Seattle Mariners In A Familiar Position as Postseason Looms
There's no two ways about it. The Seattle Mariners are playing for their season.
The Mariners fell to 6.5 games behind for the third American League Wild Card spot and 5.0 games behind the Houston Astros in the American League West with their 3-0 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Monday.
Seattle has its work cut out for it. Even if the Mariners were to manage to claw back and tie with the Boston Red Sox and Kansas City Royals for the Wild Card spot, or the Astros for the AL West crown, two of the three teams own tiebreakers over Seattle.
It's a bad spot for the Mariners to be in. But it's not an unfamiliar one.
Seattle was 7.5 games back of first place in the AL West on Aug. 17, 2023. By Aug. 27. 2023, the Mariners clawed back to claim the top spot in the division.
A lot of things had to work together for Seattle to work itself to that point. The team had a weak strength of schedule that helped aid the reclaiming of the top spot in the division.
That lead didn't end up holding and the Mariners were eliminated from playoff contention on the second-to-last day of the season after a 6-1 loss to Texas and a Houston won 1-0 against the Arizona Diamondbacks on Sept. 30, 2023.
The Mariners are in the middle of one of their most disappointing stretches to date and are 1-6 on their road trip. Five of those losses included getting swept by the Detroit Tigers and a series loss against the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Seattle has two more games left against Los Angeles before returning home for a six-game homestead against the San Francisco Giants and the Tampa Bay Rays. The Astros have two more games against the Red Sox, then series against the Baltimore Orioles, Philadelphia Phillies and Royals coming up after that.
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