Baseball does not have a firm foothold in the UK. While MLB has been holding short series in London for the last few years, taking the lead from the NFL in that respect, you are far more likely to find somebody more interested in offensive yards gained than batting averages.
To be a British baseball fan is to accept a certain amount of isolation. It becomes an idiosyncratic answer to questions at work about what sports I enjoy, evoking a mix of mild interest and puzzlement. Good for breaking the ice at a new job, not so good for having much of a shared basis for continued conversation.
In varying degrees of bluntness, I’m asked: “Why?” Why baseball?
And why, of all the teams to support and follow throughout a 162-game season, why the Seattle Mariners?
The West Coast of the USA is eight hours behind my home. Day games start at a respectful 6pm. More often, first pitch is around 2am. Even when I do find other baseball fans around me, or manage to successful instil a love for the game in my loved ones, most of the time my chosen team simply plays too late for watching to be a communal experience.
There has to be a reason for me to love the Mariners. Otherwise, why would I?
Like many others I was drawn to the Mariners by Jon Bois and Alex Rubenstein’s 2020 documentary. In the first couple years I downplayed how much this was the reason for my affinity for Seattle taking form, but I’ve since gotten over that. The portrait of the team in the 6-part, 3-and-a-half hour long documentary (since released in a single part for convenience) was compelling – a lovable underdog team with a lot of heart, rejecting the boom and bust of the rebuild cycle for something else. If you haven’t watched it, you should.
I did not want to watch the Yankees machine or the Angels clownshow – after running the team in OOTP a few times, I watched some games and fell in love.
The 4 years since then have shown that heart. Julio Rodriguez has shown he is every bit the superstar we wanted him to be. J.P. Crawford has risen to be the rock of the infield, the team’s emotional heart. Kyle Seager worked his arse off, putting his all into getting the Mariners back to the playoffs after a long drought, ultimately failing to do so before he retired. Mitch Haniger mashed, then left, and has now returned in 2024 as a much-needed injection of skill.
But now, the drought is over. The Mariners are no longer the team that didn’t make the playoffs in years. That’s a .500 or over team. Does the team’s heart survive not being an underdog anymore?
The 2023-4 offseason was poor – there’s no getting around it. Dreams of the Mariners competing for Ohtani’s signature proved to be just that, and aside from Mitch Garver the changes to the roster have been mostly without any real eyecatchers even with due respect given to the aforementioned returning veteran Haniger.
For me, the real heartbreaker was the loss of Jared Kelenic. A true development story, he struggled in the starting roster, was sent back to AAA, but then came up to be one of the surprise sparkplugs in the lineup. Seeing him grow and thrive despite his struggles – that was the heart of the Mariners. In the offseason, he was traded to the Atlanta Braves for Jackson Kowar and Cole Philips. Philips is in the minor leagues, and Kowar was diagnosed with a torn UCL before opening day. He won’t play this year.
That’s baseball for you, people will say. It felt like a stab in the heart. Perhaps the trade had more to do with his lengthy absence last season for a self-inflicted broken foot, obtained by kicking a water cooler in anger during a game. Or even the earlier contract disputes with the Mariners in 2020. To me, it was the end of a surprise story that could have caught my attention this season.
Because my expectations are low this season.
Let’s move to last night’s game – The Mariners hosted the Red Sox. Luis Castillo, the star of the Seattle starting rotation, started on the mound. He wasn’t that sharp, allowing six hits, two walks and four earned runs over five innings. The bullpen didn’t help much, allowing about two.
In the Mariners’ starting lineup, we saw a line drive double from Julio, another double from new acquisition Garver and home runs from Haniger and Dylan Moore. Otherwise? A game with a promising amount of pops off the bat, but ultimately a loss, 6-4.
There are 162 games in a baseball season. One loss doesn’t matter.
There has to be a reason for me to love the Mariners – otherwise, why would I? I don’t live in Seattle. It’s chronologically inconvenient. I don’t have a strong baseball fan community here. The team is not going to win the World Series.
This year, the Mariners will demonstrate that reason again. And I, in a meandering, diarising blog post like this one, will share it with you. After every game.
There will be more about the game tomorrow, but this one was written hungover.
Natalie O'Connor 