Mariners' magic runs out as Blue Jays hold on to win series opener in Seattle

Tim Booth, The Seattle Times on May 10, 2025

Published in Baseball

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SEATTLE — There were fewer neighbors from north of the 49th parallel inside T-Mobile Park on Friday night.

They were still the ones left cheering the most at the end.

While it wasn’t a full-on takeover of the ballpark as it’s been in the past, the Canadian visitors in town to see their team were rewarded as the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Seattle Mariners 6-3 in the opener of their three-game weekend series.

M’s starter Luis Castillo struggled to get through five innings and was tagged for five runs. Castillo’s velocity was down, his location wasn’t great and the Blue Jays took advantage.

The loss also saw the return of the Mariners failing to come through with the bases loaded and no outs in the eighth inning with former M’s reliever Yimi García seemingly on the verge of a meltdown.

Trailing 5-3, Julio Rodríguez opened the eighth inning with a blistered single on a 1-2 pitch and after the Blue Jays’ dugout barked at home plate umpire Nic Lentz that Rodríguez should have been out on the previous pitch.

García was rattled and walked Cal Raleigh on four pitches and threw just one strike to Randy Arozarena to load the bases with no outs.

Miles Mastrobuoni was called upon to pinch-hit for Donovan Solano and hit a liner that Vladimir Guerrero Jr. initially dropped at first base, only to quickly recover to get the force out on Rodríguez at home as all the runners held up initially.

García then struck out Leody Taveras and Dylan Moore and left the Blue Jays fans as the only ones cheering.

While the influx of Canadians making the trek down wasn’t near as overwhelming as previous years, there were still a decent amount of Blue Jays hats and jerseys and at least one Canadian flag out in right field. But what was a clear Toronto home game in the past wasn’t the case this time. It even seemed like there were more M’s than Blue Jays fans among the announced crowd of 31,564, which hasn’t happened when Toronto is visiting since … when?

There wasn’t much reason to cheer early on for M’s fans as Castillo was in trouble right from the start.

Castillo was forced into deep counts, which quickly elevated his pitch count. When he did find the zone, there were too many pitches in spots where Toronto batters could get the barrel to the ball.

His velocity was also noticeably down from his average for the season. His mix of pitches is at its best if hitters must respect a fastball that’s sitting 95 or 96 mph for most of the night.

Against the Blue Jays, Castillo’s four-seam fastball averaged 1.2 mph slower than his overall average for the season, per MLB Statcast. His sinker was 1.5 mph slower and Castillo didn’t throw a single pitch that reached 95 mph.

Addison Barger’s two-run double in the first inning came on a changeup left up in the zone. His double with two outs in the third came on a middle fastball and sparked a three-run rally. Ernie Clement followed with an RBI single and Nathan Lukes, with only three extra-base hits on the season, turned on a belt-high fastball on the inner half of the plate and just cleared the fence in right field to give Toronto a 5-0 lead.

J.P. Crawford extended his hitting streak to 16 games with a single in the third inning, the frame where the M’s finally got to Toronto starter Kevin Gausman for a run on Jorge Polanco’s RBI single.

But the Mariners struggled to extend any rallies against Gausman in part because of Toronto’s defense. Rodríguez scorched a 111-mph pitch with runners at the corner and two outs in the third inning, only to watch Barger leap and snatch the liner out of the air to save at least one run.

In the fifth, Ben Williamson’s bid for his first career homer at T-Mobile Park was denied when Daulton Varsho jumped at the wall in center field and pulled back Williamson’s drive. And three pitches later, a Crawford liner toward left-center field was snagged out of the air by Bo Bichette.

The M’s finally found grass in the sixth inning and ended Gausman’s night. Three straight hits by Rodríguez, Raleigh and Arozarena scored one run. Solano struck out in an ugly at-bat, but Taveras picked up his first hit at home with the Mariners with a double to score another. The rally ended with Moore striking out swinging against reliever Brendon Little and runners at second and third.

The M’s finished 3 for 11 with runners in scoring position.