Seattle Mariners: What if the M’s won Game 4 of the 2001 ALCS?
Ed Stein
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In 2001, the Seattle Mariners won 116 games. They never made it to the World Series, losing to New York in the ALCS. An eighth-inning Yankees home run was the turning point. “What if it didn’t happen?”
“You take the blue pill… the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want. You take the red pill… you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.” – Morpheus from the Matrix. In our next red pill installment, we ask, What if the Seattle Mariners won Game 4 of the 2001 ALCS?
Being a manager or coach is an invitation to be second-guessed. For the overall majority of 2001, Seattle Mariners manager Lou Piniella pushed all the right buttons at the time they needed to be pushed. After all, his team won an American League record 116 regular season games. But a pitching-change decision he made in Game 4 sunk his team.
Let’s set the stage. After their record-setting season, the Mariners beat Cleveland 3-2 in the ALDS to advance to the American League Championship Series against the three-time defending World Series Champion New York Yankees.
New York won Games 1 and 2 in Seattle before the Mariners came back to win Game 3 at Yankee Stadium 14-3. Series momentum was on the verge of changing.
Game 4
If Game 3 featured an offensive explosion, the bats were quiet in Game 4. Through seven innings, the game was scoreless, and each team had only one hit (although Mariners pitchers gave up ten walks). In the top of the eighth, Mariners’ second baseman, Bret Boone, hit a solo home run to put his team up 1-0.
Going into the bottom of the eighth with a 1-0 lead, Piniella pulled Jeff Nelson, who pitched 1.2 stellar innings in relief. I know why Piniella did what he did next, but it’s a decision that haunts Seattle Mariners fans to this day.