Mariners Run Wild, Rout Rangers 15-3

Late in the game, the Seattle Mariners sent batters to the plate one at a time - they only seemed to come in waves.

Eight of them in the seventh inning. Fourteen more in the eighth. Nine in the ninth.

By the time Texas had recorded the last nine outs, 24 Mariners reached base and 15 scored. It wasn’t so much a rally as a Seattle stampede.

One of the more remarkable first weeks in Seattle history added another chapter, turning a 1-0 seventh-inning Texas lead into an eventual 15-3 Mariners victory that left the team atop the American League West with a 5-1 record. Good start?

“A good start is when you’re so far ahead nobody can catch you,” Ken Griffey Jr. said. “We ain’t there, yet.”

But they’re working on it.

Ranger Kevin Gross thought he’d slowed them down a bit, taking that 1-0 shutout into the seventh inning, having out-lasted Randy Johnson and allowed Seattle one hit. When he gave up a walk and two singles, Gross was lifted - and like Johnson, watched the unfathomable final innings on television.

“We went from a nail-biter to a blowout,” manager Lou Piniella said. “I don’t care who you are, you walk 13 men in a game and you’re going to lose.”

The first seven Mariners to bat in the seventh inning reached base - yet Seattle was lucky to come up with two runs because Griffey was caught stealing and Jay Buhner was thrown out at the plate during that rally.

And in their half of the seventh, Texas rallied for one run off Ron Villone to tie it 2-2.

All the wasted Seattle motion in the seventh seemed like good practice by the eighth. During that eighth-inning rally:

Buhner’s sacrifice bunt moved runners into scoring position and, given another second at-bat, he singled home two runs.

Edgar Martinez walked twice.

Joey Cora had a good game in the inning - singling, doubling, scoring two runs and driving in a third.

Seattle rallied again in the ninth. Junior, the designated hitter because of an upset stomach, watched from the dugout.

“What was I thinking? I was thinking, ‘Damn, it’s fun being on this end of one of these games,”’ Griffey said. “I remember Detroit beating us 18-4 or something like that.”

No one could remember a Mariners finish like this one. No one tried.

“Until it got away, we did some small things right,” Piniella said. “We kept it close.”

Little things like rookie left fielder Darren Bragg throwing a Ranger out at the plate when Texas had a 1-0 lead in the sixth inning. Like reliever Nelson, coming in with the bases loaded and Seattle ahead, 2-1, and getting two outs while the Rangers forged a tie with a grounder to shortstop. Or like Buhner, the cleanup hitter, being asked to dump the sacrifice bunt.