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Perhaps manager Don Wakamatsu summed tonight's loss perfectly when he said: “Not exactly the game we were looking for to come out and start the second half."

No, skip it was not. It was ugly four errors, two wild pitches, seven runners left on base but it all started with Garrett Olson's outing of 2 2/3 innings.

"I think we've talked all year long the importance of the starting pitcher establishing a tempo," Wakamatsu said. "I think it was two-fold. No. 1, I didn't think Olson came out and had much of a feel. I thought he pitched a little defensively and his tempo was poor."

Poor? Olson grinded that game into a mind-numbing halt, agonizing between pitches and basically pitching like Miguel Batista with Rickey Henderson on first base.

“It just was one of those unfortunate days when I could not find a rhythm, even in the first inning,” Olson said. “I just really had a hard time finding the zone consistently.”

And the lack of rhythm led to the extended moments between pitches, between hitters, between breaths.

“I feel like I forced myself to kind of slow down,” Olson said. “I think when you do that, you can continue take yourself out of a rhythm instead of just attacking hitters. Looking back, I should have just grabbed the ball, get the sign and attack the hitters.”

Wakamatsu said Olson was being defensive and trying to be too perfect.

"That's where we talk about sometimes guys want to be too perfect," Wakamatsu said. "We talked about it after the first inning. I said you don't have to be too perfect out there. It's not for lack of care or anything else. It's probably caring too much. I think he put a lot of emphasis on him being outstanding today, instead of going out and doing like he does out of the bullpen. At least he's done such a tremendous job. I saw a little different body language and maybe trying to carry a club out there the first two innings."

Olson admitted that he wanted to help the team get off on a good start in the second half, but didn't think he was putting too much pressure on himself. He did think he might have been trying to be too fine.

"It seems to be like I was trying to make good pitches out there instead of letting it just go through the zone like I have been doing most of the season," Olson said. "I guess its another way of putting it, definitely."

So what happens next for him? Well that's a good question. Can the Mariners afford to start him again in their four man rotation and have an outing like that. They are going to be five games back on Friday with the Angels winning.

It should be noted that the Rainiers rotation slotted out with Steven Shell pitching tonight, Ryan Rowland-Smith starting on Friday, followed by Gaby Hernandez, Brandon Morrow and Jason Vargas. But watch to see if they shake-up the rotation, or limit Rowland-Smith so he could possibly make that start on Tuesday in Detroit, or even Vargas for that matter.

Let's get to Russell Branyan. I must offer a bit of an apology for saying that Branyan got into his home run trot on that first inning double. Apparently he tweaked his back when he was running to first and that's why he didn't get a triple.

Branyan says its nothing major, and it must not be because he played the rest of the game.

“I think it was just maybe the three days off and it just was tight getting back into the swing of things,” he said. “It was just when I started running. It was a little bit tight all day. It got a little bit better as the game went on and I think it will be a lot better tomorrow.”

If Branyan doesn't tweak his back, he swears he would have gotten a triple and the Mariners would have had another run on Jose Lopez's grounder to second.

Still the Mariners got a hit in every inning, but only the one hit. Ronny Cedeno got the only run with a solo homer.

Perhaps, but maybe a day off wouldn't hurt since the Indians will start another lefty and give Chris Shelton more than a token pinch hit appearance.

As for the error in the second inning, he lost the ball in the sun, which we all figured.

Branyan was honest about the team's efforts on Thursday.

“Coming back form three days off, teams respond differently,” Mariners first baseman Russell Branyan said. “We came out a little bit flat today.”

It is still way too early for the Mariners or the fans to begin panicking about such a uncharacteristic outing. It is after all the first game after the all-star break.
No one on the Mariners is fretting.

“I think we’ll get it out of our system this one game, and tomorrow we’ll come back and we’ll start to see a more polished ball club,” Branyan said. “I don’t think anyone here is really worried.”

Let's hope so.

Well, we're here in Cleveland where the temperature is in the 80s and pretty humid. But still a good night for baseball. A pretty decent sized crowd is filling considering the Indians are not a good team in the least.

The Mariners are four games back in the AL West and beating teams like the Indians are a must if they have any hope of contending for a division title. Of course, it won't be easy against the reigning Cy Young winner Cliff Lee. Last year he beat the Mariners twice, throwing a complete game win Safeco and beating the Mariners in April as well.

In two starts, he pitched a combined 15 innings, allowing 19 hits, 5 runs with seven K's and no walks (not a surprise from last year's team).

Also a few former Mariners on the Indians in Asdrubal Cabrera, Shin-Soo Choo and Luis Valbuena.

First inning
Russell Branyan did a nice job of turning that triple into a double. Branyan belted a Lee offering off the wall in left-center. Jackson grad Grady Sizemore tried to make a leaping catch but the ball bounced away. Branyan trotted in with a double, replays made it look as though Branyan thought it was gone off the bat and he got into his home run trot early. Either way, he's stranded there.

Well former Mariner Asdrubal Cabrera, who was traded for Eduardo Perez on June 30 of 2006, doubles home Sizemore. Inexplicably, Cabrera bails out Garrett Olson by trying to steal third and getting thrown out by Johjima. Really Asdrubal, one out, Victor Martinez (your clean-up hitter) at the plate and you try and steal third?

Olson gets out of the inning by taking an eternity between each pitch and basically boring the Indians hitters into making outs. He threw 25 pitches in the inning, not exactly an ideal start.

Second inning
How ugly was that inning. Olson has grinded the pace of the inning down to Batista-like levels. Honestly, there are people falling asleep in the stands in between every pitch. Olson gives up two more runs as as Ben Francisco reaches on an error when Branyan lost a throw from third in the sun. Jamey Carroll doubles him home and Sizemore scores Carroll with a single to right. Cleveland leads 3-0.

Third inning
At least we can close the book on Olson after he issues a two-out walk to Travis Hafner. Jakubauskas is in.

Olson pitches 2 2/3 allowing three runs (two earned) on five hits, while walking three and throwing 69 pitches. Jakubauskas immediately gives up a hit and then tosses a wild pitch, but does get them out of the inning with minimal damage.

Ronny Cedeno hits a ball hard to the wall that is robbed by Grady Sizemore with a nice leaping catch. Tough break for a guy that can't buy a hit, not even with a major league salary.

Fourth Inning
A 1-2-3 inning for a Mariners pitcher, it's a refreshing change.

Franklin Gutierrez gets a one out double but is stranded. Shocking.

Fifth Inning
Cedeno shows a little more power hitting his fifth homer of the season, so when he does hit, it appears to be a home run.

Jakubauskas commits an error so when that player later scores, he isn't charged with an earned run. Which is weird cause he's the reason the runner was on.

Sixth inning
Jose Lopez singles to lead off the inning and moves no farther.
Well the Mariners aren't playing good baseball, pretty simple. Branyan committed another error at first - Seattle's third of the game. Shawn Kelley still finds a way to get out of it though. Really is it only 4-1, it feels like 40-1.

Seventh inning
Mark it down, the 6-4-3 double play turned by Asdrubal Cabrera will be a web gem, perhaps No. 1. He fielded the slow roller up the middle off the bat of Cedeno (see no home run) and then flipped it behind his back to Jamey Carroll to start the DP.

Conversely, if you need any evidence of the Jose Lopez's lack of fielding range, the infield single Travis Hafner just got is the perfect example.

The other day Jon Shields over at Proball NW, formerly Bleeding Blue & Teal, had a excellent and detailed post on the changing mechanics of Felix Hernandez, complete with video.

So we asked Manager Don Wakamatsu if he noticed these changes and here's conversation about it.

"He’s done that at different times," Wakamatsu said. "Early in the year, we were more concerned about it because he would turn and leak down the hill. Now he turns and comes back and is back and squared up. That’s fine if we’re talking about the Luis Tiant thing. His ability to get back square before he goes down the hlll – it’s not problematic. It’s when you try to combine them all is where you get in trouble. It’s been more prevalent in his last three outings."

Wakamatsu compared it in a way to Ichiro and his unique batting stance and swing. Felix is just trying something that will help him.

"They are so athletic they can add some personality to their delivery and add some maybe deception to it and still be fine and not lose anything," he said. "That’s what we will monitor."

Wakamatsu liked what he saw from the delivery in the all-star game.

"To do it against some of the greatest players in the game and he did it in the all-star game maybe you look at it as both growth but also try to monitor it also," Wakamatsu said.

So Felix is adding deception to his other-worldly stuff, is that really fair?

"I don’t mind it," Wakamatsu said giggling. "Again, it’s nice to see a player have that comfort level. Again it takes a lot of athleticism and a lot of ability to be able to control the body to do those kind of things. As long as he’s able to command the pitches, we’ll allow him to continue down that road."

As for Felix, the rotation is slotted as Olson, Felix, Washburn, Bedard.

So here it is over the next few days
Today - Olson vs. Lee
Friday - Hernandez vs. Huff
Saturday - Washburn vs. Ohka
Sunday - Bedard vs. Laffey

So when the game comes around July 25th when the need for a fifth starter would arise, Wak said he would choose from Morrow, Vargas or Rowland-Smith.

"We'll have played Cleveland five games," Wakamatsu said. "It will give us a much clearer picture of what we might need with our choices down in Triple A. Whether it's Rowland Smith, or bringing back Morrow, or Vargas. It will depend on how they're pitching and what we need." at the time.

UPDATE: Third baseman Matt Tuiasosopo has rejoined the Tacoma Rainiers and is in the line-up tonight in Las Vegas. So that's some good news for Tui as he returns from having bone spurs removed from his elbow.

Don't be misled by the title. Yes, Adrian Beltre is back with the team. But he's still not close to returning to the field. But he's rejoined the team and plans to stay with it while he continues rehabbing and working out as he recovers from surgery on his left shoulder to remove bone spurs.

"It feels better than I thought it would," Beltre

He even played catch today. But because it still pains him to raise his arm, the person playing catch has to deliver the ball low.

Beltre still doesn't have very good range of motion in the shoulder so raising the arm and moving it out in front of him are pretty painful.

Still, the shoulder has progressed to the point where he hopes to be fielding ground balls by some time next week and swinging the bat in two weeks.

"It depends on how I feel," he said.

When asked if it was ahead of schedule, he said he didn't know and he has no target date for a return.

"It's too early, I still don't have a lot of motions that I can do yet and there is some pain in there," he said. "Until the pain goes away and the range of motion comes back, I will pretty sure I will be able to come back quick, but there is some movements that I can't do without pain. And I don't want to rush it."

Beltre had surgery June 30th, and the prognosis was a six to eight week absence. So mid August might be the earliest we could see him.

As for the surgery it was pretty standard, but Beltre said that Dr. Lewis Yocum was surprised by the amount of scar tissue in his shoulder. It was that scar tissue that was right up against the bursa sac and causing the pain and inflammation.

"There was no room between the bursa sac and bone spur," he said. "They said that's what caused the pain, there was no room for the bursa sac to move."

Still, doctors told Beltre the surgery went well.

"The surgery is supposed to be so I can be pain-free," he said. "Who knows? You never know with surgeries. As long as I can do everything baseball-wise, offensively and defensively, without major pain I’ll be all right. Sometimes surgery takes a little longer than six weeks or a year to get better. Sometimes it takes a lot longer, and you have to play through it.

He also watched every Mariners game on television.

"I watched all the games," "I saw all of them, didn’t miss a beat. I saw the Gutierrez homer. I’m proud of him. He went through some struggles at the beginning, but his swing looks so nice. He was really big the last two weeks. Hopefully he can stay like that. He was really the guy, the last couple of weeks, that’s been the big hitter."

So the next question had to be what it was like watching the games on TV like Mariners fans do.

"Sometimes as a fan, you get a little mad at some plays," he said. "You’re a fan, you’re not really there. Sometimes I had to get up and walk away a couple of innings and then come back."

As for Mariners' fans seeing Beltre again this season. He didn't hesitate to say yes.

"No doubt," he said. "That’s why I did it this year, because I’m pretty sure I’m going to be back. Hopefully, it will be 100 percent, and I’ll be able to help the team, because our team is doing really good now. We have a really good chance to win the west. The race is really close, and it’s wide open That’s what made my decision tougher. I know our team is winning, playing good, and we have a really good chance to get really hot the last 2 ½ months of the season, and who knows what will happen."

Mariners (46-42)
Ichiro RF
Branyan 1B
Lopez 2B
Griffey DH
Gutierrez CF
Langerhans LF
Johjima C
Woodward 3B
Cedeno SS
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LHP Garrett Olson (3-2, 4.42 ERA)

Indians (35-54)
Grady Sizemore CF
Asdrubal Cabrera SS
Shin-Soo Choo RF
Victor Martinez 1B
Travis Hafner DH
Jhonny Peralta 3B
Ben Francisco LF
Jamey Carroll 2B
Kelly Shoppach C
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LHP Cliff Lee (4-3, 3.47 ERA)