{"id":4250,"date":"2022-09-26T00:34:46","date_gmt":"2022-09-26T00:34:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/?p=4250"},"modified":"2022-09-26T00:34:46","modified_gmt":"2022-09-26T00:34:46","slug":"mariners-stumble-home-after-a-disaster-of-a-road-trip-still-alive-in-the-playoff-hunt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/?p=4250","title":{"rendered":"Mariners stumble home after a disaster of a road trip, still alive in the playoff hunt"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

TERRY MOSHER<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TOP OF THE TOWN <\/strong>\u2011 Suddenly things are falling apart of the miracle run of the Seattle Mariners. Poised to take perhaps the top Wild Card spot in the American League, the mariners go on a 10-game road trip against three of the worse teams in the league, planning on padding their 80-62 record and make the playoffs for the first time since 2001 when they won a baseball record 116 games, tying the 2009 Chicago Cubs who also won 116 games, only in 154 games instead of the 162 for the Mariners. The Mariners that year also established a record for winning 59 games by 4 or more runs. So what happened on this supposed easy trip through the California Angels (67-86), Oakland Athletics (56-97) and the Kansas City Royals (63-90)? Well, the Mariners lost 3 of 4 to the Angels, two of three to Oakland and all three to the Royals, including the game Sunday (Sept. 25) when they held a 9-0 lead after four innings, 11-2 after five and lost 13-12 surrendering 11 runs in the sixth inning, Now they come limping home for their last 10 games of the regular season, three against Texas Tuesday-Thursday (Sept). 27-29, three against Oakland (Sept. 30-Oct 2) and the final four against Detroit (3-5) with a doubleheader set for Oct. 4). All three teams have a losing record, but as the just completed road trip suggests, that doesn\u2019t matter. The Mariners are playing hurt. Luis Suarez, who has a club\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 -leading 31 home runs, has been out with a broken finger, but is expected back for Tuesday\u2019s game with Texas. Julio Rodriquez, who may be named the American League rookie of the year, is on the 10 day injury list with a bad back and can come back for the Detroit series. Catcher Cal Raleigh has a sore thumb (he came out of the game Sunday) and is day-to-day. He has a franchise record 25 home runs for a catcher. Jesse Winker was hurt in Sunday\u2019s game and his status is unknown. So here the Mariners (83-69) are sitting in the third AL Wild Card spot four games up on the 79-73 Baltimore (they also have the tie-breaker against Baltimore) with 10 to go. The magic number to make the playoffs is six, six wins or three wins and three Baltimore losses. The Orioles play four on the road against Boston and three against the Yankees and then three home against Toronto. So the Mariners have the advantage, but as this last road trip hints at you never know. It\u2019s now up to the Mariners to get back on track. They have Monday off to get their mind right. \u2026As for the Seahawks, this season looks bleak. They lost Sunday to the equally sad Atlanta Hawks at Lumen Field and now they go to Detroit and New Orleans for their next two games. It\u2019s going to be a long season and you might want to schedule a nap during their games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TERRY MOSHER   TOP OF THE TOWN \u2011 Suddenly things are falling apart of the miracle run of the Seattle…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-column","category-mosher"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4250"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4250\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4251,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4250\/revisions\/4251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}