How Seattle Mariners' ALDS vs Detroit Tigers will be won

I was all ready to whip up some flowery prose, some grand proclamation about writing your own history, but it feels like it’s just time to get down to business. Maybe it’s the five days off, which is essentially eight since the Seattle Mariners haven’t played a meaningful game since clinching the No. 2 seed on Sept. 25.

Seattle Mariners’ Bryan Woo has ‘positive’ throwing session

Whatever it is, let’s just get right to it. Here are the forces at play that will decide the ALDS between the Mariners and No. 6 seed Detroit Tigers.

Rest v. Momentum

The rest during the wild card round was pivotal for the Mariners, and on paper it gives them a massive advantage when it comes to lining up their rotation for the ALDS. Plus, it gets that guy who caught 120 games this year off his feet for a few days before he gets called upon to catch every inning of every postseason game.

Yet we have seen teams that win a Wild Card Series, especially when they have been on the road for a while, conjure up playoff magic. The 2023 Texas Rangers are the shining example. Texas played its final seven games of the regular season on the road and flew right to Tampa to start the postseason. Fifteen days and four straight road wins later, they returned home with a 2-0 lead in the ALDS and rolled all the way to a World Series title.

The Tigers have been on the road since Sept. 22. Whether they’re broken down and tired or a team that found its flow state will go a long way towards determining who wins this series.

The impact bat

• Julio Rodriguez

Everything about Julio says superstar, and while Cal Raleigh’s pursuit of home run history grabbed the headlines during the second half of the season, it was Julio who emerged as an incomparable force in the Mariners’ lineup. His 3.8 fWAR since July 11 leads baseball, and it’s that stretch beginning in Detroit – where he hit a home run in every game of Seattle’s series sweep – where Julio showed how vital he is to the Mariners.

A strikeout rate of 21.4% is the lowest of Julio’s career, and he is just one of seven players in MLB this season to put up a 30 home run/30 stolen base season. With the attention that Raleigh has garnered from opposing pitchers this year, which will be amplified even more in the postseason, Julio is situated in the perfect spot behind him in the lineup. And all of that is just his impact on offense. Factor in what should be a Gold Glove-winning season in center field and Julio stands as the player most consequential to the Mariners’ postseason success.

• Kerry Carpenter

He is a direct descendant of Babe Ruth – no actual evidence proves this, but his career against the Mariners would have you fooled – and has the ability to break open a game for the Tigers’ lineup. In six career games at T-Mobile Park, Carpenter rocks a .381/.381/.857 slash line for a 1.238 OPS with three homers and nine RBIs. He missed a month during the season with a hamstring injury, which included the July 11-13 series in Detroit when the Tigers were swept by the Mariners.

Game 1

The Tigers have essentially waved the white flag for Game 1. They simply don’t have any starting pitching available after having to use their three main starters – reigning Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal, 2025 All-Star Casey Mize and veteran Jack Flaherty – to get through the Guardians in the ALWCS. The Mariners have better pitching depth, but the off days built into a series negates that advantage after this first game.

Skubal is likely to start Game 2 and a series-deciding Game 5 (if there is one). Simply put, Seattle can’t let it get that far.

Winning the opener goes a long way for both teams, but it takes on paramount importance for the Mariners. Sure, they have had relative success against Skubal twice this year, but believe it at your own peril that what happened during the regular season will have any correlation on the playoffs, especially after Skubal was transcendent in his 14-strikeout performance against the Guardians. That didn’t really look like a guy you’d want to face twice in a five-game series.

Therein lies the double-edged sword and why Game 1 looms large in a positive way as well for the Mariners. Win the opener and all the pressure is on the Tigers and Skubal to deliver a win in Game 2. Replicate that regular season success, and all of a sudden the Tigers are heading home on the brink of elimination.

A week of waiting has built up to this moment. Is it Saturday yet?

How Seattle Mariners’ ALDS vs Detroit Tigers will be won

Tags: