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Batista solid as Mariners beat error-filled Rangers

Apr 15, 2007 - 12:47 AM SEATTLE (Ticker) -- Miguel Batista showed his Seattle Mariners teammates he is a better pitcher than his last effort.

Batista pitched 6 2/3 solid innings and Adrian Beltre hit a two-run homer as the Mariners posted an 8-3 victory over the Texas Rangers.

Beltre had two hits and drove in three and Jose Guillen added a two-run homer for Seattle, which scored three of its four runs in the third inning on two errors by Texas.

Batista (1-1), who allowed eight runs and 10 hits in his first start on April 4 against Oakland, surrendered only three runs, five hits and a walk while striking out five.

"Thank God I didn't get nailed today," said Batista, who had not pitched since April 4 because of a series of postponements on the club's recent road trip. "You don't know how hard this team is pushing together to try to get things going and the inactivity didn't help us at all."

Mariners manager Mike Hargrove felt Batista was a lot more relaxed in his second outing than in his first.

"Batista was much better today than in his last outing," Hargrove said. "He got the ball down and threw strikes and I think it had a lot to do with the fact that last time he was really excited and this time he was more in control of that."

In the third inning, after a fielding error by third baseman Hank Blalock allowed the Mariners to take a 1-0 lead, second baseman Ian Kinsler made another fielding error that allowed two more runners to cross the plate, upping Seattle's lead to 3-0.

"We might have gotten out of the inning with just one run, but that's baseball," Texas manager Ron Washington said. "Kinsler will make that play. Blalock will make that play. We just didn't make them, and it ended up being a four-run inning. It made (starter Vicente) Padilla work harder than he should have."

Raul Ibanez had a sacrifice fly later in the frame to increase the lead to four.

Beltre homered with a runner on in the fourth off Padilla, and Guillen hit one out in the seventh off reliever C.J. Wilson for the Mariners (4-3), who find themselves in first place in the American League West after five of their contests were canceled due to inclement weather.

Seattle was batting just .211 as a team before the game, last in the major leagues.

"We've swung the bats pretty well in our first six games but we don't have a lot of hits to show for it," Hargrove said. "Offensively, I think we are going to be OK. Today we got a big push from Guillen with his two-run home run to put us back up by five."

Padilla allowed six runs - four earned - six hits and three walks while striking out one to fall to 0-3.

"It's tough," Kinsler said. "We can't come up with a play for Padilla. But, he battled and stayed in there and got us out of the inning with minimal damage, so that was a good sign."

Brad Wilkerson hit a solo homer and Sammy Sosa hit a two-run shot for his second homer this season and 590th of his career for Texas.

"The more I play the more I find out the little adjustments I have to make," said Sosa, who is hitting just .167. "I wish I was hitting better than I am right now but what it is is what it is. I've just got to keep grinding."