Playoff bound Mariners take game one of doubleheader into extra innings, Abraham Toro walks it off
By Charles Hamaker
Seattle, WA – In far from ideal fashion, the Seattle Mariners took game one of their Tuesday doubleheader against the Detroit Tigers into extra innings. With Seattle already securing a playoff berth and their spot in the seeding essentially locked in, the Mariners hoped they could get in and out of this series quickly. It took ten innings, but Seattle was able to take game one thanks to a sacrifice fly that scored Carlos Santana for the winning run.
Chris Flexen had a bumpy start for Seattle (Photo by Liv Lyons)
Flexen struggles, bullpen has to deal with extra innings
Chris Flexen got the start on the mound, as the Mariners aimed to do their best in order job at keeping starting pitching and their bullpen as rested as possible. Having been a starter earlier in the season and doing a fine job in the rotation last year, it seemed that Flexen should have been just fine in a starting role yet again. Flexen had a bit of a bumpy road, only going four innings while surrendering five hits, three runs on 71 pitches.
The bullpen allowed a similar line to what Flexen gave up, while also including a... unique face from the bullpen. Matt Festa, Erik Swanson, Andres Munoz, and LUIS TORRENS (Yes, the catcher) relieved Flexen. Festa struggled in in his two innings of relief, giving up three hits, and Detroit was able to get two runs off of those hits. Swanson and Munoz threw scoreless frames, while catcher Luis Torrens came in to pitch the top of the tenth. Had it not been for the ghost runner rule for extra innings, Torrens would have had a scoreless frame. The run-on Torrens was unearned, and the catcher (primarily a catcher at least) earned a win.
Mitch Haniger unleashed a two-run homer in the 3rd inning (Photo by Liv Lyons)
Offense comes in bursts, but comes in handy when needed most
The Seattle offense saw a multitude of fun ways to score, including using “dad strength.” Catcher Curt Casali hit his first home run in a Mariners uniform in the third inning, scoring the first run for Seattle. Casali added a second hit later in the game, a single in the eighth inning. Mitch Haniger continued the blast fest, slamming a two-run homer later on after Casali had hit his to give Seattle a lead.
The Mariners went quiet for three innings from there, until the seventh when Ty France singled to drive in Adam Frazier. Eugenio Suarez tied the game back up with a single to left field, driving in France. Again, for a few frames, the Seattle offense went silent. In the bottom of the tenth, Carlos Santana tallied his third hit of the game. Santana’s hit scored Eugenio Suarez from second base, and shortly after Santana himself was driven in. Abraham Toro hit a sacrifice fly, Santana barreled home, and Seattle took game one.
Andres Munoz pitched a scoreless, hitless inning of relief for the Mariners (Photo by Liv Lyons)
Quick notes
The win is Seattle’s 12th walk off of the season
The Mariners are now 11-5 in extra inning contests and 33-22 in one-run contests
Seattle’s 12 walk-off wins are tied for the second most in franchise history, dating back to 1986, trailing only 13 back in 2009.
Luis Torrens became the first position player to record a win in franchise history and the first position player that is not named Shohei Ohtani to do that since John Baker of the Chicago Cubs did so on July 29th, 2014 against the Rockies.
Andres Munoz is now tied for having the sixth most strikeouts (96) in a season by a reliever, tying himself with Jeff Nelson who accomplished the feat back in 1995.
Munoz is also tied for the second most strikeouts by a reliever in all of baseball this season with Brewers reliever Devin Williams
Luis Torrens threw an inning of relief for Seattle, and collected the win (Photo by Liv Lyons)
This is normally where the “what’s next” paragraph is, but considering that this article is about game one of a doubleheader, click here for the article about game two
