• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers

Mariners club three homers to beat Orioles

Aug 9, 2007 - 3:03 AM BALTIMORE (Ticker) -- Jose Vidro helped the Seattle Mariners continue their second-half surge.

Vidro had three hits, including a two-run homer just seven pitches into the game, and drove in four runs to lead the Mariners to an 8-4 victory over the Baltimore Orioles.

Jose Guillen and Raul Ibanez also homered and Ichiro Suzuki had three hits and scored twice for Seattle (62-49), which has won eight of 11 and pulled even with the Detroit Tigers for the lead for the wild card.

Along with his fourth home run of the season, Vidro added a pair of singles and two sacrifice flies, extending his hitting streak to 10 games.

"I'm seeing the ball good. We've got two or three guys getting hot at the same time," Vidro said

With the score tied, 3-3, in the top of the fourth, Vidro gave the Mariners the lead for good with a sacrifice fly to right-center. One pitch later, Guillen gave starter Felix Hernandez some breathing room, blasting a two-run shot to left field to extend the lead to 6-3.

Hernandez (8-6) struggled early but managed to go 6 2/3 innings, giving up four runs on 10 hits. He struck out only two, marking just the third time this season that the 21-year-old failed to strike out at least five.

Hernandez threw 91 pitches on a night when the temperature at gametime was 101 degrees. "Felix pitched a good game. It was sticky out there, and he had to work hard, but he was under his pitch count," Seattle manager John McLaren said.

Baltimore loaded the bases with two outs in the bottom of the eighth inning, but J.J. Putz got Ramon Hernandez to ground out to shortstop to end the threat. The closer finished off the ninth, retiring the side in order for his American League-leading 33rd save.

Nick Markakis had two hits and two RBI for the Orioles, who have lost six of eight meetings with the Mariners this year.

Baltimore starter Jeremy Guthrie (7-4) lasted just four innings, giving up six runs on eight hits. The rookie righthander came into the game tied for third in the AL ERA (2.98).

"His pitches were up in the zone," Orioles manager Dave Trembley said. "He made a lot of mistakes with first pitches - and they hit them."

Guthrie had defeated Hernandez a few weeks ago, when the two matched up at Seattle in an Orioles 8-3 victory on July 17.

"It wasn't my day. I didn't have stuff," Guthrie said. "I just didn't execute."

Trailing, 3-1, in the bottom of the third, the Orioles mounted a two-out rally when Markakis singled and scored on Kevin Millar's RBI double.

Miguel Tejada followed with a single up the middle to tie the game. The hit for Tejada was the 1,000th RBI of his career.