Two Walk Offs, One 19 to 1 Beating, and I Watched Every Inning

Donovan Walton won Friday in the tenth. Seattle hung nineteen on us Saturday and Carlos Cortes had to pitch. Then Lawrence Butler hit his second homer of the day to walk it off Sunday. A's 8, Mariners 7.

Three walk off wins in seven days. For a team that's 61 and 89. I don't care how that sounds, I'm enjoying it.

Sunday afternoon in West Sacramento. Bottom of the ninth, down 7 to 6 because Randy Arozarena decided this was his personal home run derby, and Zack Gelof leads off with a single to left. Lawrence Butler steps in against Andres Munoz and hits it over the wall in right center.

Gone. A's 8, Mariners 7. I jumped off the couch so fast the dog left the room.

That was Butler's second homer of the day. He hit one in the first inning too, right behind Gelof's, back to back. Those two started it and those two finished it, and somewhere in the middle I aged about a year.

The seventh inning is where I got back in

Jacob Lopez threw 102 pitches and got eleven outs. That was the start. Seattle was up 6 to 2 by the fifth, Arozarena already had a two run homer and an RBI single, and Bryce Miller walked five guys in five innings and we did basically nothing with any of them. I was getting mad at the TV.

Seventh inning. Bases loaded, Gelof takes ball four, Seattle challenges the pitch and loses. 6 to 3. Butler grounds out and another run scores. Then Shea Langeliers comes off the bench to pinch hit, and he lines one that deflects off Seranthony Dominguez into right field and two more come home.

Tied at six. One at bat all day for Langeliers and that's what he did with it.

Geoff Hartlieb threw two scoreless innings in the middle of all this and nobody's going to remember it, so I'm writing it down here.

Then Hogan Harris gave up the second Arozarena homer in the eighth. Seven to six. I said a word that my neighbor definitely heard through the wall. Elvis Alvarado gave up a hit in the ninth and nothing else, and then Gelof and Butler did the rest.

Saturday, and I'm keeping this short

Mariners 19, Athletics 1. Twenty three hits.

Gage Jump gave up a two run homer to Dominic Canzone in the first and a three run homer to Arozarena in the second and that was his night. Seth Johnson, then Joey Estes, then Yunior Tur, and before the eighth inning was even over Carlos Cortes was on the mound. Carlos Cortes. Our left fielder.

He got four outs. He also walked three and gave up three runs, and honestly he looked about as comfortable out there as anybody else we sent up.

Weston Wilson, hitting .217, went 5 for 6. Cole Young drove in five. Bryan Woo threw six innings and the one run we scraped off him in the third wasn't even earned. 10,289 people sat through that on a Saturday night and I hope somebody handed them a free hot dog on the way out.

Friday, Walton in the tenth

Friday's the one that set the whole weekend up. Jeffrey Springs gave us five decent innings, Jeff McNeil and Max Muncy each drove one in in the first, Butler hit a two run homer in the third, and we led 4 to 2. Then Lazaro Montes tied it in the sixth with a two run shot of his own and it went to extras.

Top of the tenth, Julio Rodriguez singles a run home off Chris Roycroft and Seattle's up 5 to 4. I figured that was that. It's been that kind of year.

Bottom half. Michael Stefanic pinch running at second. Donovan Walton hits one out to right. Walk off, 6 to 5, and I was yelling at nobody in my living room.

Walton had three hits. Butler had three hits. Fourteen as a team, which for this lineup in September is basically a parade.

And Wednesday, the one nobody saw

Wednesday afternoon against Toronto, 89 degrees, 7,217 people in the stands. Brady Basso threw four shutout innings. Henry Bolte hit his tenth homer in the third. Walton drove in another run with a fly ball to right in the fourth. Scott Blewett, Luis Medina, Harris and Alvarado finished it off, and that's a 2 to 0 shutout and two of three from the Blue Jays after that flat Tuesday night.

Nobody talks about that game. I'm going to, because five pitchers combined on a shutout for a 59 win team and it deserves one paragraph somewhere.

61 and 89

Three and one since the last time I wrote a game column about this team, with a 19 to 1 sitting right in the middle of it like a stain. Two of three from a Mariners club that's six back of the last wild card and needed these games a whole lot more than we did. I liked that part more than I should.

Butler's up to 16 homers. Gelof has 18. Langeliers is swinging again, which I didn't expect when I wrote the September update. And the walk offs keep coming, McNeil last Monday, Walton Friday, Butler Sunday, in a minor league ballpark in a season that ended months ago.

Off day Monday, then Tampa, and the Rays have already won 90. It'll probably get ugly. I'll be watching anyway.

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