Mariners fail to qualify for Interesting Olympics, get blown out by Red Sox 14-7

“What sport is that?”

Instead of watching today’s Mariners game, an absolute shellacking at the hands of the Red Sox, I would have preferred to be watching the Paris Olympics. There is nothing I love more than becoming attached to a new sport for two weeks, and then promptly forgetting about its existence for the next two years, when the cycle begins again. I love watching Olympic athletes compete and hearing their stories and wondering how one exactly becomes, say, a hammer-thrower or slalom kayaker or Olympic-level skateboarder at the age of 14, which they all seem to be (perhaps because one must be young and invincible-feeling in order to perform some of those tricks). And I love being utterly uninvested in watching these things, unlike, say, watching the Seattle Mariners, who tonight could only dream of putting on a display equal in power to the various athletes in Paris. Here’s an inning by inning breakdown, tied to its Olympic equivalent:

First Two Innings: Women’s Gymnastics

If there’s one summer Olympic sport people are familiar with, it’s generally women’s gymnastics. The US almost always fields a very competitive team, although in recent years have had to stave off challengers like China and Japan and a surging Great Britain team, which has come up in recent years thanks to the country investing more resources in their gymnasts. The Red Sox, like the US Women, are a well-established powerhouse that experiences fluctuations but generally performs well; the Mariners are the Great Britain of baseball, up-and-coming challengers but still outsiders. The Mariners sent their best out to the mound today in Logan Gilbert, who looked absolutely dominant in his first two innings of work, at one point throwing the fastest pitch of his career at 99.7 mph (although it was a ball, which would annoy Logan). He started by striking out two in a 1-2-3 inning, and followed that up with a 1-2-3 inning ending in a strikeout. Unfortunately he was matched step by step by Nick Pivetta’s two 1-2-3 innings with three strikeouts.

Third Inning: Breaking

This doesn’t have anything to do with the sport (call it “breaking” not “breakdancing”), new to the Olympics this year, but this inning was the breaking point of this game. The Mariners had a chance to get on the board, with Mitch Haniger and Josh Rojas hitting back-to-back singles, but Victor Robles grounded into a double play to wipe away any scoring threat. The Red Sox answered back by putting two on of their own with just one out; Gilbert could have mirrored Pivetta again with an inning-ending double play of his own, but the speedy Jarred Duran was just able to beat out the relay throw. Then, the floodgates: instead of what should have been an inning-ending called strike three, home plate umpire Andy Fletcher totally blew this call:

Hyphen’s tweet kind of gives it away there, but yes, things went totally sideways after that. The missed call seemed to mess with Gilbert’s focus, as he immediately threw a wild pitch, allowing a run to score; Abreu would go on to battle him for another seven pitches, anding in a run-scoring base hit. After that, Gilbert made his own case worse by hanging a fastball in the middle of the plate that Yoshida hit for a two-run homer to make it 4-0; Devers doubled off a good pitch at the bottom of the zone and Tyler O’Neill doubled off a not good pitch in the middle of the zone, ambushing a first-pitch fastball; Dominic Smith then checked in with a double of his own as Gilbert tried, and failed, to get the final out of the inning. Eventually with his pitch count spiraling, Servais was forced to lift Gilbert; Trent Thornton came on and couldn’t get his batter either, to make it 7-0. Eventually it ended when Connor Wong, possessed by the greedy spirit of the robber barons who haunt Boston, tried to swipe third and was thrown out, but the game was fully broken by then. And not in the fun, dance-y way.

That inning sucked. Watch Victor Montalvo, one of America’s medal favorites for Breaking, show off his skills instead:

Fourth inning: Jeu de Paume

Jeu de Paume is basically a predecessor to both handball and tennis, and was occasionally called “real tennis” to distinguish it from “lawn tennis,” the sport we now know as...uh, tennis. It was only played at one Olympic Games: 1908, in London, when Jay Gould II (yes, son of the American railroad magnate Jay Gould, told you the spirits of robber barons were alive in Fenway tonight) won the US’s only gold medal in the sport. Similarly, in this inning, the Mariners finally scraped across one lousy little run, as Randy Arozarena led off with a double, and was sacrificed home by Cal Raleigh and Jorge Polanco. I’ve been begging the Mariners to play more small ball, but maybe not in seven-run blowouts.

The Red Sox, representing Actual Tennis, added another three runs off Thornton in the bottom of the inning to make it 10-1. Here’s the equivalent of that:

Fifth inning: Trampoline

The US has never won a single medal in trampoline, a sport that’s appeared seven times in the Olympics. Perhaps the US delegation should ask the Red Sox, who used Fenway Park as a trampoline, bouncing balls over and off of the Green Monster and tacking on another two runs in this inning off Thornton, whose ERA took a real hit tonight, to make it 12-1.

Here’s a look at the ROOT camera operators during this game:

Sixth inning: Men’s Gymnastics

While the women’s gymnastics competitions attract enormous, star-studded audiences, men’s gymnastics have not enjoyed the same level of success. That all changed this year, as the men’s team took home their first medal in 16 years, a bronze, and also gifted us a new national hero: pommel horse specialist Stephen Nedoroscik, who endearingly must remove his glasses before climbing up on the apparatus, only to immediately put them back on when he’s finished.

This inning also offered an unexpected bit of fun in a dreary landscape, with Randy Arozarena and Cal Raleigh going back-to-back on home runs, including Randy’s first as a Mariner.

But really there’s no better avatar for Stephen Nedoroscik (whose twitter handle is, endearingly, @GymnastSteve), whose pommel horse routine basically delivered USA a much-needed medal, than Cal Raleigh, who lost a few health points tonight taking some punishment behind the dish:

Seventh inning: Distance Plunge

The Red Sox score two more runs on a home run by Romy Gonzalez (who?) off Gabe Speier to make it 14-3.

Plunge for Distance, where a competitor dives gently into the water and floats as far as possible without moving a single muscle, has been called the “dullest” Olympic Sport of all time, making just one appearance at the 1904 Games, and I’d still rather have watched it than this game.

Eighth and ninth innings: Rhythmic Gymnastics

To their credit, the Mariners fought back against Trey Wingenter, on in relief of Nick Pivetta in the eighth. Cal Raleigh and Leo Rivas hit back-to-back singles and Luke Raley walked to load the bases, allowing Dylan Moore to double home two of the three Rs on base; a wild pitch scored another. Jason Vosler grounded out to scrape across another run, making the score a more respectable 14-7, where it would stay thanks to a solid inning of relief from Tayler Saucedo.

The US has never medaled in rhythmic gymnastics, and this year they have just one athlete competing: Evita Griskenas. Griskenas had to fight her way back from a severe foot injury suffered before the 2023 World Championships but has been steadily on the rise, winning silver in the All-Around at the Pan-American Games and earning a spot in the 2024 Olympics. It’s a long, uphill battle for the US to try to earn a medal in rhythmic gymnastics, but Evita—who specializes in ribbon (the rhythmic gymnastic apparatuses are rope, hoop, ball, clubs, and ribbon)—is going to make her best go at it. Likely, she’ll come up short, as the Mariners did today, but you have to enjoy the moments of beauty when they come.

Enough of this. Off to watch some women’s rugby, which is my new favorite sport—for these two weeks, at least. The Mariners are back at it tomorrow at 4:10, and hopefully Luis Castillo won’t allow a try plus a conversion of runs (that’s seven, for those of you who aren’t rug-heads like me) in his outing.