On a chilly night when the Brewers played like the better team, they also watched their starter, Corbin Burnes, one of the best pitchers in the National League, leave the game with an injury.
After sweeping the Rockies in routine fashion over the weekend, the Mariners saw their four-game winning streak come to an end, getting suboptimal outings from starter Chris Flexen and reliever Penn Murfee, minimal offense and a few costly mistakes in a 7-3 loss that felt like several of their defeats this season.
Seattle is now 0-7 this season in games that opponents score four runs or more.
Given an early three-run lead, Burnes cruised through the first five innings, allowing one run — a Cal Raleigh solo homer — on two hits. But after issuing a leadoff walk to J.P. Crawford to start the sixth and then getting Julio Rodriguez to fly out to deep center, Burnes summoned trainers and grabbed at the left side of his chest. He exited the game immediately.
Flexen gave the Mariners another uneven outing, pitching six innings and allowing four runs on six hits with a walk and five strikeouts. His results seem to vary from inning to inning.
He needed just five pitches to work a 1-2-3 first inning on three ground outs. But then it took 24 pitches to finish a second inning in which seven batters came to the plate and the Brewers scored three runs. Rowdy Tellez and Brian Anderson each singled to start the inning and Luke Voit drove in a run with a double to left. With one out, Owen Mitchell singled up the middle to score Anderson. A fielder’s choice on a ground ball allowed Voit to score to make it 3-0.
The Mariners answered in the bottom half of the inning. Raleigh pulled a 1-1 change-up into the seats in right-center for his second homer of the season. The solo homer cut the lead to 3-1.
Flexen found a rhythm after the second-inning struggles, setting the side down in order in the third, fourth and fifth inning. That scoreless streak came to an end in the sixth. Willy Adames led off with a single and William Contreras worked a walk. Flexen came back to strike out Tellez but allowed a run-scoring single to Anderson that made it 4-1.
Seattle turned to heavily-used middle reliever Penn Murfee to pitch the sixth inning. He immediately served up a solo homer to pinch-hitter Brice Turang, whose father, Brian, was a catcher for the Mariners in 1993-94, and then issued a one-out walk to Christian Yelich, who stole second, advanced to third on a throwing error and scored on William Contreras’ single.
Rodriguez’s third homer of the season — a solo blast to deep right-center in the eighth inning — proved inconsequential to the outcome.
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