KANSAS CITY, Mo. _ Following his second straight strikeout of the game, the dynamic hitting cyborg _ part man, part machine _ that is Mitch Haniger displayed a rare sign of frustration.
A hard shake of his head and a glare skyward to the baseball gods that were causing his swing and his approach to momentarily malfunction was the equivalent to a full-scale meltdown from a normal play. He may make outs because that happens in baseball, but rarely does he have two at-bats in a row without solid contact, let alone contact. Haniger wasn't pleased.
But as he stepped to the plate in the ninth inning, there was no sign of his past failures or lingering frustration. The machine in him had processed it and moved on.
So when Royals reliever Brad Boxberger left a 91-mph fastball on the outside edge, Haniger had none of the baggage of the previous two at-bats cluttering his process. He stayed on the pitch and launched a towering fly ball to right field for a game-deciding solo home run in Seattle's 6-5 victory over the Royals.
Haniger's third homer of the season was the Mariners' only long ball in the game. It gave them 34 on the season and made it 14 consecutive games with a home run start the season. But more important to the players, it was also their fifth consecutive victory and notched a series win over the Royals.
But the final outcome didn't come without drama.
Roenis Elias loaded the bases with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but he got Adalberto Mondesi to pop out to shortstop to end the game and notch his second save.
Yusei Kikuchi will have to wait another four days to try and notch his first major league win, though he was more than deserving in his third big league start.
The rookie lefty shook off a sluggish start to his outing, which included serving up a pair of mammoth home runs, and gave the Mariners six innings with three runs allowed on five hits with a walk and three strikeouts. He retired the final 11 batters he faced.
The Mariners grabbed a 1-0 lead in the first inning. Jay Bruce hit something other than a homer, doubling into the right field corner off Royals starter Heath Fillmyer. Edwin Encarnacion followed with an RBI single to left to easily score Bruce. It was the seventh time in 14 games that the Mariner had put up at least one run in the first inning. Encarnacion also reached double digits in RBI with 10.
The Royals answered immediately off Kikuchi. With two outs, Mondesi singled, stole second and scored on Soler's RBI single to left field to tie it at 1.
Kansas City grabbed a brief 2-1 lead in the second inning when Hunter Dozier jumped on a hanging slider from Kikuchi, pulling a solo homer deep into left field.
