Mariners believe they’re better
Team’s improved since it swept Jays in July series
When American League rookie of the year favourite Julio Rodriguez steps into the batters’ box against Alek Manoah to begin Game1of the first playoff series between the 1977 expansion cousins, it will mark the first post-season action for the Seattle Mariners in 21 years.
“End The Drought” became a rallying cry for the Mariners and their fans this season, and they clinched a playoff spot on the final Friday of the regular season when catcher Cal Raleigh hit a ninth-inning, walk-off home run against the Oakland A’s.
The last look we had at the Mariners was a four-game sweep of the Blue Jays in early July that erased what was then a four-game deficit in the wild-card standings and ended a brutal road trip that would ultimately cost manager Charlie Montoyo his job.
That series featured the Jays at their lowest point in the season — they had lost nine of10 games when they left Seattle — but it also featured the best of the Mariners and what would become some of their calling cards in of a 90-win season: timely home runs and an outstanding bullpen.
The opener of that series was the only easy Seattle win. The Jays decided to use the since-departed Anthony Banda as an opener and he only retired one of the four batters he faced. Casey Lawrence took over and allowed home runs to Dylan Moore and Raleigh, and the Jays were down 7-1 after three innings.
The last three games were all barnburners. The Mariners won the second game when Eugenio Suarez hit a three-run walk-off homer in the 11th inning off Sergio Romo, the sixth reliever the Jays used in the game and the only one to give up a run. Romo was gone less than a week later.
Manoah allowed just one hit over his first six innings the next day but his teammates only managed to score him one run, so when Carlos Santana took the big right-hander deep with a runner on in the bottom of the seventh, it was enough for another Seattle win.
The Jays were leading the series finale 4-1 in the bottom of the fifth, when Gabriel Moreno’s throw to first base broke the glove of Vladimir Guerrero Jr., going right through it. It would have been an inning-ending double play; instead, Seattle went on to score twice in the inning. Another late-inning tworun homer by Santana, this time in the eighth off Adam Cimber, lifted the Mariners to a third straight come-from-behind win.
The Seattle bullpen threw 15 innings in the series and allowed just one run on seven hits, with 16 strikeouts against three walks.
Manager Scott Servais thinks the Mariners are better now than they were then.
“We have a right fielder now who was out almost four months of the season,” said Servais, a former bigleague catcher in his seventh year as Seattle manager. “And in 2021 Mitch Haniger was probably our most productive offensive player (hitting 39 homers and driving in 100 runs). He is back, he is healthy, he is ready to go.”
The right-handed swinger returned from an ankle injury in early August and finished the season with a flourish, batting .371 with four home runs and 10 RBIs over his final nine games.
“He’s definitely a sparkplug for that team,” Jays third baseman Matt Chapman said. “He makes that team go. I know he’s had some injuries the last few years (Haniger missed 99 games in 2019, all of 2020 and 105 this season) but when he’s healthy he’s a great player.”
Servais also spoke highly of his catcher. “Cal Raleigh has had a phenomenal two months, what he’s done with the bat in August and September, the late-game home runs.”
The switch-hitting Raleigh, in his first full season in the big leagues, hit just .216 over the season’s final two months, but he blasted13 home runs, seven of which came in the sixth inning or later.
The Mariners hit 197 homers this season, fifth in the American League and three behind the Jays’ 200, but their offence isn’t as diverse, scoring half a run less per game than the Jays. They have the edge in runs allowed, though, giving up 3.85 per game to the Jays’ 4.19.
Trade-deadline acquisition Luis Castillo, who will start Game 1, has led a very good starting rotation with a 3.17 ERA and 1.102 WHIP since coming over from Cincinnati, earning a five-year, $108-million (U.S.) contract extension. Left-hander Robbie Ray, who won the Cy Young Award with the Jays last year, is scheduled to start Saturday. If there’s a Game 3 on Sunday, it’s likely to be right-hander Logan Gilbert, whose 3.20 ERA and 1.180 WHIP were second only to Castillo’s.