M’s rally from 7 down to beat Jays, reach ALDS
TORONTO — Fueled by an improbable comeback, the Seattle Mariners are in the American League Division Series with a 10-9 win on Saturday to complete a sweep of the Toronto Blue Jays in their AL Wild Card Series.
The Mariners were down 8-1 in the bottom of the fifth inning before scoring four runs in the sixth, four in the eighth and one in the top of the ninth to get the victory. It was the biggest road comeback win in playoff history and baseball’s largest rally to clinch a postseason series.
Making the franchise’s first playoff appearance since 2001, Seattle trailed 9-6 in the top of the eighth inning. With two out and the bases loaded, J.P. Crawford hit a blooper to center against All-Star closer Jordan Romano. Center fielder George Springer and shortstop Bo Bichette went hard after the ball, but it landed as the two collided. All three runners scored on the double, tying it at 9.
Adam Frazier hit the tiebreaking RBI double in the ninth inning to give the Mariners their fourth postseason series win in franchise history; they also won the ALDS in 1995, 2000 and 2001.
The Mariners were 35-1 to come back and win the game at Caesars Sportsbook when they were down seven runs. Seattle got as long as 150-1 at sportsbook PointsBet.
Cal Raleigh, who hit an RBI single for Seattle in the eighth, reached on a one-out double against Romano in the ninth. After Mitch Haniger flied out, Frazier drove in Raleigh with a double to right.
Bichette walked, stole second and advanced to third on a grounder in the eighth, but Andres Munoz retired Alejandro Kirk to end the threat. George Kirby, Seattle’s eighth pitcher of the game, handled the ninth for his first career save. Matt Chapman walked with one out, but Danny Jansen struck out and Raimel Tapia lined out to end the game.
The Mariners then poured out of their dugout and celebrated behind the mound. They also beat Toronto 4-0 in Game 1 of the best-of-three series on Friday. Next up for Seattle is Houston in the ALDS.
Meanwhile, after battling the past month to host an AL wild-card series inside their typically raucous ballpark, the Blue Jays’ season abruptly came to an end.
Expectations had been high for Toronto to go on a long playoff run. They were based largely on the team’s offensive success in the final weeks of the regular season. After the Blue Jays went 13-14 across the month of August, they rallied through the rest of the schedule.
Toronto was 22-11 in its final 33 games, and even took five of the six games that immediately preceded the postseason. A win at Baltimore last Monday clinched the AL’s top wild-card spot and home-field advantage in the round for Toronto.
Toronto got off to a fast start in Game 2. Teoscar Hernandez hit a two-run homer in the second and a solo drive in the fourth against Robbie Ray, who won the AL Cy Young Award while pitching for the Blue Jays last year. Hernandez joined teammate Danny Jansen and former Toronto slugger Jose Bautista as the only Blue Jays players with multihomer games in the postseason.
After Ty France scored on Tim Mayza‘s wild pitch in the sixth, Carlos Santana gave Seattle’s comeback a big boost with a three-run homer. Jansen made it 9-5 with an RBI single off Penn Murfee in the seventh, but Toronto’s bullpen couldn’t close it out.
Anthony Bass gave up hits to all three batters he faced in the eighth, including Raleigh’s RBI single, forcing interim Blue Jays manager John Schneider to call on Romano for a six-out save. Romano gave up a single to Frazier and struck out Santana and Dylan Moore, but Crawford tied it with a first-pitch double.
Toronto intentionally walked Julio Rodriguez before Romano struck out France to end the inning. Ray, who signed a $115 million, five-year contract with Seattle in November, allowed four runs and six hits in three-plus innings.
These playoff games were the first held at Rogers Centre since 2016, when the Blue Jays lost in five games to Cleveland in the American League Championship Series. Cleveland went on to lose that World Series to the Chicago Cubs.
Toronto did appear in the 2020 wild-card series, also getting eliminated in two games. The higher-seeded Tampa Bay Rays hosted that series, which happened during a stretch of COVID-impacted seasons that had the Blue Jays playing home games at their spring training facility in Dunedin, Florida, and their Triple-A affiliate’s home park in Buffalo, New York.
The Associated Press and ESPN’s David Purdum contributed to this story.
NASCAR driver Katherine Legge said she has been receiving “hate mail” and “death threats” from auto racing fans after she was involved in a crash that collected veteran driver Kasey Kahne during the Xfinity Series race last weekend at Rockingham.
Legge, who has started four Indy 500s but is a relative novice in stock cars, added during Tuesday’s episode of her “Throttle Therapy” podcast that “the inappropriate social media comments I’ve received aren’t just disturbing, they are unacceptable.”
“Let me be very clear,” the British driver said, “I’m here to race and I’m here to compete, and I won’t tolerate any of these threats to my safety or to my dignity, whether that’s on track or off of it.”
Legge became the first woman in seven years to start a Cup Series race earlier this year at Phoenix. But her debut in NASCAR’s top series ended when Legge, who had already spun once, was involved in another spin and collected Daniel Suarez.
Her next start was the lower-level Xfinity race in Rockingham, North Carolina, last Saturday. Legge was good enough to make the field on speed but was bumped off the starting grid because of ownership points. Ultimately, she was able to take J.J. Yeley’s seat in the No. 53 car for Joey Gase Motorsports, which had to scramble at the last minute to prepare the car for her.
Legge was well off the pace as the leaders were lapping her, and when she entered Turn 1, William Sawalich got into the back of her car. That sent Legge spinning, and Kahne had nowhere to go, running into her along the bottom of the track.
“I gave [Sawalich] a lane and the reason the closing pace looks so high isn’t because I braked midcorner. I didn’t. I stayed on my line, stayed doing my speed, which obviously isn’t the speed of the leaders because they’re passing me,” Legge said. “He charged in a bit too hard, which is the speed difference you see. He understeered up a lane and into me, which spun me around.”
The 44-year-old Legge has experience in a variety of cars across numerous series. She made seven IndyCar starts for Dale Coyne Racing last year, and she has raced for several teams over more than a decade in the IMSA SportsCar series.
She has dabbled in NASCAR in the past, too, starting four Xfinity races during the 2018 season and another two years ago.
“I have earned my seat on that race track,” Legge said. “I’ve worked just as hard as any of the other drivers out there, and I’ve been racing professionally for the last 20 years. I’m 100 percent sure that … the teams that employed me — without me bringing any sponsorship money for the majority of those 20 years — did not do so as a DEI hire, or a gimmick, or anything else. It’s because I can drive a race car.”
Legge believes the vitriol she has received on social media is indicative of a larger issue with women in motorsports.
“Luckily,” she said, “I have been in tougher battles than you guys in the comment sections.”
Legge has received plenty of support from those in the racing community. IndyCar driver Marco Andretti clapped back at one critic on social media who called Legge “unproven” in response to a post about her history at the Indy 500.
“It’s wild to me how many grown men talk badly about badass girls like this,” Andretti wrote on X. “Does it make them feel more manly from the couch or something?”
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business3 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway