TORONTO – Here are three instant impressions after the Mariners’ 4-3 loss to the Blue Jays in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series. Toronto won the series 4-3.
Seventh hell
When the seventh inning started, the Mariners had a two-run lead and were nine outs from a pennant. And manager Dan Wilson and the Mariners’ pitching brain trust decided to try to buy one more inning from Bryan Woo when he had done his job bridging the two innings needed from George Kirby to the bullpen.
Having Woo, normally a starter, begin the seventh was a debatable mistake. Not having closer Andrés Muñoz warming and ready for the top of the Blue Jays batting order should and will linger with this coaching staff.
Reliever Eduard Bazardo has been terrific this entire season. But facing the top of the Blue Jays order with two runners on is when Muñoz should have been called upon instead of Bazardo. Saving him for the ninth inning doesn’t matter if the ninth inning never comes.
The only thing that beats you in that moment is a three-run homer. And Bazardo will carry the unfortunate distinction of giving up the most painful homer in M’s history to, of all people, George Springer.
It shouldn’t have been on him.
Going to Bazardo and not making sure Muñoz was ready was the mistake of all mistakes during a season when there were plenty of times that questioning looks were given to bullpen decisions.
The stars shined
Up until the seventh inning, this was going to be a story about the Mariners’ biggest stars coming through on the grandest stage of their careers to date.
Stars need to shine on the biggest stages, and that’s exactly what Cal Raleigh and Julio Rodríguez did. And to a lesser extent, George Kirby.
Rodríguez set the tone leading off the game with a double and scored on Josh Naylor’s single. He homered in his next at-bat on a hanging breaking ball from Blue Jays starter Shane Bieber. Raleigh homered in the fifth inning when the Blue Jays dared to have Louis Varland face him.
They should have been memorable swings forever remembered in Mariners lore, and not the footnotes they will become.
The same goes for Kirby, who showed he’s the pitcher the Mariners want on the mound in an elimination game.
He first showed it in 2022 in the 18-inning marathon against Houston. His mettle was on display again in Game 5 of this year’s ALDS against Detroit.
Ever again?
It took 17,729 days – starting with the day of the first pitch in Mariners history – to play for a spot in the World Series, when the M’s went into Game 6 with a 3-2 lead in the ALCS.
They played one of their sloppier and more lifeless games of the second half of the season in Game 6. Game 7 will be remembered for the pain of watching a 3-1 lead slip away with just nine outs remaining.
The M’s aren’t a cursed franchise. Many of their problems throughout their history are self-inflicted. But to be so close for the first time is a pain without a salve to soothe the feelings .