Mariners finally “seize the moment” and advance past Tigers to advance to ALCS

SEATTLE — On a regular-season scoring average basis, the Mariners and Tigers scored and allowed about the same number of points — 4.70 and 4.28, respectively. In the first four games of the best-of-five ALDS, each team won by one point, and each team won with laughter. Both teams have one win at home and one on the road, and both teams rely heavily on their bullpens. Heading into Game 5 on Friday night in Seattle, it’s clear a team needs to do something to differentiate themselves. These teams were locked in a stalemate on the night, having played matched hands for much of the series, and needed a new strategy, some different tactics to gain an advantage and break the deadlock, and even then it took 15 innings and 4 hours and 58 minutes to do that. After the game, the Mariners defeated the Tigers 3-2 on a home run by Jorge Polanco and advanced to the American League Championship Series for the first time in 24 years.

“I don’t even know where to begin trying to look back on all the heroic efforts today,” manager Dan Wilson said. “The 15th inning? I have to say, I don’t know how the fans kept their energy up. Even in the 15th inning, the sound was unbelievable. It’s a special place. T-Mobile Park is a special place and they showed us that tonight. It was an unbelievable game from top to bottom.”

Both starters took the mound for the second time in the series, and both took a slightly different approach in Game 5 than previous starters had. In Game 1, Seattle starter George Kirby hit 31 percent of his sliders; it was the first pitch he threw to eight of 22 batters. In Game 5, Kirby used his slider 50 percent of the time and threw it as the first pitch to 10 of the 18 batters he faced. After the game, he confirmed it was a conscious shift in strategy to show Detroit’s lineup something different than what he had seen six days earlier. “All these guys from top to bottom are probably looking for a heater to start with,” Kirby said, “with a slider, a curveball, whatever it is early on, just — if I keep them off balance a little bit, I can attack that area more with my fastball.” Despite the recent exposure, he’s been able to maintain the four-seamer’s effectiveness by mixing in more sliders early in the count. Although the slider-heavy approach meant Kirby got fewer strikeouts than usual, he allowed just three hits and one earned run in five innings, striking out six.

After throwing his changeup just 22 percent of the time in Game 2, Detroit starter Tarik Skubal was back to throwing his changeup more than 30 percent of the time in Game 5 (in line with his average usage rate this season) and significantly reducing his usage of the slider and sinker.

As Jake Melholt pointed out before Game 5, the Mariners offense is happy to have the buffet of sinkers and sliders he’s put on the hot pot through the first three games of the season against Seattle. Anyone can truly stand up to Skubal, at least to some extent. Certainly with that in mind, Skubal elected to rely more on his changeup, which is his best pitch based on Stuff+ and run value. Although his start in Game 2 was marred only by Polanco’s two homers, Skubal’s revised pitching mix was more effective in Game 5, finishing with six innings of pitching, two hits, no walks, 13 strikeouts and one earned run. Skubal’s best season got even better, as he set a postseason record with seven consecutive strikeouts, further distinguishing himself.

But while some aspects of each team’s game plan need to evolve in order to remain competitive and potentially create an advantage, other aspects provide a firm advantage that should never be modified. Like Josh Naylor’s running back. Despite the slow pace, Naylor reads pitchers and situations like a book. His ability to make the right reads resulted in 30 stolen bases during the regular season, and he openly signaled to hitters multiple times in Game 4 while standing at second base. So it was no surprise when Naylor doubled up in the second inning when he made a move to steal third. But Skubal seemed to suddenly suffer a brief episode of amnesia, causing him to forget to check on the runner. Naylor was able to read Skubal and push the ace to third as he started serving. It was clear Naylor couldn’t believe his good fortune as he briefly surged back into second place. The crowd realized what was happening before Skubal did, and as roars spread throughout the stadium, Naylor perhaps feared that over-excited fans would blow his cover. But Skubal’s attention remained on Mitch Garver at the plate, and Naylor moved to third because of Skubal’s memory loss. From there, Naylor scored easily when Garver carried the ball into right midfield. At this point, Seattle leads 1-0.

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Eventually, the starters exited the game and head coach Wilson and Detroit’s A.J. Hinch needed to find new ways to gain an advantage. Initially, Wilson played the hits, which led to him bringing in Gabe Speyer to face Kerry Carpenter for the fourth time in the series. After Wilson got Kirby to face Carpenter for the third time in Game 1, and Carpenter hit a two-run homer, Speyer became Wilson’s go-to man to retire Carpenter, one of the heaviest players in the game. Carpenter has a career wRC+ of 138 against right-handers and a 69 wRC+ against left-handers, and 63 of his 70 career home runs have come in the regular season with a platoon advantage. He was 7-for-13 with five home runs in his career against Kirby, including the postseason, two of those hits (both singles) coming in Game 5 twice before. The move makes sense.

However, Carpenter came up with runners on in the second against Speier with no one out, hitting a 411-foot fastball to center field to give the Tigers a 2-1 lead in the sixth. Carpenter did exactly what Wilson’s tried-and-tested Speyer strategy was designed to prevent.

Then, in the seventh inning, with runners on first and second and Skubal out, Wilson attempted to send lefty Dominic Canzone and his 150 wRC+ against righties to home plate in place of Garver and his 63 wRC+ against righties against right-handed reliever Kyle Finnegan. But after Canzone was announced, Hinch removed Finnegan from the game and brought in left-hander Tyler Holton. From there, Wilson turned to birthday boy and pinch-hitter Leo Rivas, who brought the neutral platoon split into the feature. So when Holden left a changeup at the plate, Rivas hit the ball into left field for a game-tying single. Bringing in Rivas is a shift in strategy for Seattle. Initially, when Rivas heard his number being called, he thought he was the favorite to run against Polanco, who finished second. Instead, he made his playoff debut and tied the game at two.

“To be honest, I’m ready to run for second place in Polo,” said Rivas, who turns 28 on Friday. “Then [bench coach] Manny [Acta] Coming to the case, ‘Hey, dad, come over here. Go find this person. My reaction was, ‘Okay, I got him.’ ‘”

The next move for the Mariners is to bring in starters Logan Gilbert and Luis Castillo from the bullpen to shake things up and separate themselves from the Tigers. Both pitchers have headlined Seattle’s rotation over the past few years, but neither has pitched an inning of relief at the major league level. Gilbert last struck out in 2017 as a sophomore at Stetson University, while Castillo last appeared as a reliever for the Marlins’ High-A affiliate in 2016. Gilbert and Castillo combined for 3 1/3 scoreless innings, eliminating the need for Wilson to call up bullpen members that Detroit had already beaten earlier in the series.

As the innings wore on, Hinch rotated through Finnegan, Holden and Will West, his mainstay reliever. He also brought in Troy Melton and Cade Montero, his versatile pitchers who have cycled between starters and relievers all season. Then, like Wilson, Hinch asked the starters to keep the momentum going for a few innings. Game 3 starter Jack Flaherty, who hasn’t shown relief since pitching an inning in the bullpen for the Cardinals in 2022, worked in Games 13 and 14.

But before we get into what happened in the 15th inning, we have to pause and explain a little bit of the T-Mobile Park story to those who don’t already know. As part of the interinning entertainment at every home game, the Mariners host a salmon run in which four salmon — king, sockeye, coho and humpback — race along the caution track. Statistics were recorded for each salmon, and Hampi, as we all know, never won. As of this writing, a fun fact in Humpy’s profile on the Mariners website reads: “Never Won a Game!” Just a week ago, outfielder Victor Robles joined the Salmon Run to ensure Humpy remained winless. But as the teams continued into overtime, there were calls behind the scenes for a second Salmon Run. You’ll never believe what happened: Hampy got his first career win. Players and coaches aren’t the only ones in the stadium pushing the envelope to get the win.

Then, in the bottom of the 15th inning, Tommy Kahnle took the rubber for the Tigers. Kahnle is known for throwing his changeup 86 percent of the time. But perhaps knowing a change of strategy was necessary to finally overcome the deadlock in the game and series, Kahnle threw just 62 percent of his changeup, opting to mix in six fastballs. Perhaps the uptick in fastball usage is just a byproduct of Kahnle’s inability to find his changeup. Normally, he’s able to throw the ball to all quadrants of the zone, but on Friday, Kahnle struggled to even kiss the shaded areas of the zone. The only way he can get hitters to swing is by using his fastball to prove he can still hit the zone with something. But this is not enough.

After J.P. Crawford’s single to start the inning, Kahnle hit Randy Arozarena, putting two runners on and no one out. The next batter was Cal Raleigh, who hit a fly ball to center that didn’t seem ideal to advance a runner, but Crawford caught up and advanced to third, and a Parker Meadows throwing error not only allowed Crawford to reach third, but also advanced Arozarena to second. Detroit intentionally put Julio Rodriguez on base for Polanco, hoping he could get over Kahnle’s changeup into an inning-ending double play. Instead, Polanco got a full count, then got enough buckets on a low-and-away changeup to drive the ball through four holes into right field, scoring Crawford and sending Seattle into a state of joyous madness.

“I know we had a long game, but this team never gave up,” Polanco said. “I know there’s a lot of emotion, but we always try to keep it simple. I just want to go out there and compete and try to win.”

With this victory, the Mariners advanced to the American League to face the Blue Jays. This will be Seattle’s first and fourth appearance in the Championship Series since 2001. Despite the team’s many successes over the past 30 years, it has never reached the World Series.

While waiting for Wilson to join the media in the interview room for the postgame press conference, a Mariners public relations person brought a gray plastic chair and placed it behind the microphone in the center of the table among several padded leather chairs. The reason for the change was clear when Wilson walked into the room. Wilson, visibly dripping with beer and champagne soup, sat on a gray plastic seat to avoid staining the upholstery of the chairs on either side. The rearrangement of the furniture represents a final shift in strategy aimed at getting Seattle over the ALDS hump and heading to Toronto, where the series begins this Sunday.