miles per hour from where it generally was the past couple of seasons. It is also down from the 96 mph he used to crank it up to five years ago.

Now, it’s one thing not to have velocity on your four-seamer when your sinker is moving the way it’s supposed to. But when you don’t have an effective sinker and you have to rely on the four-seam fastball more, the hitters know this, too. And it’s a little easier to fool hitters sometimes when you can just overwhelm them with 96 mph stuff rather than doing the same with a 92 mph pitch they can catch up to.

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Last week at Fenway Park, I was asked if I’d participate in a podcast for the FanGraphs website and after agreeing to, was asked on-air by writer David Laurila about why the Mariners don’t draw many walks. I had no idea what questions were going to be asked, so my quick response was to mention that the team as a whole had to stop chasing pitches out of the strike zone and also learn to better punish pitchers once they came inside the zone.

I was going off memories of watching Chone Figgins, Brendan Ryan, Miguel Olivo and others take some wild swings earlier on. Also, the inability of the Mariners to punish pitchers is a topic we’ve discussed for two years on this blog. In my conversations with personnel from other teams, the one thing they’ve mentioned is that there was no one player any pitcher really feared in the Mariners lineup. Nobody who could consistently change the outcome of a game with one swing. Therefore, opposing pitchers have been taking liberties with the Mariners, coming at them aggressively with little fear of any reprecussions since the start of 2010.

That was my take on it, anyway, but I figured I’d look into it further.

After all, manager Eric Wedge has been working for over a year now to change the approach of M’s hitters so that they attack first and do damage with hittable pitches. But Wedge has also preached to them that they should lay off the unhittable stuff and take walks if they absolutely don’t get anything hittable.

The day after I did the FanGraphs podcast, I happened across this post written that day on the excellent Seattle Sports Insider website. Naturally, having just talked about the subject on the podcast, I was interested to see the author suggest that opposing pitchers had thrown more pitches inside the strike zone to the Mariners (as of a week ago) than to any other team.

Not only that, but he also notes that an abnormally high number of strikes are coming on 1-0, 2-0 and 2-1 “hitter’s counts” which seems to suggest that — rather than risk a walk — the pitchers are simply shrugging, throwing the ball right down the middle without fear and all but daring the Mariners to swing and do something to the pitch.

Sure enough, in the game that day, a struggling Josh Beckett went out and threw 60 strikes among his 93 pitches, practically daring the Mariners to do something.

The Mariners did nothing and were shut out for seven innings by Beckett and 5-0 overall.

After the game, ESPNBoston columnist Gordon Edes and I walked out of Fenway Park together. Edes had rushed over to remind me of an interesting tidbit. That Beckett had allowed a league-high 19 extra-base hits in his first six outings of the season, but yielded only four singles to the Mariners.

I mean, a guy with a near 6.00 ERA, who was getting crushed for home runs and doubles all season to that point had just thrown two thirds of his pitches inside the strike zone and the M’s did nothing with them.

Now, here’s the good news.

Photo Credit: AP

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Brandon League didn’t make it easy in the ninth, giving up a homer and three straight singles with one out. The Rockies scored two, but League got Tulo on a force out and then struck out Helton on a 3-2 pitch with runners on first and third.

ROCKIES EIGHTH: First 1-2-3 inning of the game for Mariners, with Furbush getting the first out, Wilhelmsen the next two. Mariner relievers have worked three scoreless innings. 6-2 Mariners.

MARINERS EIGHTH: They go down in order, but still hold a 6-2 lead. Six outs from a three-game sweep.

ROCKIES SEVENTH: Mariners get another good relief effort, this time from Charlie Furbush. He replaced Kelley after a one-out single, and struck out Carlos Gonzalez on three pitches before getting Tulowitzki to ground out. 6-2 Mariners.

ROCKIES SIXTH: Great relief work from Shawn Kelley, who takes over for Beavan after a leadoff double by Cuddyer. He gets Rosario on a liner to second, then strikes out Pacheco and pinch-hitter Colvin. Not sure why Beavan was taken out, though. He had just 82 pitches and had batted the previous inning. 6-2 Mariners.

MARINERS SIXTH: Yes, the ball is flying today — Carp rips the Mariners third homer of the game, a second-decker to right. It’s 6-2 Seattle.

ROCKIES FOURTH: Beavan nearly escaped after a one-out double by Michael Cuddyer, but with two outs Pacheco ripped a single off the left-field wall to bring him home. 5-2 Mariners.

MARINERS FOURTH: Mariners get Ryan to second with one out, but Ackley and Saunders strike out. Still 5-1 Mariners.

ROCKIES THIRD: Car-Go just misses his second homer of the game, settling for a two-out double off the scoreboard in right. But Beavan strikes out dangerous Troy Tulowitzki on a full-count pitch. 5-1 Mariners.

MARINERS THIRD: Big inning, as Jesus Montero and Justin Smoak became the first Mariner hitters to hit back-to-back homers — Montero’s with Ichiro aboard. It’s 5-1 Mariners.

ROCKIES SECOND: The Rockies get a runner to third with two outs, but Beavan gets his opposite number, Jeremy Guthrie, to ground out. 2-1 Mariners.

ROCKIES FIRST: The Rockies get one back on Carlos Gonzalez’s homer to dead center, into the pine trees. 2-1 Mariners.

MARINER FIRST: Once again, the Mariners jumped ahead with two runs in the first. Ackley got it started with a double off the base of the wall in center and moved to third on Michael Saunders’ long fly (Saunders has a lot of 400-foot outs in this series). Ichiro couldn’t get the job done, striking out, but Seager walked. WIth Montero up, he took off for second. On the throw, Ackley broke for home, and Scutaro threw wildly to the plate for an error. Credit both runners with a steal, with Seager advancing to third on the throwing error. Justin Smoak singled him home. 2-0 Mariners.

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