SEATTLE \u2013 Mariners new third baseman Brendan Donovan made a costly throwing error Saturday night after charging in on a Steven Kwan bunt in the 10th inning of the Mariners\u2019 6-5 loss to the Guardians.<\/p>\n
Early in Sunday\u2019s game, Donovan bounced back with a nifty play on a ground ball near the third-base bag, fielding it cleanly and throwing on the run \u2013 practically from the third-base coach\u2019s box \u2013 to get Gabriel Arias out at first base to end the second inning.<\/p>\n
It was an encouraging sign for Donovan, who had played all over the field during his four seasons in St. Louis, much of it second base and left field. He worked diligently with Mariners infield coach Perry Hill throughout spring training, and the team is confident Donovan will be a suitable solution at third this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust with any new position, there\u2019s going to be some growing pains,\u201d Donovan said. \u201cBut I just try to play hard. I try to really prepare and just play the game. We talk about not playing scared, right? I understand I am going to make mistakes \u2013 I don\u2019t want to make mistakes, but that\u2019s how you learn.\u201d<\/p>\n
What has to have the Mariners especially encouraged is Donovan\u2019s production at the plate through his first series in Seattle.<\/p>\n
The team\u2019s new leadoff hitter, Donovan reached base in his first four plate appearances Sunday. He was hit by a pitch in the leg in his first two times up, and in his third plate appearance he belted a game-changing three-run homer on a line drive that just cleared the wall in right.<\/p>\n
On a chilly, 43-degree evening, the long ball was not part of his initial plan in the fourth inning.<\/p>\n
\u201cIronically,\u201d he said, \u201cI was looking at where the third baseman was. I was going to lay a bunt down. It was cold out there. \u2026 I was like, \u2018I\u2019m not moving real fast today. I don\u2019t think anybody is.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
In his first plate appearance with the Mariners on Thursday, Donovan became the first player in Mariners history to hit a leadoff homer on opening day.<\/p>\n
In 18 plate appearances, he has six hits, four runs, two walks, two hit-by-pitches, four strikeouts and one steal.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis uniform is dirty every single night,\u201d M\u2019s manager Dan Wilson said. \u201cThat shows you the type of player he is and how much of a gamer he is. He\u2019s going to leave it out there every single night \u2026 and that\u2019s something the clubhouse appreciates and respects.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SEATTLE \u2013 Mariners new third baseman Brendan Donovan made a costly throwing error Saturday night after charging in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":651945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2392],"tags":[5,620,4,619,65,3235],"class_list":{"0":"post-651944","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-seattle-mariners","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mariners","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-seattle","12":"tag-seattle-mariners","13":"tag-seattlemariners"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116316537358810495","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=651944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/651945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=651944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=651944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=651944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}