Loosely translated - toma means "take that" in Spanish and that's what the Mariners dugout was screaming at the Oakland A's when Ken Griffey Jr hit his two-run laser of a homer in the fifth inning.

Let's go through it quickly.

Jose Lopez hits a first-inning double to left off of A's starter Vin Mizzaro. In the third, Lopez hits a solo homer off Mizzar. In the fifth, the first pitch he sees from Mizzaro hits him right in the ribs or love handle area.

Lopez was cleary not pleased he fired the bat to the ground, made a gesture to Mizzaro and yelled a few words. Mizzaro yelled a few back and both teams got to the top step of the dugout.

After it was kind of broken up, Lopez went to first and home plate umpire Marty Foster gave official warnings to each side about ejections for retaliations.

Manager Don Wakamatsu went out to discuss the situation with Foster, because his take on the situation wasn't that it was a purpose pitch.

"I don’t believe they hit him on purpose," Wakamatsu said. "It’s a situation where a guy hits a double and a home run and gets hit, and fingers start pointing. I was with the club last year in Oakland and I know their temperament. I don’t know the kid but I’d like to think that he didn’t hit him on purpose."

Lopez didn't quite see it the same way.

"I hit a home run off him and the next time up he hits me with the first pitch, that doesn’t look good,” Lopez said.

One person who wasn't caught up in it was Ken Griffey Jr. who was awaiting on deck. He too had been hit by Mizzaro earlier in the game.

So after watching a pair of change-ups go by - one a strike and one a ball - Griffey sat on a 1-1 fastball and hammered it to right field. It was a line drive homer and a no doubter. So much so, that Griffey did the trademark drop the back and take a few walking steps to first before beginning his trot.

The Mariners dugout exploded.

“Yeah, it got us pumped up,” said Mariners starter Ian Snell. “These guys were screaming “Toma! Toma!” and started jumping up and down and giving high fives.”

Toma loosely translates to "take that."

As he rounded third toward home, Griffey pointed to the suite where his mother Birdie was sitting.

"Yeah, she doesn't get to see very many games live," Griffey said. "She was here for the golf tournament. She wanted to see her oldest child. She's going to take credit for that one."

That seemed to be more important to Griffey than getting revenge.

“It was a close game,” he said. “I was trying to drive the ball, and I just happened to get a pitch I could drive. I wasn't thinking about it. I'm trying to win games. Those things happen in the course of a game you may or may not like. But the objective is to win the game.”

But Wakamatsu said that Griffey took some pleasure in making Mizzaro eat it.

“We heard about that in the dugout,” Wakamatsu chuckled. “How dare they. He’s always got a flair for the dramatic. That was beautiful.”

And because of that, any thoughts Snell may have had about protecting his hitters didn't seem quite as necessary as keeping up a solid start.

He had a no-hitter threw 4 1/3 innings and had just a hiccup in the sixth inning where he gave up a run on three hits.

“That’s two starts in a row where this guy keeps improving,” Wakamatsu said. “The big thing for me was two walks against an awfully patient ball club. He kept his pitch count down and attacked the zone. I couldn’t be happier with his outing.”

Snell was pleased as well.

“I kept the ball down,” Snell said. “It was just hard for me to get accustomed to this league, but now I’m starting to get used to it and starting use my other pitches besides my fastball and it’s throwing hitters off and it’s helping me out a lot.”

Snell also said he used his slider quite a bit, more than he had in his past starts and that it seemed to help immensely.

"I changed the eye level, and changed the mentality, changed the velocity of the ball and I got my curveball in there and I started throwing my slider more than I have been in my last couple starts," he said. "I got a lot of ground balls with that and a lot of lazy fly balls."

Sean White pitched two shutout innings, while David Aardsma picked up his 29th save of the season.

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Quickly before we get to the game updates, here's a few other notes from the pregame meeting with manager Don Wakamatsu.

* Carlos Silva will throw a simulated game on Wednesday. He will throw approximately 35 to 40 pitches.

"If everything goes well, we’ll probably send him out (on a rehab assignment) at that point," Wakamatsu said. "If not or if we feel he might need another one, we’ll do another sim before we send him out."

* Ryan Langerhans injured his shoulder crashing into the wall in Cleveland. He could play today in an emergency, but Wakamatsu is hoping to avoid using him.

* Chris Jakubauskas, who was optioned to Triple A Tacoma, will play catch today, throw one bullpen session and then head to Tacoma, where he'll pitch most likely on Friday.

"We’ll try to get him two outings if we can and talk about bringing him up on the first," Wakamatsu said.

GAME UPDATES START HERE
First inning
Snell goes 1-2-3.

The Mariners get a little something going against Vin Mazzaro - wasn't he in that movie where he said: "I live my life a quarter mile at a time." Anyway, Lopez doubles off Mazzaro and then he was either to fast or to furious and hit Junior in the leg with a pitch. He then followed that up with a walk of Bill Hall to load the bases, but Joh reaches and swings feebly at a slider well off the outside corner of the plate -- not exactly a new phenomenon there -- for an easy ground ball to short.

Second inning
Another 1-2-3 for Snell.

The Mariners once again get runners on first and second with two outs as Saunders and Gutierrez both single, but Branyan strikes out to end the inning. Two innings, 5 men left on base.

Third inning
Snell gets into his first trouble with a couple of walks, but works his way out of them.

Jose Lopez leads off the bottom of the inning by pulling a 91 mph to left for his 18th homer of the season - it's a career high. If it seems like the majority of Lopey's homers go to left, well it's because they do, check out this post by Dave Cameron over at the USS Mariner.

M's lead 1-0.

Fourth inning
Another 1-2-3 inning for Snell, including a sweet fielding play by Branyan at first and some good athleticism from Snell to get over and cover on the play.

Mazzaro gets in another bases loaded jam thanks to three walks, but Branyan hits into a 4-6-3 double play to end the inning.

Fifth Inning
Well, the no-hitter was broken up by Daric Barton, who singled up the middle. Snell got a nice ovation from the crowd afterward. More importantly he got out of the inning without any further damage.

Things get a little testy in the fifth as Mazzaro drills Jose Lopez in the ribs with the first pitch of the inning. Lopez is clearly not pleased and has some words for Mazzaro. Home plate umpire Marty Foster warns both dugouts. So the question remains, if you are Snell and you have a one-hitter going, do you hit a batter to protect your hitters?
But Ken Griffey Jr., who was also hit by Mazzaro, got even in a different way by crushing a homer to right to give the M's a 3-0 lead.

Sixth Inning
Well, Snell didn't hit anyone and he didn't keep the shutout alive as Kurt Suzuki singled to left to score Mark Ellis from second to give the A's their first run. Snell did manage to get out of the inning after that.

The M's get a runner on, but that's about it.

Seventh inning
A nice inning for Sean White, who pitched a 1-2-3 inning.

The Mariners strand two more runners in the game.

Lineups

A's (55-68)
Adam Kennedy 3B
Mark Ellis 2B
Scott Hairston LF
Jack Cust RF
Kurt Suzuki C
Ryan Sweeney CF
Landon Powell DH
Daric Barton 1B
Cliff Pennington SS
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RHP Vin Mazzaro

Mariners (63-61)
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Russell Branyan 1B
Jose Lopez 2B
Ken Griffey Jr. DH
Bill Hall RF
Kenji Johjima C
Jack Hannahan 3B
Jack Wilson SS
Michael Saunders LF
---------
RHP Ian Snell

Adrian Beltre was back in the Mariners clubhouse and seemed in good spirits.

As I'm typing this, he's taking out at third base taking ground balls. He took batting practice earlier.

Manager Don Wakamatsu said that because Beltre was able to do some light activities that he may indeed be ready to play when he is scheduled to come off the disabled list on August 28th.

"This might be a good sign," Wakamatsu said. "We talked in Cleveland that he might not be able to make it back for the 28th. To me this is more promising and we’ll see how he reacts today."

For those of you who don't know what happened to Beltre, well he took a ground ball in the groin area against the Chicago White Sox and since he doesn't wear a cup, the ground ball, hit him in a bad, bad way and he suffered "a severely contused testicle."

I know, it gives me a stomach ache typing it. Anyway, there was and still is significant swelling.

"It's better than it was before, but there's still pain," he said. "I haven't moved to see how it's going to be. Maybe today or tomorrow is going to be a good test to see how it's going to be in the next couple of days."

At least Beltre has a good sense of humor about the situation.

He just laughed and said "Thanks Grif" when Ken Griffey Jr. hollered, "Hey it's the nutcracker, it's good to see you."

Sitting in Beltre's locker was a brand new cup still in the wrapper. Beltre admitted he didn't know who put it in there, but that he was probably going to have to use it.

"For now, probably, I will. Against my will, maybe," he said. "The swelling is still there, so maybe for now, I have to. I think I need custom-sized one. I'll see what I can do."

Realistically, the doctors said he has to wear the cup if he wants to play because the swelling is still evident.

But when the swelling goes down, will cup be removed?

"I don't know," he said. "That's a good question."

It shows how much he loathes wearing a cup if he's considering going back out there after suffering the injury he had.

"I might be lying if I said that," he said. "I've tried before. It's uncomfortable. I hated it. If it's going to happen every 11 years of my career, I'll take my chances."

The last time Beltre wore a cup was in the minor leagues for the Los Angeles Dodger in their camp in the Dominican Republic.

"I tried to wear it because it was mandatory," he said. "But every time you move, it's uncomfortable. To go to side, you dive, you dive on top of it. I don't know exactly how I'm going to do it."

So if we see you walking funny?

"Then I probably have it on," he said.

Since Beltre hadn't talked with the media since that fateful night, he kind of relived it.

"I thought, 'it exploded,'" he said when asked of when it first happened. "It was weird, because it hit right on it, right on top of it. I felt like going down, but I saw the ball right next to me, and I wanted to finish the play. Then I made a wild throw. It was on target, but low."

After that, Beltre didn't lay down, he kind of walked around to shake it off. A lesser man would have curled up in the fetal position in pain.

"There was camera's around," he said. "You can't lay down on the ground."

Not only didn't he lay down on the ground, he also kept playing for the next five innings.

"I didn't have any option," he said. "I couldn't because Jack (Hannahan) was hurt. He hurt hamstring, so we didn't have an extra infielder. Two or three innings after that, I dove in first, and it really hurt. That's when I started thinking ... but even if I wanted to, we didn't have an extra infielder. Jack was out in the fifth inning.

And the Griffey game winning hit?

"At times it hurt a lot, but other times, it didn't hurt that much because of the adrenalin of the game," he said. "It was a close game, nothing-nothing, and we're just trying to get the game over. When I was running, it didn't really feel that bad."

UPDATE 4:24 -- Officially Ichiro has tightness in his left calf. It's been bothering him the last week and it "grabbed on him" a little at the end of yesterday's game. Manager Don Wakamatsu said Ichiro said the calf is much better today. But Wakamatsu indicated that Ichiro probably won't play till Wednesday.

UPDATE 3:29 -- Apparently Ichiro has a strained calf. Not sure of the extent.

Ichiro Suzuki is not in the line-up today, Bill Hall will be taking his place in right field. Not sure what's up with it, but I will let you know more when I get the chance.

Mariners (63-61)
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Russell Branyan 1B
Jose Lopez 2B
Ken Griffey Jr. DH
Bill Hall RF
Kenji Johjima C
Jack Hannahan 3B
Jack Wilson SS
Michael Saunders LF
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RHP Ian Snell