(Toronto) The Seattle Mariners overcame a seven-point deficit and beat the Toronto Blue Jays 10-9 in a wild second game on Saturday to knock the Canadian club out of the playoffs.
Posted at 8:34 p.m.
Updated at 9:17 p.m.
In the ninth inning, Cal Raleigh doubled off Blue Jays reliever Jordan Romano and scored the game-breaking run through Adam Frazier, who slammed a double into the right-field corner.
George Kirby got the save and the Mariners completed the first-round best-of-three series sweep in front of a packed and stunned Rogers Center.
Teoscar Hernandez homered twice to help the Blue Jays take an 8-1 lead after five innings. However, Carlos Santana’s three-point slap in the sixth, where the Mariners scored four, and the four in the eighth allowed the Mariners to tie the game.
It’s the second time in three years the Blue Jays have failed to win a game in the first round. The Queen City club was swept by the Tampa Bay Rays in 2020 and missed the playoffs last year.
The Mariners will face the Houston Astros in a best-of-five series. The confrontation will begin Tuesday, in Texas.
Blue Jays players will have to empty their lockers after a dizzying and surprising fall. This is yet another failure in October.
Raleigh had three runs and had three of 13 hits for the Mariners. Danny Jansen, who hit three hits, drove in two runs for the Blue Jays, while Santiago Espinal and Alejandro Kirk added two hits apiece.
Blue Jays starting pitcher Kevin Gausman got off to a good start that ended after five and two-thirds innings. Former Blue Jays left-hander Robbie Ray went just over three innings in his first start for Toronto since signing with the Mariners in the offseason.
PHOTO NATHAN DENETTE, THE CANADIAN PRESS
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.
Gausman allowed five hits, four runs and struck out seven.
The Mariners shut out the Blue Jays 4-0 in Game 1 of the series on Friday. It was the Blue Jays’ first playoff game at home since 2016.
The Torontonians have won 92 games this season — two more than the Mariners — and secured first place among teams drafted from the American before the end of the campaign. This allowed the Blue Jays to rest some key players late in the season.
PHOTO JOHN E. SOKOLOWSKI, USA TODAY SPORTS
Mariners players celebrate after their victory.
But it didn’t pay off against the Mariners, who weren’t intimidated by the loud Toronto crowd.
The Blue Jays haven’t won a playoff series since 2016, when they reached the All-American Championship Series for the second straight year. The Blue Jays’ last World Series victory was in 1993.
This season, the Mariners ended a 21-year drought with no playoffs.