The Seattle Mariners enter play on Monday night at 25-29 and in second place in the American League West. The M's, who entered the season with real World Series expectations, have failed to generate any consistent traction en route to being 2.5 games out of first place.

The starting pitching has been up-and-down while the defense has been subpar in multiple spots. The offense has gone through wild swings and the group has been injured for most of the year, now currently missing Gabe Speier, Cal Raleigh and Brendan Donovan. J.P. Crawford, Matt Brash and Bryce Miller have all been on the injured list as well.

Manager Dan Wilson and president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto have taken plenty of arrows from the fanbase and several of the online rhetoric has turned toxic.

But there's one thing that stands out above the rest, at least to me, that I discussed on the most recent 'Refuse to Lose Territory' podcast.

"One of the things that is most frustrating to me, most frustrating to me, is that this (series loss against the Royals) is the fourth time, the fourth time this season, that the Mariners have won the first game of a series and then failed to win either of the next two.

The inability to finish the job has been startling with this team all year, whether that is big picture in terms of winning the first game and losing the next two, whether that is smaller, not being able to cash in with runners in scoring position, not being able to play add-on, not being able to seal the deal occasionally in the bullpen, not being able to have a starter put a stamp on their outing.

Finishing the deal has been a problem for this team all year.

Look, the Mariners won the first game of the series against the Yankees, lost the next two. They won the first game of the series against the Angels, lost the next two. In Chicago, they won the first game against the White Sox, lost the next two. Against the Royals here, they won the first game, lost the next two.

So in those 12 games, the Mariners have gone 0-4 in series and 4-8 in those games.

Imagine if they had just won those series. If they win the first and then one of the next two, how much different are things looking if they're 8-4 in those 12 and not 4-8? They're over .500. They're 29-25 if they just do the job to win one of two games after winning the first.

But why are they not doing that? Because they are doing too many things that bad teams do."

The Mariners will play the Athletics on Monday at 6:40 p.m. PT. Luis Castillo will start against Aaron Civale. The A's currently lead the division, making this a big series for the M's.

You can listen to the most recent 'Refuse to Lose Territory' podcast here, or you can watch on YouTube below:

Remember to join our MARINERS on ROUNDTABLE community, which is FREE! You can post your own thoughts, in text or video form, and you can engage with our Roundtable staff, as well as other Mariners fans. If prompted to download the Roundtable APP, that's free too!