Except that our manager will still be here in 2025.
To be a born-and-bred Red Sox fan living in the land of the AL West is sometimes a strange experience. I live in Seattle these days, and there are crossovers between the Sox and the Mariners, sure. They both have passionate fans. Within recent history, these teams have experienced high highs and low lows. The teams and fanbases, despite reason for despair along the way, both seem to have a deep yearning to win and to be taken seriously. The ultimate Red Sox/Mariners crossover has to be the Jason Varitek/Derek Lowe trade that brought these pivotal players to Boston in 1997. The teams’ 2024 fortunes though, have roughly paralleled each other, for a lot of the season, in big and small ways.
In the early days of the 2024 season, it was a heady experience, a carnival ride that pulled out of the gate fast, whisking us away, high above everyone else.
Here in Seattle, the season began with some flash and some new mascots. Opening day involved a ceremonial contract and retirement, the return of Nelson Cruz, King Felix and Ichiro, the awarding of the Silver Slugger to Julio Rodríguez, and Humpy the salmon’s first unsuccessful race around the field perimeter. And Seattle took off hot.
It was a shock because the AL West was supposed to be dominated by the WS-champion Texas Rangers and the perennially contending Houston Astros. Both of those teams started out quiet for a number of reasons. It was remarked on around town here: people wondered how long it could last, but Seattle was at the top, by even as much as ten games! Even when they lost, no one cared that much. I’ve been to many Mariners games this season and when Cubs fans unfurled their W flags during a Mariners home loss, Mariners fans allowed themselves to look the other way. Turned the other cheek. Let them have their silly flags; we have arguably the best pitching in the league. Plus Cal Raleigh, clutch masher of home runs. Plus the Salmon Run.
Yes, people commented to themselves, and to coworkers, and in all the other places where people talk about such things, that it was kinda funny, it sure was odd that the Astros couldn’t get it together. But oh well, that was their problem!
Photo by Stephen Brashear/Getty Images
Meanwhile, the Red Sox also got off to a bang-bang start and shocked everyone in the process. In fact, the Sox kicked off the season here in Seattle and they split the series. There was no obvious “plus” in our column (unlike the Mariners pitching), we just went out and did…very unexpected things. Our pitching was…great? Our speed was on display. Offense was clicking. Our defense was absolutely dreadful so that was a real concern but there were many, many unexpected bonuses in the first half of the season. To name just a few: the emergence of Jarren Duran and Tanner Houck as soon-to-be All Stars, Andrew Bailey’s magical turnaround of our pitching staff, Ceddanne Rafaela’s glove tricks in both center field and at shortstop, where he saved our asses a whole bunch in April and May. Even guys like David Hamilton, who had a really rough start and took all kinds of abuse for it (some of it from me) made clear improvements. Bit players like Romy Gonzalez, Enmanuel Valdez, Garrett Cooper, and others had big moments in the sun.
We were riding on clouds in Boston and Seattle. The sky was the limit. Except that we were both looking over our shoulders a little bit, weren’t we? The Red Sox had the huge and unwelcome reality check of Trevor Story going down with an awful injury. Ditto Triston Casas. Mariners fans, despite the joy of owning a huge lead—and beating the Astros at home several times—seemed to know, underneath, that it couldn’t last. Maybe there was even an understanding that they were getting away with something, and it was a matter of time before they got caught, like a puppy hiding a shoe. As long as they can’t find us, they can’t catch us!
With some hindsight, we can all see that these beautifully puffy clouds were artificially inflated.
Here’s what happened: injuries struck in Seattle: J-Rod, who’d never caught fire in 2024 like you’d expect, went down with a calf injury. J.P. Crawford, who also wasn’t his usual self, suffered an unfortunate HBP that broke his hand. There was a wishing for them to get better—to be better—that both underscored fans’ desperation and fed it. The collective thinking was: If only our best players were at 100%, then we’d really take off. People tended to overlook that most of the players were at their personal 100% but it just wasn’t good enough. The double Mitches (Garver and Haniger) even if one of them is a fan favorite, are not going to emerge as a thing. Cal Raleigh hits homers when he can and calls a good game, but he can’t do it alone. The Mariners have been fielding designated hitters with batting averages in the low .200 range—or even below, and it’s really shocking—for several years now. So injuries to J-Rod and Crawford aren’t the only negatives at play here.
Over in Boston, we also had injuries galore that made us dig really deep, but it was the pitching that truly began to unravel. People have speculated that Andrew Bailey’s plan to throw fewer fastballs has been figured out by all the other teams, and wondered if he has anything else up his sleeve. The starters regressed (or returned to mean). The bullpen in particular has caused a lot of last-minute heartache.
Photo by G Fiume/Getty Images
That brought both teams to the trade deadline in similar positions. It was clear they both needed help if they were going to truly compete in the second half—presumably making themselves better, but also to avoid falling behind others who were confidently predicted to buy, and buy big. Looking at you, Orioles, Yankees, and Astros!
But there was a lot of Will they or won’t they? on both sides. Arguments were drawn up to go all in, to stand down, or even to sell. Both heads of baseball operations, Jerry Dipoto for the Mariners and Craig Breslow (new to the role but in some ways seen to follow a similarly conservative approach as his predecessor Chaim Bloom) are known for nibbling around the margins. Dipoto makes a ton of trades but rarely the blockbuster. Breslow may never get the chance to even think about that as the President of Baseball Operations for the Red Sox; his job is to wait around for the Big Three to mature and materialize as superstars while he makes minor “improvements” to the current team. I’m simplifying here, and I don’t want to take anything away from Breslow’s intellect or abilities, but let’s call this what it is. This is owner John Henry’s plan and it’s going quite well from his perspective. (Please god, it’s me again and don’t let him buy the Celtics. Please and thank you.)
So that’s where the two teams stood as they headed toward the All-Star break and trade deadline. And here’s where they began to differ in significant ways.
The Mariners were aggressive at the trade deadline. They knew they needed offense, and they went after it: Randy Arozarena and Justin Turner (who I’d hoped the Sox might re-sign). They also acquired two bullpens arms. Their trade deadline was a splash and they made their intentions clear.
Photo by Brian Rothmuller/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images
The Sox went a different route. Yes, they addressed needs, mostly pitching, but again, they bit around the edges, sometimes even taking low-hanging fruit that didn’t even involve a trade. You already know I’m talking about James Paxton, who’d been DFA’ed by the Dodgers, and that’s prime Red Sox territory these days. I hated this move immediately because…James Paxton? Yes, the oft-injured James Paxton. And now the Red Sox and Mariners are both members of the Fool Me Twice Big Maple Club, in that his second stints with both teams were disasters (he threw just 24 pitches for the Mariners in 2021 before going down with an injury that lasted through the rest of his one-year contract). The Mariners at least had a decent first run with him (including a no-hitter) that enticed them to invite him back, something the Sox simply cannot say.
So we know Paxton didn’t work out (and the Dodgers are snickering even now). But our other trades haven’t either.
Our deadline is being called a failure in some quarters, and for all their splash and willingness to jump in with both feet, it’s the same with the Mariners. Is it that the new players haven’t worked out, or that the Mariners simply didn’t take care of business because they didn’t plug all the holes? Also, the Astros came back to life, like we knew they would. The Mariners lost their lead in the division and are currently 7.5 games behind in the chase for the Wild Card.
The Sox once led by as many as two games for the Wild Card. As improbable as that was—and everybody said so and knew it to be true—we got caught up in it, but it slipped through our collective fingers. We currently sit at 3.5 games behind in that race. MLB has dubbed each team one of the “biggest fallers” in the playoff hunt. The Sox odds of making the postseason have declined about 20%. For the Mariners, it’s more than 30%. It’s increasingly doubtful that either team will play in October.
Duran and Houck are symbolic of this post-All-Star break return to earth for the Sox. Duran in particular ignited a firestorm that won’t be forgotten in a hurry, one that left a bad taste in a lot of mouths. The Red Sox as an organization deserve to share in that for the way they handled the situation. Neither the player nor the team looked like they were in the driver’s seat, as they had seemed to be earlier in the season.
This is probably the point in the carnival ride where you start to feel a little tired of it. Or is it just me? You can see your friends—your sensible friends who didn’t get on the ride—waiting down below. They flash into your line of vision every time the ride swoops over in their direction and then they’re gone again, as the G-force yanks you back and you have to hang on and move your hair out of your mouth and not let your sunglasses and whatever else fly away. Swoop, up high, swoop, down low, swoop, away in another direction.
Many Sox fans still seem to think that there’s a chance. Despite a tricky and difficult upcoming schedule, we might sweep the Twins; we can root for Bobby Witt, Jr. and the Royals to fail…there are pathways, yes. Despite the series win against the Astros, these pathways may be increasingly less likely. But hope is technically alive!
The atmosphere around Seattle is a little darker. The feeling is that the Mariners have reached the end of their 2024 rope. It feels over, way over. I went to a game about ten days ago, and the Mariners were never in it; they were completely overmatched by the in-control Tigers. The fans, to their credit on a Tuesday night, stayed until the end, but instead of the good-natured optimism from earlier in the season, there was a grimness, an I’ll believe it when I see it stubbornness. At least, that’s what kept my friends in their seats. They’d declared they were going to leave in the eighth inning because they couldn’t take it anymore, but when the eighth came, they crossed their arms, grimaced, and stayed in place. I’m here, but boy this sucks. That’s the attitude in Seattle.
Maybe we’ll be pleasantly surprised, in either city, or both. I noted on our writers’ Slack channel the other day that “nothing says September like somebody tanking somewhere,” so someone else’s misfortunes could help us out. But that’s a slim thread to root for. Don’t get me wrong; I will be rooting for that, or for whatever it takes.
As I wrote this article, it was announced that the Mariners fired manager Scott Servais. We already know this is one Mariners path that the Red Sox won’t follow, due to Alex Cora’s contract extension. And who knows where the Mariners might go from here?
So far, they’ve been a few steps ahead of us all along—with the Paxton second-signing fiasco, make that a few seasons ahead of us. Except for the new manager, we might still end up in similar places, even if the Sox look as though they may drag it out for dramatic purposes, as they tend to do. It was a lot of fun while it lasted, but less fun the longer it lasted, and ultimately (I predict) exhausting.
We’ll stagger away from the carnival ride, breathless, hair messed up, checking and adjusting our pockets, purses, and glasses to make sure we didn’t lose anything really important. The up-and-down is starting to take its toll. It seems like ages ago when it still felt fun and exciting (it was only mid-July, for godsakes) but I can’t help thinking about when the ride comes back down to earth, and they let us go.
It’s already happened in Seattle, unless the managerial change really turns them around.