The Seattle Times

Sept. 11—OAKLAND, Calif. — After suffering through a stretch of some strong left-handed starting pitching, the Mariners are enjoying this mini-run vs. right-handed starters right now.

Seattle pounded right-hander Kendall Graveman — Oakland’s best starting pitcher — and scored eight runs on 12 hits in the first five innings and rolling to an easy 14-3 victory on a brilliant Saturday.

The Mariners improved to 74-68, but didn’t gain any ground in the American League wild-card standings with Detroit and Baltimore playing against each other. Seattle remained 3 1/2 games back. They’ve won four games in a row and five of their last six.

“Everybody is aware of what’s going on,” Nelson Cruz said. “We are very focused on just one game at a time.”

But the chance to gain more ground seems possible with Seattle scheduled to face right-handers the next three days. The Mariners are 51-37 in games where the opposing starter is right-handed.

“It was an outstanding offensive day against a guy who’s been throwing the ball well,” manager Scott Servais said.

Indeed, Graveman came into the game having allowed just four earned runs in his last 29 innings pitched.

“We’d seen him a couple of times earlier this year, and right now with our guys, their timing is good, their rhythm is good in the batter’s box,” Servais said. “We had good at-bats. It was up and down the lineup. It wasn’t just one or two guys carrying us. And that’s great to see.”

The Mariners had 17 hits in the game with every player that stepped to the plate reaching base at least once and all but one registering a hit.

Seattle started the run-fest on Graveman in the first inning, scoring a pair of runs, highlighted by Nelson Cruz’s RBI double.

The Mariners broke it open in the third thanks to Cruz. With the bases loaded and no outs — a situation that hadn’t been kind to them or him — he yanked a double into the corner to score two runs. Seattle tacked on two more runs. The third run of the inning came on an infield RBI single from Jesus Sucre, something that may might not happen again any time soon.

“Speed kills,” said Felix Hernandez, jokingly.

Ben Gamel, making the start in center field, beat out a potential double-play ball to force another run across to make it 6-0.

Unlike past games where they would take an early lead and never add on, the Mariners continued to add to the lead.

Two more runs came in the sixth inning, knocking Graveman out of the game. After back-to-back singles from Gamel and Marte to start the inning, the rejuvenated Nori Aoki doubled to left field to score both runners and make it 8-0. It was Aoki’s second double of his three-hit day that also featured a walk.

The game went from rout to absurdity when the Mariners scored six runs in the seventh inning off the A’s bullpen. Kyle Seager started off the inning by blasting a solo homer to right field to make it 9-0. It was Seager’s 28th homer of the season.

Seattle added five more runs after, including Shawn O’Malley’s two-run single and Cruz’s sac fly giving him three RBI on the day.

Lost in the avalanche of runs was another win for Felix Hernandez. Despite some early command issues, Hernandez worked six scoreless innings, giving up six hits with a walk and two strikeouts to improve to 11-5.

“The first two innings I was a little wild and the ball was moving all over the place,” Hernandez said. “But after that, I just wanted to pound the strike zone. I was just trying to calm down and not be to quick to the plate.”

Once Seattle pushed the lead to 6-0, Hernandez knew what to do and attacked hitters, getting easy soft contact outs. He allowed just two baserunners over his final four innings of work.

“That’s why he’s won a lot of games in this league,” Servais said. “When you give him a lead, I think it was up to six runs, he’s not going to let those slip away. He knows how to get deep into games. That’s he’s why he’s Felix.”

The big lead allowed the Mariners to not even consider using closer Edwin Diaz, who had pitched each of the last three days.

The combo of Drew Storen, Tom Wilhelmsen and Vidal Nuno worked the final three innings. An unearned run against Storen broke up the shutout, and Wilhelmsen gave up a two-run homer to Ryon Healy in the eighth.

AL wild-card race

Top two wild-card teams make American League postseason.

Team W-L GB

Toronto 78-63 +1 1/2

Baltimore 76-64 —

Detroit 76-64 —

N.Y. Yankees 76-65 1/2

Houston 75-67 2

Seattle 74-68 3

Kansas City 72-68 4

Ryan Divish: 206-464-2373 or rdivish@seattletimes.com. On Twitter @RyanDivish