Few Watch As M’S Fall

Pitching is all about deceiving hitters and for one inning Tuesday night, deception was not part of Tim Belcher’s arsenal.

A six-hit, four-run second inning staggered Seattle and the Mariners couldn’t recover, falling to Oakland 6-4 in the Kingdome.

The game was witnessed by only 9,767 fans, the smallest crowd in Seattle since May 7, 1991 - exactly 300 games ago. The last crowd of less than 10,000 came in the final week of the 1992 season.

Down two runs, Seattle put runners on in the eighth and ninth, but each time came up empty as Dennis Eckersley entered for his 16th save. The early outburst proved to be to much to overcome.

“He (Belcher) struggled in that second inning,” Mariners manager Lou Piniella said. “Hopefully, he’ll find his groove again quick.”

The one Mariner in a groove, Edgar Martinez, increased his American League RBI lead with a sacrifice fly in the first. After Rich Amaral doubled to start the inning and was sacrificed to third by Joey Cora, Martinez’s drive was caught by Rickey Henderson and Seattle had its only lead.

Athletics starter Mike Harkey wasn’t fooling the Seattle hitters, but neither was Belcher.

Back-to-back doubles by Ruben Sierra, who went against a defensive shift the opposite way, and Brent Gates tied the game at 1.

Craig Paquette launched Belcher’s next offering into the right field bleachers, making it 3-1. A fourth consecutive hit came on Mike Bordick’s single. With that, Bob Wells was up in the bullpen and the game was only 25 minutes old.

“They mixed in some well-hit balls,” Belcher said. “I made several bad pitches. No question about that. Too many pitches into their strengths, obviously.”

The bottom five of the order continued to hit Belcher’s pitches like they were coming out of a pitching machine. Eric Helfand’s single with Bordick on the move went through the right side and put runners at the corners.

Stan Javier lined a ball to Amaral at the left field warning track scoring Bordick to make it 4-1. Geronimo Berroa followed with a single, before Mark McGwire popped out, ending the hit-a-thon.

For Oakland, though, it wasn’t even the most hits in an inning this year. The A’s had seven in a 14-7 win at Baltimore on June 4.

Belcher (3-3) won his first three starts with Seattle, but in the second he looked more like the thrower who lost 15 games for the Tigers last year.

“When I had a lot of success early on, I didn’t give up a crooked number. They were all singles. When you go out and give them three or four, it’s hard to recover from that.”

Notes

Ken Griffey Jr. took ground balls in the outfield and at shortstop during batting practice. He looked great, flashing a smile with his cap on backward. Only difference was the elbow-high brace on his left arm. Griffey does have mobility and is progressing on schedule.