Well, I made my flight, after taking possibly one of the scariest, most expensive cab rides ever. I'm not certain, but I think I may have similar pain in my neck that Franklin Gutierrez is experiencing after my cab driver used his breaks in the jump on them with two feet method.

Anyway, a great win for the Mariners. It wasn't pretty offensively. Manager Don Wakamatsu called it "scratch and claw." I guess Mike Sweeney's RBI double was "scratch" and Wlad Balentien's RBI fielder's choice "claw."

It was enough for Washburn, who was extremely candid following his fourth straight win to improve to 8-6 on the season and lower his ERA to 2.71.

We talked with Washburn who was very candid about the team, the standings and the trade deadline.

When asked about the Angels, he said ...

"You pay attention. Our goal is to catch 'em, so you pay attention, keep an eye on what they're doing. All we can control is what we're going on the field. We have to keep playing the way we are now and try to win the first game of a series. Then stay within striking distance when we really have a chance to control our fate, when we're playing Texas and the Angels head to head. All we can control is what we're doing. You pay attention. It's just human nature to pay attention. But all we worry about is what we can control."

In fact it was Washburn who first mentioned the trade deadline, not us.

To start the second half strong, a lot can happen, the trade deadline is coming up. We know the only way we can control what's going to happen is at least try to make the decisions hard for Jack. Hopefully, we won't be in a position we're going to be selling the whole team off. I think we're making it hard on him. Let's see what he ends up doing, but we're happy with the way we're playing. We definitely need to come out and start the second half strong to continue the momentum we had at the end of the first half.

Given the opening we kept firing questions ...

We asked if the feelings change depending on how things work out

"I'd say it's a day to day feeling. A lot can happen in a day. Guti hitting the wall, luckily he didn't hurt anything serious, he'll only be out a couple of days. But if he was going to be out a long time, that might make some decisions easier for Jack. That would be a tough guy to replace. But we've had a few tough guys to replace go down this year, but it seems like someone steps up and fills that role. I don't doubt anything we can accomplish here."

=> Read more!

Well, first pitch was 1:31, so it was a 26 minute delay.

The Mariners will be facing lefty Luke French, who to be honest. I don't know much about. He's 1-0 with 1.89 ERA. He's appeared in five games and started three. He was 4-4 at Triple A

According to the Tigers media guide, Lucas "Luke" French was drafted in the 8th round of the 2004 draft. He was born in Salina, Kansas, but played his high school ball at Heritage High School in Littleton, Colorado.

First Inning
Ichiro Suzuki keeps his streak of not going in hitless in back-to-back games going with an infield single and moving to second on Brandon Inge's throwing error. He would later score on the Mike Sweeney's double down the left-field line.

I've counted eight scouts at the game. I mentioned the Phillies were here, there are also scouts from the Pirates, Diamondbacks, Twins, Yankees in attendance

Wash works into some minor trouble and works right out of it.

Second inning
Well the Mariners catch a bad break, they were trying to play hit and run with Johnson, but his liner is grabbed by Placido Polanco, who tags out Langerhans for a double play. In the very next at-bat Jack Hannahan hits a ground rule double.

Washburn goes 1-2-3 in the inning with three fly ball outs, all of his outs this game have come on fly balls.

Third inning
Three more flyball outs for Wash, its nine in a row.

Fourth inning
Washburn goes from a flyball outs to strikeouts. He strikes out 2 of 3 and gets a ground ball out.

Fifth inning
The Mariners squander a chance in the fifth getting a pair of runners on. Washburn gives up a lead-off single, but got a nice 6-4-3 double play to help get out of the inning.

Sixth inning
The Mariners go up 2-0 as Lopez doubles to lead off the inning and later scores on Wlad Balentien's fielder's choice, maybe not exciting, but effective.

Two more fly ball outs for Washburn.

Seventh Inning
Two more fly ball outs for Washburn, that's 14 of the 21 outs on flyballs.

Eighth Inning
Well, Mark Lowe nearly gives me a heart attack, walking the lead off guy, throwing six straight ball, then striking out two guys and giving up an RBI triple to Curtis Granderson. Wak pulls him for Sean White, who gets Placido Polanco and his odd-shaped head to ground out to end the inning. MAriners lead 2-1, but I wouldn't mind an insurance run for my sanity.

UPDATED 10:01 a.m.: The new start time will be 1:30 p.m. (EST), 10:30 a.m. PST.

UPDATED (9:45 a.m.): It's raining right now again. The tarp is back on the field, and I'm not going to take a picture, because I'm going to bang my head off the desk and then call Northwest to see about my options.

There was also a scout sitting behind us early that was talking to his bosses, and he let it be known that he was here specifically to scout Washburn. I checked, and he was from the Philadelphia Phillies.

As you can tell from stellar photography above, the tarp is off the field and they are applying Diamond Dray to the field. Diamond Dry is basically ground up corn cobs, that somebody marketed for quick water absorption for baseball and softball fields. And now the guy is a probably a billionaire.

The reason the grounds crew is wearing Santa Hats is for the Tigers' Christmas in July promotion. I'm sure they're ecstatic about wearing a santa hat in like 88 percent humidity.

Not much going on in the pregame meeting with manager Don Wakamatsu.

He still has made no decision on the Sunday starter. He mentioned Jason Vargas or Chris Jakubuaskas as candidates, and did not mention Brandon Morrow.

The decision could come down to if they have to use Jakubauskas today or tomorrow extensively.

Adrian Beltre will start hitting off the tee during the Toronto series next week and Wakamatsu said it appeared that his recovery will be "expedited."

UPDATE: It would help if I actually remembered to post the lineups. You'll notice Franklin Gutierrez is not in there. The knee and elbow are fine according to Wakamatsu, but the neck muscles are still very stiff.

LINEUPS
Mariners
Ichiro RF
Branyan 1B
Lopez 2B (Thanks ETFM for the heads up)
Sweeney DH
Balentien LF
Langerhans CF
Johnson C
Hannahan 3B
Cedeno SS
-------
LHP Washburn

Tigers
Granderson CF
Polanco 2B
Cabrera 1B
Thames DH
Ordonez RF
Raburn LF
Inge 3B
Ryan C
Everett SS
---------
LHP Luke French

This picture does not make me happy. Not because of the sheer anticipation of seeing Jarrod Washburn pitch, but because I have a 7:30 flight out of here, and that could be in jeopardy. And that would be beyond inconvenient for me.

You know what else is inconvenient -- how bad the Kansas City Royals are playing. They have a 6-2 lead on the Angels and then choke it away in the late innings, using four different pitchers in a five-run eighth inning. Then again this a team that did trade for Yuniesky Betancourt ... on purpose. But if you ask their GM Dayton Moore, he believes they're on the "right track" for long term success. Apparently Moore has been watching a few too many Tony Robbins videos at night, but at least he got a snuggie and a shamwow as well.

I don't know what to think about the Angels right now, they keep winning games behind the stellar hitting of Erick Aybar, Maicier Izturis and Mike Napoli.

And apparently, the team I thought was the best in the American League - the Boston Red Sox - apparently can't beat the Texas Rangers. Texas swept the Red Sox, knocking Boston out of the AL East lead and keeping pace with the Angels.

So here's the standings....
Angels 55-38 .591 ----
Rangers 52-41 .559 3.0
Mariners 50-44 .532 5.5
A's 40-53 .430 15.0

I was perusing the Detroit Free press and John Lowe's game story

When I came across this quote.

"This is not an ordinary pitcher," Tigers manager Jim Leyland said. "This guy is one of the best in baseball. It still frustrates you a little bit, but not as much as if it had been an ordinary pitcher.

You said it Jim.