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If there have been a great blueprint for the Mariners’ first playoff sport since 2001, it will have included dominant pitching, good protection, and simply sufficient offense to come back away with a win. They executed that plan to perfection on Friday afternoon, defeating the Blue Jays, 4–0, within the first sport of their Wild Card Sequence matchup. Luis Castillo was in full management over his 7.1 innings pitched, people hero Cal Raleigh hit a two-run dwelling run within the first inning, and Andrés Muñoz slammed the door within the ninth.
The formidable Blue Jays offense by no means threatened to interrupt by towards Seattle’s flame-throwing duo, who scattered seven hits all through the sport; Toronto’s solely extra-base hit got here with two outs within the ninth inning. A pair of two-out base hits put runners on first and second within the third and once more within the fifth, however Castillo escaped these jams with ease.
It was a little bit of an atypical begin for the right-hander, who struck out simply 5 Blue Jays, three of them coming within the seventh inning. Toronto’s batters had the fifth-lowest strikeout charge and the seventh-lowest chase charge within the majors this 12 months; they’re a troublesome bunch to whiff. As an alternative of mowing down the opposition with swings and misses, Castillo pitched to the sides of the strike zone, content material to let opposing batters attain for pitches. The outcome: tons of weak contact. He allowed 22 balls to be put in play with a mean exit velocity of simply 82.6 mph and solely six registering as laborious hit.
All that weak contact allowed Castillo to be environment friendly along with his pitch depend: He by no means threw greater than 20 pitches in a single body and cruised into the eighth inning. He ended up throwing 108 pitches within the sport, 30% of which had been referred to as or swinging strikes. Plunking George Springer in a 1–2 depend with one out within the eighth proved to be Castillo’s finish, however Muñoz entered and retired Bo Bichette and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. en path to a five-out save. His solely blemish was a two-out double by Matt Chapman within the ninth.
Between the 2 of them, Castillo and Muñoz fired 71 fastballs within the sport; all however two of them had been 97 mph or sooner. Castillo averaged 98.6 mph on his four-seamer and sinker, repeatedly hitting triple-digits with each pitches, and Muñoz averaged 101.9 on his heater. The Blue Jays couldn’t deal with the warmth or the placement. Check out Castillo’s pitch chart:
There’s nary a pitch within the coronary heart of the zone, with loads of four-seamers and sinkers dotted on the sting.
It was apparent from the get-go that Castillo was feeling good. The speed on all of his pitches was up over his season norms, and that increase lasted all through the sport. His sinker carried an extra two inches of arm-side run on the evening, and his four-seamer noticed 4 additional inches of horizontal break. That elevated motion mixed along with his impeccable command meant the Blue Jays had no probability to barrel up something.
After the game, Whit Merrifield broke down precisely what he and his teammates had been up towards:
“Properly, the rate is what it’s. We’re used to seeing velocity. However when he’s obtained two completely different fastballs at that degree, he has a sinker pounding out your fingers at 99 to 100, after which he has the four-seam that he’ll throw up and away. You’re going to need to decide on what that 100 mph pitch goes to do, and that’s what makes it robust. He did a superb job of holding that four-seam away and holding that two-seam in in your fingers all sport.”
The outcome was plenty of swings that regarded like this:
Unfair ? pic.twitter.com/DtDsp0pdYx
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) October 8, 2022
Issues had been stress free for Castillo, too, because the Mariners obtained on the board straight away with three runs within the prime of the primary. Blue Jays starter Alek Manoah was uncharacteristically wild, hitting Julio Rodríguez on the forearm with the fourth pitch of the sport and driving the subsequent pitch up underneath Ty France’s chin. As he did all through Seattle’s second-half surge, Eugenio Suárez drove in Rodríguez with a one-out double into the suitable discipline nook. The following batter, Raleigh, dumped a center-cut sinker over the fence in proper to push the result in 3–0. After a breakout season on the plate, Raleigh reached hero standing in Seattle when he launched the house run that clinched the group’s first postseason berth in twenty years. His homer right now won’t be as memorable, but it surely was simply as impactful.
LET’S GOOOOOO pic.twitter.com/Os67PgMJ6S
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) October 7, 2022
Manoah largely settled down after that tough first. He struck out Rodríguez with one out and two males on within the second inning, then flew by the third and fourth, notching six straight outs. The Mariners added a run within the fifth on a fielder’s alternative from Suárez, as soon as once more scoring Rodríguez, who had as soon as once more been hit by a pitch. Regardless of having thrown simply 79 pitches, Manoah’s day got here to an finish within the sixth after recording two fast outs, with supervisor John Schneider pulling him forward of a trio of lefties due up for Seattle. 5 completely different relievers completed out the sport for Toronto.
This was precisely the type of efficiency the Mariners had been hoping to get out of Castillo after they traded for him on the deadline after which signed him to a five-year extension earlier than the tip of the season. With one other Seattle win on Saturday, he’ll get an opportunity to do it once more and hold this storybook run going.
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