The Seattle Mariners are the hottest team in the American League, and now they've reached the top of the division.
With a 1-0 victory over the Baltimore Orioles on Tuesday, the Mariners won their eighth straight game and tied the Houston Astros, who were blown out 14-1 by the Boston Red Sox, for first place in the AL West. Both teams now sit at 67-53.
The Mariners trailed the Astros by as many as seven games in early July, but now have an even playing field for the final month and a half of 2025.
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The big turning point for Seattle was the MLB trade deadline, when Seattle picked up the Arizona Diamondbacks' corner infield with separate deals for third baseman Eugenio Suarez and first baseman Josh Naylor, plus a trade for Pittsburgh Pirates reliever Caleb Ferguson. The Mariners are 10-1 since the deadline passed on July 31.
It was Naylor who came up big Tuesday, delivering the only RBI of the game with a single in the first inning.
Of course, the most valuable player for the game was starting pitcher George Kirby, who struck out seven, walked none and allowed only three hits in seven scoreless innings on 87 pitches. Eduard Bazardo, Gabe Speier and Andrés Muñoz combined for two more scoreless innings out of the bullpen to finish the shutout, the Mariners' ninth of the season.
A rough stretch for the Astros has coincided with the Mariners' surge. Houston added at the deadline too, with their Carlos Correa reunion, but a 2-8 stretch in late July and early August opened the door for Seattle. Making matters worse, the Astros had to place All-Star closer Josh Hader on the IL due to a shoulder strain Tuesday.
With 42 games remaining for both Houston and Seattle, the AL West is shaping up to be a dead sprint between the division's standard-setter of the past decade and the upstart with the AL MVP favorite and plenty of young talent. For now, the Mariners can definitely say momentum is on their side.
That's not all at stake for the Mariners, as there's also the matter of Cal Raleigh, who leads MLB with 45 home runs and could theoretically break the record for homers by a catcher (Salvador Perez, 48 in 2021), among switch-hitters (Mickey Mantle, 54 in 1961) and even the American League (Aaron Judge, 62 in 2022).
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