Mariners battle for walkoff win over A’s in 10 innings
SEATTLE – This much can be said about the Seattle Mariners as they play out the final series of the 2024 season – a three-game series with a team that is soon to be formerly known as the Oakland A’s – they are playing with the effort of a team still fighting to make the playoffs.
That dream died a few days ago, making this weekend series moot in terms of overall meaning.
But a fan watching the Mariners play Saturday evening at T-Mobile Park, and unaware of their decided fate, might think they were seeing a team in a must-win situation.
When Leo Rivas raced for home on Justin Turner’s ground ball to second, diving headfirst toward the plate and just avoiding the tag from Shea Langeliers to give the Mariners a 7-6 walkoff victory in the bottom of the 10th, it had the Mariners spilling out of the dugout in celebration and a crowd of 33,007 standing and roaring.
It will make the Mariners overall record seem better, but it meant nothing else – well, except to the players on the field.
Then again, playing hard has never been an issue for this team. Scoring runs and winning games has been the problem.
Dipoto calls season ‘incredibly frustrating’
The formality of a planned news conference from the interview room of T-Mobile Park with a dais, microphones and Mariners’ logo backdrop was replaced by a wooden bench in the first-base dugout on a chilly Saturday afternoon before the penultimate game of the regular season with a handful of media members surrounding him.
Given how last year’s season-ending news conference went awry and then so wrong with comments that left the fan base largely incensed while providing endless memes and countless references on social media, there might not have been an ideal scenario for Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto to discuss the season that was and the offseason ahead.
The last time Dipoto had spoken to the media publicly was via Zoom conference on Aug. 22 – the day he fired manager Scott Servais and hitting coach Jarret DeHart and replaced them with Dan Wilson and Edgar Martinez.
For the eighth time in his nine years leading the front office, the Mariners missed the postseason despite having a 10-game lead in the American League West on June 19. The Mariners will finish with fewer wins than the past three seasons.
“Incredibly frustrating,” Dipoto said. “It’s part of the reason why we’re trying to figure out a different way, a different message. Philosophically, we’re all wired to do the same thing, you know. In some ways, what we’ve done, organizationally, we’ve achieved so much. We’ve put a good team on the field for four consecutive years. We have talked about creating a sustainable roster. We’re just having a tough time figuring out how to climb the wall from a good team to a very good team or a great team. That’s going to be our challenge this offseason.”
The Mariners went 18-8 against the Rangers and Astros, but also went 36-45 on the road and 5-9 vs. the 100-loss Angels. Their starting pitching was outstanding. Their offense was somewhere between abysmal and inconsistent. Their bullpen was beat-up and not up to typical standards. They raced to a 44-31 record on June 19 to build a 10-game lead in the division. From that day to Servais’ firing, they went 20-33, losing the lead in the division in only 24 days.
“We have to find a way, over the course of a six-month season, to be more consistent than we’ve been,” Dipoto said. “This year is a great example. We’ve shown high highs and low lows, and we have to figure out how to create more of an even performance across a six-month season.”