All Rise: A Night in the Supreme Court

By Patrick

Felix, judged by a jury of his peers

All Rise.

Tom Hutyler’s voice boomed over the PA system, and 39,000 fans rose to their feet in order to cheer Felix Hernandez as he walked from the bullpen to the dugout before the game. As the sound of a gavel rebounded around Safeco Field, the King took of his hat and saluted every bit of the stadium he could. The cheers of the fans intensified and then died away, but the playoff atmosphere, like which hadn’t been seen since 2001, stayed in the park for all nine innings.

Ask anyone who went to the Mariners’ 5-1 win over the Indians last night, and they will tell you something along the lines of “one of the best games I’ve ever been to.”

And they would be right. Not only did the King deliver a solid 7 2/3 inning performance, but fans got the chance to cheer for him at every opportunity imaginable.  With two strikes, the ENTIRE stadium was chanting “K, K, K, K.” He got standing ovations as he walked in from the bullpen, as he took the mound intentionally a little before his teammates in the first inning, and as he tipped his cap as he left the game in the eighth inning. Plus, almost every fan paid tribute to Felix with “King of Perfection” across their chests.

The game itself wasn’t too shabby either. The Mariners didn’t get a hit for five innings, until Eric Thames woke the entire stadium up with a blast to right. When Thames went out to right for the top of the seventh, the fans in the right field seats chanted his name over and over again until the inning started.

And even though Felix couldn’t hold the 1-0 lead in that inning, the offense refused to let him leave without the win on his special night. The first four men to bat in the bottom of the seventh scored, as Michael Saunders walked, Kyle Seager singled, John Jaso doubled, and Jesus Montero ripped a three-run shot 438 feet off the left field bleacher façade.

In the grand scheme of things though, there wasn’t anything particularly special about the actual game. Felix won a game at Safeco convincingly, and made up for not having his best stuff by scattering hits and pitching to contact. It was a pretty typical Mariners game, the sort of which the King spoils his subjects with on a regular basis.

But the atmosphere, which Felix called the best he’d experienced in his career at Safeco and which Thames likened to a World Series Game 7, made last night special. Games like last night’s make Mariner fans wonder what it would be like to contend again and pine for 2001. Just 11 years ago, the Mariners were the best regular season team in baseball history.  What would it be like in the park every night if they approached that again?

Probably a lot like last night, where the stadium rocked from Felix’s first strike all the way through the game-clinching groundout to Seager. The SODO Mojo returned last night, and who knows, if the Mariners keep winning, it might keep coming back late into September. Go M’s.