Randy Arozarena, Julio Rodriguez and Victor Robles of the Seattle Mariners celebrate on the field after defeating the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 1 of the ALCS at Rogers Centre on Sunday.Mark Blinch/Getty Images
As he began his start on Sunday night, Seattle pitcher Bryce Miller stared into his dugout, banged a fist against his heart, looked up and pointed at the big man. Then he introduced himself to George Springer with an outside fastball. The Blue Jays designated hitter planted it in the right field stands.
It appeared God had made his choice.
So for nine innings, the Toronto Blue Jays rested. When someone came into the dugout to give Toronto a little shake and tell them the game was over, it turns out they’d lost, 3-1.
The danger of the New York Yankees was that they are exciting. The danger of the Seattle Mariners – a new, more dangerous danger – is that they are boring.
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Seattle has no easily identifiable faces. They make no comments. They summon up no hard feelings. The most noted thing about the team this season is that one of their guys has an enormous bum. I’ve seen it now. I’m impressed, but not that impressed.
Playing the Yankees gets you ready to go to war. The Mariners make you feel like lying down and just getting a few quick winks. Twenty minutes, I swear. Set an alarm if you don’t believe me.
The Mariners may be boring, but they are not bored. They live in Seattle. It doesn’t get much more exciting than that. That feeling of madcap northwestern energy can carry them through any road trip.
Right now, they’re back at the hotel watching Turner Classics together in the lobby, nodding off in team-branded barcaloungers that they fly all over the continent.
An evening of stultification started with the Jays players, but quickly spread to the audience. This is a Very Big Deal. Toronto mayor Olivia Chow keeps invading Instagram to tell me so. But after the high of that Springer home run, the crowd was nullified.
For long stretches, it sounded like everyone was being forced to watch one of those email phishing tutorials your office sends out weekly. By the time the seventh inning stretch rolled around, most could no longer stand. They half-waved their hands in the air, or struggled to their feet just as the song was ending.
Jays pitcher Kevin Gausman reacts after giving up a home run to Seattle catcher Cal Raleigh.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
A closed roof inevitably makes the Rogers Centre muggy, and the crowd torpid, but the Mariners took them completely out of the game … by losing. Then, when everyone was tired and thinking about how hellish the subway was going to be on the ride home, Seattle won.
What was happening out in the field? I don’t know. Someone hit into a groundout. Someone else flew out to centre. All of this was hard to concentrate on. Seattle time machines you - they turn October into August.
In their first playoff round, Seattle faced a Detroit team that couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn if they were inside the barn. Yet the Mariners somehow strung them out for five games plus six innings. The Tigers weren’t beaten. They got tired and gave up.
The roundhousing version of the Jays we just watched against the Yankees seemed happy to get into a soft slapping contest with the Mariners. Afterward, Jays manager John Schneider seemed to admit as much.
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“There’s a fine line of trying to wait them out knowing they’re depleted,” Schneider said, implying his team had stepped over it.
It was a great idea for the first six innings, when the game was the most-least exciting thing in sports – a pitching duel. That was when Toronto thought it could sneak away with this contest of monotony.
After giving up that first-pitch home run, Miller was superb. Toronto starter Kevin Gausman was equally metronomic. Whatever was going on, it was happening quickly.
The last couple of innings in Gausman’s night went like this – pop out, pop out, pop out, strikeout, strikeout, home run, base on balls … wait, wait, wait. Was that a home run? Really? It hardly registered.
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That’s how a one-run lead that felt like it would endure until doomsday morphed into a tie that became a loss because of one wild pitch.
That’s how Seattle gets you. You’re all relaxed and then boom – you’re so relaxed that you slide off the mound and try cricket bowling the ball to home plate.
Then – unfairly, if you ask me – Seattle decided to become exciting. Randy Arozarena stole second and third. The crowd was too exhausted to boo.
Sensing that the most popular thing they could do was end this torture, the Jays’ bullpen collapsed like a white dwarf, sucking in all hope of a comeback behind it. The crowd tried to rouse itself for the bottom of the ninth with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. leading off. Once he grounded out, it gave up.
Toronto Blue Jays manager John Schneider heads back to the dugout after making a pitcher change during Sunday's eighth inning.Chris Young/The Canadian Press
If this is Seattle postseason baseball, Toronto must immediately stop playing it with them.
Seattle is like Toronto – good from the top of the order to the bottom, plays a good field, pitches well, has a varied approach. Most people believe there isn’t much to separate these two teams aside from momentum, and Toronto just gave that up.
The really ominous thing is that this was Seattle unsettled. Miller was going on short rest. Two starters appeared as relievers in their 15-inning win over Detroit, meaning the rest of the starting rotation is all mixed up. Seattle won’t get back to normal operating procedure until Game 3.
This was a team ripe to be unsettled. Now it’s Toronto’s turn.
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On Monday, they will start rookie Trey Yesavage. Yesavage began his pre-game remarks on Sunday by scolding unidentified people – online jerks, presumably – for going after his family. It’s an understandable human reaction, but it isn’t an optimal sporting one.
Schneider scoffed at the thought that a 22-year-old who’s been in the big leagues for less than a month would feel squeezed after watching his team get origami’d in Game 1.
“It does not put any extra pressure on Trey,” Schneider said. “It’s another game.”
It’s another game if Toronto wins it. It’s an absolutely pivotal one – and probably not in a good way – if they lose it.