Mariners Miss Great Chances, Fall 4-3 To Toronto Seattle Wastes Torres’ Good Outing, And Rodriguez Can’t Come Through

It came down to moments Friday, as baseball games so often do. The Seattle Mariners had a handful of good ones, a few bad ones and two that beat them.

Broken down, Seattle’s 4-3 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays resulted from a pair of missed opportunities - one at the plate, the other on the mound. And the Mariners who failed were angry, but not embarrassed.

“Sometimes you try your best and it doesn’t work out,” Salomon Torres said. “I went out there thinking ‘shutout’ from the first inning to the last, and it didn’t happen.”

It didn’t happen because of one bad inning - one bad pitch. Three marvelous defensive plays early had kept Toronto off the scoreboard and Torres on his game plan.

But in the fourth, rookie Alex Rodriguez couldn’t handle a one-out ground ball up the middle, and the error extended a rally Torres couldn’t pitch out of before it beat him.

Torres got another ground-ball out, intentionally walked John Olerud to load the bases and then fell behind in the count to third baseman Ed Sprague, 2-0.

“He was ahead of hitters all night, but the one he fell behind beat him,” manager Lou Piniella said. “It was a fastball up.”

Torres remembered it as a slider with no bite. Catcher Chris Widger said it was a fastball. Whatever it was coming in, it quickly became Sprague’s second grand slam of the season and put the Mariners in a 4-0 hole.

“One pitch made the difference,” Torres said. “The team did everything it could to win; I did everything I could. We needed this one, because a win and we’re at .500 again. That pitch to Sprague was the only mistake I regret tonight.”

Seattle tried to come back against raw rookie Edwin Hurtado, a right-hander who was 2-4 in Class AA Knoxville and now 2-0 against the Mariners.

Tino Martinez and Rodriguez hit solo home runs, and in the eighth the Mariners chased Hurtado with a rally that looked as if it had to at least produce a tie game. It didn’t.

Rich Amaral singled and Edgar Martinez doubled up the alley in right-center field, pushing Amaral home to make it 4-3. And there, down by a run with no one out, Martinez stood at second base.

Tino Martinez pulled a ball down the line, where Olerud turned it into the first out, though Edgar moved over to third base. Lefty reliever Tony Castillo then pitched around Jay Buhner, walking him on four pitches.

Piniella went to his bench and sent Mike Blowers to bat for left-handed hitting Warren Newson - a percentage move, with Blowers hitting .301 against left-handed pitching.

“I went up looking for a pitch I could hit hard, a pitch that was up so I could hit a fly ball, and the first two strikes I took were balls down,” Blowers said. “He didn’t give me a pitch I could drive. With two strikes, I can’t think fly ball. I have to try to hit it hard up the middle. I did. It was just right at somebody.”

The ball rocketed along the AstroTurf to second baseman Roberto Alomar, who flipped it to shortstop Tomas Perez, who fired to first to complete the double play.

There had been other chances - Buhner grounded into a double play in the sixth inning - but the eighth inning was Seattle’s last, best shot to break through.

In the ninth, pinch-hitter Alex Diaz grounded out, Widger flied out and it came down to one final confrontation between veteran reliever Castillo and rookie Rodriguez, who’d flown all day to get to SkyDome.

Working the count full, Rodriguez fouled off four pitches.

“I felt locked in, I thought I was going to get him,” Rodriguez said. “Then he put a sinker on the black, I had to swing and I hit a fly ball to center field. A home run, an error? No, this wasn’t a good game.

“But it will get better.”