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Seattle Mariners

Mariners’ win streak snapped with walkoff loss to the White Sox in 10 innings

Seattle's Trent Thornton delivers a pitch in Wednesday's 5-4 loss to the White Sox in Chicago.  (Getty Images)
By Ryan Divish Seattle Times

CHICAGO – The winning run at third base with no outs, or the bases empty with one out in a tie game in the bottom of the 10th inning?

The decision was all about the possible reward of having a chance to win the game. The only risk would be not trying to make a play and delay the looming if not likely defeat.

It’s the sort of play that gets made when your team has won eight in a row and seemingly can do no wrong.

Seeing that Tim Anderson, the Chicago White Sox’s automatic runner to start the extra inning, was taking liberties with a massive secondary lead after every bunt attempt by teammate Elvis Andrus, J.P. Crawford broke for second base awaiting a pickoff throw from Cal Raleigh.

When Raleigh fired to Crawford at second, Anderson didn’t even think of retreating back, knowing he was out, so he sprinted for third base.

With no time to get a good angle to throw to Eugenio Suarez at third, Crawford got rid of it as fast as possible, hoping to get it over the shoulder of Anderson and to Suarez to make the tag.

Instead, the throw grazed the back of Anderson’s helmet as he was about to start a headfirst slide. It ricocheted over by the White Sox dugout, allowing Anderson to race home with the game-winning run and a 5-4 victory.

“As runners are taught, you kind of go toward the (fielder’s) glove because that’s where the ball is going to end up,” manager Scott Servais said. “And unfortunately, the ball hit him. It was a big break for them today.”

With Texas having a rare off day on a Wednesday, Seattle fell to 1½ games back in the American League West.

It appeared the Seattle Mariners’ eight-game winning streak was destined to end in the sweltering afternoon heat. Given their lack of offense that left them trailing through the game, the stirring three-run rally in the top of the ninth inning to take the lead and then failing to close it out in regulation made the ending on an error seem anti-climactic.

“He was already three-quarters of the way there,” Crawford said. “I tried to make something out of nothing. I was just trying to get an out. I shouldn’t have thrown that ball. I was just trying to go for it all.”

If Crawford doesn’t attempt the throw, Anderson is at third base with no outs and Andrus, Luis Robert Jr. and Eloy Jimenez batting in the inning. The White Sox are bad, but the likelihood of the heart of their lineup finding a way to score that run was high.

He’s made that throw before and probably should try it again in the same situation.

That the Mariners were even in that situation spoke to their resiliency as a team and also their failures to do much early in the game under less-than-ideal conditions.

Down 3-1, with uniforms heavy and sweat-soaked, a product of the sunny and sweltering sauna they were playing in at Guaranteed Rate Field with temperature reaching 99 and the heat index saying it felt 110, it would’ve been easy for thoughts of postgame air conditioning and an upcoming night at home to stifle the motivation to grind out one more inning of at-bats.

Realistically, the road trip was already a success. After all, baseball doesn’t let even the best teams win every game.

Not this team. Not these players.

“It kind of looked like we’re down and out there,” Servais said. “With this team, and why I love this team, we never quit. They don’t care who’s on the mound, what the situation is, how tired guys are at the end of a trip, It’d been very easy just to pack it in today and say, ‘yeah, we had a great trip.’ Our guys don’t do that. We fight till the end and we found a way to get the lead.”

The Mariners simply wouldn’t surrender to the conditions or the broken team that was beating them.

It started with Josh Rojas’ one-out single to right field off hard-throwing reliever Gregory Santos. Raleigh singled to left field to put the tying run on base. Crawford worked a walk to load the bases and Santos hit Julio Rodriguez in the forearm with a 100-mph fastball to force across a run that cut the lead to 3-2.

Suarez gave the Mariners their first lead of the game, lining a single to center that scored Raleigh and Crawford.

Nine wins in a row loomed.

However, Andres Munoz struggled in another save situation, unable to keep his slider out of the middle of the plate.

After getting up 0-2 on Oscar Colas with a pair of sliders, Munoz went to the pitch again and it stayed in the middle of the plate. Colas punched a double to right field to put the tying run on base.

After striking out Trayce Thompson, Munoz got up 1-2 on pinch-hitter Andrew Benintendi on four fastballs. He went back to the slider and left it up in the zone. Benintendi hit a line drive single to right field. Colas scored from second, just beating the throw from Teoscar Hernandez and tying the game.

Munoz retired the next two batters with strikeouts, but the Mariners were forced to play to another inning in the heat.

Having used all of his bench players already, Servais was forced to use Mike Ford, who made the last out of the ninth inning, as the automatic runner in the 10th. That proved costly as he failed to score from second Rojas’ bloop single to right field. When Crawford worked a walk off left Edgar Navarro, it loaded the bases for Julio Rodriguez with two outs. But his comebacker to the mound was gloved for the final out of the inning.

The White Sox scored three runs off Seattle starter George Kirby. He gave up a run in the first inning but didn’t allow a run over the next four innings. In the sixth, he gave up two-out single to Colas and then watched as Trayce Thompson was able to turn a slider on the outside corner into a two-run homer to left field. It left Kirby shaking his head and ended his outing.

“It’s exactly where I wanted a 3-2 slider,” Kirby said. “No one usually hits a home run on that. He made a better swing. It’s tough when that last one sends me out of the game.”

The Mariners first run didn’t come until the seventh inning. Trailing 3-0, pinch-hitter Jose Caballero worked a walk off White Sox left reliever Aaron Bummer. Taking advantage of Bummer’s slow delivery to home plate, Caballero stole second and then stole third with relative ease.

With Caballero at third base, left-handed hitting Josh Rojas worked a 3-1 count and then dropped down a perfect drag bunt that rolled in the area between the pitcher’s mound and first base with a play not even made.