Coming off his roughest outing of the month, a matchup with the Diamondbacks wasn’t necessarily the easiest recipe for a bounceback for Bryan Woo. Woo didn’t care. Flashing the stuff that earned him down-ballot AL Cy Young Award votes last year, Woo dominated the D-backs with nine strikeouts in seven scoreless innings in a 5-1 win, which stretched the Mariners’ winning streak to a season-best five games and put Seattle over .500 for the first time since the fifth game of the season. “You know when it’s one of those days where he’s just coming after you,” said center fielder Julio Rodríguez. “He definitely had them uncomfortable throughout the game.” The D-backs managed just two hits off Woo, both coming in the fifth, and he didn’t issue any walks. And he did it by going strength-on-strength. Arizona came into the day hitting an MLB-best .288 vs. fastballs. The D-backs’ .846 OPS vs. heaters ranked third, behind only the Dodgers and Yankees. Their 17.7% whiff rate vs. fastballs was tied for fourth lowest, and their 166 strikeouts on them were the fewest in baseball. But Woo came out Saturday with his signature combination of the four-seamer that was tied for the fourth-most valuable pitch in baseball in run value last year and a sinker that had an even higher putaway percentage, and shoved. “Honestly, I had no idea they hit fastballs well,” Woo said. “I was just sticking with my plan. When it comes down to it, that’s what I always want to do: stick to my strengths and what I’m doing. “If it ends up that we start a game and it’s not working out, I’ll make my adjustments. But for the most part, just going out there with my Plan A. If we need to make adjustments, then we will. But until then, keep doing what I’m doing.”
