The Boston Red Sox come into Seattle with a 29-43 record, buried in last place in the AL East. They’re losers of four straight and fresh off getting swept by the Blue Jays. They find themselves 15.5 games out of first place, and making their slow walk toward the trade deadline seller table.So, on paper, this is a team the Mariners should beat. The M’s enter the series 39-37 after taking a needed series from the Baltimore Orioles. They’ve been fine with homecooking, posting a 21-17 record at T-Mobile Park this season. Still, with a 18-20 record on the road, stacking more wins would be ideal.The Mariners’ probable starters against the Red Sox are the next test of Seattle’s piggyback experiment. And it starts with the original build on Friday night. Mariners’ Red Sox Series Is About More Than Beating a Bad TeamJune 19: Bryce Miller, 3-0, 1.54 ERASo we pick up back where it all began. The Mariners are relaunching their piggyback plan with the original tandem. Bryce Miller is expected to start, and Luis Castillo (2-6, 5.00 ERA) will come out of the pen.Honestly, Miller is the right guy to start this iteration. His last outing was pretty ridiculous. His final line: 8 IP, 2 ER, 4 H, 2 BB, 7 K, helping Seattle have an emphatic 10-2 win over the Washington Nationals.Despite starting the season on the IL, he’s been the Mariners cleanest story since returning to the rotation. The velo is up on his four-seamer, and pairing it with his secondary offerings has kept lineups looking lost at the plate. He’ll look to continue that against a Red Sox offense ranked 28th in MLB with a 90 wRC+.Castillo hasn’t been bad in relief, all things considered. He actually has a 2.38 ERA and hitters are batting .132 against him. So as uncomfortable as it may be. It’s working. His last outing as a starter against Washington was another step forward, yet he still struggled to reach the six-inning mark. He allowed two hits and one run over 5 2/3. So he continues to show signs of turning it around after a sluggish start to the season. The entire point of this plan is supposed to be health and efficiency. Miller and Castillo can give them that, but only if this doesn’t turn into a chemistry experiment gone wrong. These two have done this dance before, they know how to make it work, and the others will be watching and following suit.June 20: Emerson Hancock, 5-3, 3.28 ERAHancock continues to be the surprise development of the Mariners season, but his last start wasn’t pretty. The Nationals were all over him on June 14, he finished with a final line: 4 IP, 6 ER, 9 H, 2 K. He only threw 59 pitches, and 45 of them were either fastballs or sinkers because the offspeed stuff just wasn’t working. The Nats attacked, and squared him up as they beat the Mariners 8-3. Bad starts happen, and this is a good opportunity for Hancock to bounce back. The key for Hancock is to get the sweeper working again. It’s a pitch that has been a backbreaker for his opponents, but his command of that pitch is pretty dodgy. We’ve seen what happens when his breaking stuff doesn’t work. His velo doesn’t blow anyone away. The best version of Hancock is the one that uses strong sequencing, speed differentials, and can use the fastball/sweeper combo to keep hitters guessing. June 21: Logan Gilbert, 5-4, 3.43 ERAThe Mariners should feel good about Gilbert closing this series out on a Sunday matinee. He’s coming off one of his strongest starts of the season. Against the Orioles, his final line: 7 IP, 1 ER, 2 H, 1 BB, 10 K. He gave up a run early, then settled in nicely.The most encouraging part was how in sync everything looked with Cal Raleigh back behind the dish. The battery reunion was huge. Of course, outside of Raleigh nearly hitting Gilbert in the head returning the ball to the mound, which only ended up being a funny instance because no one got hurt.And what a difference Raleigh’s game-calling makes. The two are very close, Raleigh knows Gilbert's stuff, and there’s no way to avoid that familiarity angle there. It clearly helped bring Gilbert’s arsenal back to life.That tandem alone should help the Mariners' confidence rolling into the series finale, but that doesn’t mean it’s all sunny skies. Everyone will still need to do their job. In theory, this is a series the Mariners should take care of without overcomplicating it. But the Mariners haven’t won a series against the Red Sox in Seattle since 2019. So we can’t pretend this will be a walk in the park.Add us as a preferred source on GoogleFollow