NEWSLETTER
“Momma always said: MLB.TV is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re going to get.”
Close enough, right?
If you were lucky enough to catch some of the Mariners-Yankees game last night, you were treated to one of the season’s best games.
Wild One in Seattle!
Tuesday brought us possibly the most entertaining game of the season between the Mariners and Yankees at T-Mobile Park in Seattle. Simply calling this one a pitcher’s duel wouldn’t do it justice, but it was very much that.
Luis Castillo was electric on Tuesday night in his second start for the Mariners since he was acquired at the trade deadline. Castillo hurled eight scoreless innings with just three hits allowed while striking out seven Yankees hitters and walking two.
Check out the tunneling and late and drastic change of direction by Castillo’s two-seamer and slider last night. The late break makes them nearly unhittable.
Gerritt Cole was nearly as good, tossing seven scoreless innings, allowing four hits and no walks while punching out eight M’s hitters. When Cole squared off against the Mariners at Yankee Stadium on August 3, the Mariners tagged him for six runs (three home runs) in the opening frame, but Cole had Seattle’s number on Tuesday night.
Cole and Castillo combined for 15 innings of scoreless baseball and allowed a total of nine baserunners while striking out 15 and never registering a fastball under 95 mph. The bullpens were marvelous, too, with Andrés Muñoz, Matthew Festa, Paul Sewald, and Matt Brash holding New York scoreless for the next five innings.
Aroldis Chapman, Clay Holmes, Scott Effross, Wandy Peralta, and Lou Trivino combined for five scoreless innings before Jonathan Loáisiga took the mound in the bottom half of the 13th inning, where the M’s would end this one, plating the first and only run of the game on Luis Torrens single that scored Eugenio Suarez.
The pitching wasn’t the only epic show of the night. The Mariners had some incredible plays on the defensive side of things that kept this game chugging along, including this 1-6-5-4 double play that started with a behind-the-back grab my Matt Brash on a comebacker.
The Mariners moved to 60-52 with the victory over the Yankees, who have been in a funk of late, losing six of eight to open August and were just 5-5 in their final 10 games in July. Still, the Yankees are 71-40 on the season, so they’re doing just fine despite the slow couple of weeks.
Tatis Jr. on the Mend
Fernando Tatis Jr.’s rehab assignment continued on Tuesday night in Frisco, where he was playing for the San Antonio Missions, the Double-A affiliate of the Padres. Tatis opened the game with a leadoff double down the left field line in his third game with San Antonio.
Tatis drew a pair of walks in his next two trips to the plate and then tripled in his final at-bat of the evening in the seventh inning before being lifted for a pinch runner.
Tatis is set to play center field for the Missions tonight when he plays his fourth game on his rehab stint, and he is expected to return to the Padres at some point this month.
O’s Keep on Winning
The Baltimore Orioles were a fun first-half story, and I figured it would stay there after they decided to trade Trey Mancini and All-Star closer Jorge Lopez at the deadline, but the O’s just keep finding ways to win.
This time it was a two-run blast by Rougned Odor in the bottom of the eighth inning after a rain delay at Camden Yards against the Blue Jays.
After the Odor home run in the home half of the eighth inning put the O’s up 6-5 over Toronto, new Orioles closer Félix Bautista shut the door on the Blue Jays for his sixth save of the season. Baltimore moved to 58-52, just one-half game behind the Tampa Bay Rays for the third Wild Card spot in the AL.
Like I said last month when they first moved above .500, this likely won’t last down the stretch, but the Orioles are a team with plenty of arrows pointing up in the future. Plus, if it makes them feel any better, they would be in first place if they played in the AL Central, so they’re having a pretty damn good season regardless of the result.
Oh, and these closer entrances are becoming the gift that just keeps giving. New Orioles closer Félix Bautista has a new one that features the use of the Camden Yards lighting system and the whistle of Omar Little from HBO’s ‘The Wire.’
