Seattle Mariners Manager Comments on Team's Late-Season Abilities
SEATTLE — The Seattle Mariners have won three-out-of-four and moved to within 3.5 games of the Houston Astros for first place in the American League West in the first few contests of Dan Wilson's managerial tenure.
The Mariners struggled for a lot of the last two months after they were up by 10 games in the division in mid-June.
Seattle has 30 games left in the season as of Tuesday and need a lot to go right to secure its second postseason berth in three years.
But it's not an unfamiliar position for the Mariners.
Each of the 2021, 2022 and 2023 seasons Seattle has had to push to make the postseason. In all three years — the Mariners' postseason fate wasn't decided until the final days of the season.
That kind of experience has kept Seattle focused on improving on itself rather than scoreboard-watching as the season nears its conclusion.
"We're in a chasing scenario," Wilson said in a pregame interview Tuesday. "But I think the emphasis really is — it doesn't really work to concentrate on who's up ahead of you. It's about what's going on here and the guys here have really been tremendous. I think the focus is getting ourselves right and just coming out every night and battling as hard as we can for nine. And when we get close to the end of the season, we'll look up and see where we are. There's no mentality of chasing. It's just a mentality of coming out here every night, giving our best effort and giving 100%."
The Mariners have shown extra aggression on the base paths and a renewed focus at the plate with two-strike approaches that has paid dividends in the few games Wilson has managed the team.
With Seattle's experience in trying to gain ground at this point in the year — and the team's apparent buy-in to Wilson's philosophies — the postseason is looking more and more likely.
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