MLB Game Preview - San Diego at Seattle

Wed Aug 7, 2019 6:40 PM EDT

The adage about not knowing the players without a scorecard? It certainly pertains to the Seattle Mariners.

The Mariners had only two players in the lineup for Tuesday's 9-4 loss to the San Diego Padres that started on Opening Day -- Domingo Santana and Omar Narvaez.

Ichiro Suzuki retired; Jay Bruce and Edwin Encarnacion were traded; Dee Gordon and Mitch Haniger are on the injured list; and Ryon Healy underwent season-ending hip surgery.

And Tuesday, the same day Healy had surgery, Major League Baseball announced Mariners utilityman Tim Beckham was suspended 80 games for testing positive for Stanozolol, a performance-enhancing substance.

"It's disappointing when stuff like that happens," Mariners manager Scott Servais said of Beckham's suspension. "But we go on. The game does not stop. It doesn't stop for anybody. It creates some opportunities for some guys to get some at-bats out there."

Beckham, who is hitting .237 with 15 home runs and 47 RBIs in 88 games, denied knowingly taking the substance through a statement from the MLB Players Association.

"I was given a product from a trusted source, who had advised me that it was safe to take," Beckham said in the statement. "Regrettably, the product was tainted. I exercised my rights under the Joint Drug Agreement, and presented my case to an independent arbitrator. While I am disappointed in the result, I respect the ruling ..."

The Padres defeated the Mariners for the seventh straight time in interleague play as right-hander Dinelson Lamet pitched seven scoreless innings with 12 strikeouts, tying his career-high. It was Lamet's first victory since 2017 after missing all of last season and the first three months of this campaign following Tommy John surgery.

Lamet opened with 6 1/3 hitless innings before Narvaez singled.

"(Lamet) found his groove. It was good to see," Padres manager Andy Green said. "It was vintage Lamet. The slider was real, he got some more swing-and-miss with the fastball than he has been getting too. Really encouraged by the outing, the way he pulled it all together after the third inning. I thought he was really crisp after that."

Fernando Tatis Jr. extended his hitting streak to 10 games with a two-run homer into the second deck in left field. That gave him 20 home runs this season, just the 10th rookie shortstop to accomplish the feat in MLB history. Tatis also took two bases on a wild pitch in the ninth inning and ended up scoring an insurance run.

"I told him he should have scored on the wild pitch," Green said. "I think we've been spoiled by him. He's capable of a lot of things. That home run swing was really good. There's just a few guys in the game that look like they're going to bunt on a pitch and the very next pitch hit it out of the ballpark. He's just capable of some special things on the field ..."

A pair of left-handers will start the series finale Wednesday afternoon, with the Padres' Joey Lucchesi (7-6, 4.23 ERA) scheduled to face the Mariners rookie Yusei Kikuchi (4-8, 5.49), who will be facing San Diego for the first time. Lucchesi is 2-0 with a 3.09 ERA in two career starts against Seattle.

Lucchesi, 26, is winless in his last four starts, going 0-2 with a 5.57 ERA in that span.

The 28-year-old rookie Kikuchi has struggled since getting off to a solid start through mid-May. In his first 11 starts, the native of Morioka, Japan, was 3-1 with a 3.43 ERA. In 12 starts since, he is just 1-7 with a 7.65 ERA -- giving up six runs or more on five different occasions.

--Field Level Media