This Close. Again. Still.

What this episode covers

The road trip is in the books and the Mariners are still exactly where they've been: right around .500, holding the second wild card spot in the AL, not further along than they should be. Four and three felt like progress on paper. It felt like a missed six and one in practice.Chicago started hot. Raley went nuclear in game one, a grand slam and a three-run homer, seven of the team's 12 RBIs, Naylor added a three-run shot, 12-8 win. Then Saturday: a veteran lefty with an ERA over five shows up and the offense dies. One run. A Refsnyder sac fly. Castillo pitched well enough to deserve better. Sunday they had their shot, bases loaded, one out, Cole pops up and Donovan dribbles one down the first baseline. One out of three in Chicago and it should have been two.Houston started clean. Kirby went five innings, nine strikeouts, one run, and became the 12th pitcher in franchise history to reach 50 wins. Game two was all Canzone, his first career grand slam off Imai, who couldn't find the zone. Randy went four for four with a two-run homer. Woo gave six innings and two runs. Then game three happened. Miller was dealing in his season debut, on pace for six scoreless, until an umpire took a foul ball to the face and got concussed badly enough to still be in the hospital when the team left town. The rhythm broke, the Astros scraped two runs, Julio walked one home to tie it, and then the Mariners lost on a Naylor infield dribbler that was half an inch from a walk-off win. Cal backed up a throw awkwardly, tweaked his oblique, and was on the IL the next morning. Game four, Raley hit a three-run homer in the first, Garver went deep, Donovan went double-triple-single in his first three at-bats, and Castillo went five and two-thirds on 108 pitches. Back-to-back solid outings from the guy who used to be the "oh no, he's pitching today" guy. Four and three. Could have been six and one.Cal is probably done until the All-Star break, but Garver is a proven big-league catcher and Cal hasn't been Cal this year anyway. The bigger question is Raley, the team's home run leader hitting .270, still getting platooned against lefties. It's a Jerry-era roster philosophy, but at some point you have to let the hot guy hit. The rotation logjam is a good problem. Miller looked sharp coming back, Hancock has been great, Kirby is Kirby, and Castillo is in a groove. They're talking stack starts to get everyone their innings. It probably lasts one outing before something else solves it.Around the league: the Cubs have spent 20 of 45 games inside two separate 10-game win streaks. The Braves hit 30 wins first. The White Sox are above .500 for the first time since 2022, two years after setting the all-time loss record. Tatis still hasn't gone yard despite hitting the ball harder than ever. Yandy Diaz rockets, no lift. The Padres are only three wins ahead of Seattle. Flip three of those one-run losses and nobody's treating them like a tier above.Prediction for the homestand: four and two. But Mason Miller is pitching Friday, so the first eight innings of that game are going to matter a lot.

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