Bronx Beatdown: Yankees Beat Mariners 10-3 in Post-Rain Delay Shellacking
NEW YORK, N.Y. – Before the rain began to fall on Wednesday night, it was a marquee pitcher’s duel at Yankee Stadium. After the tarp was trotted out for a rain delay, however, the game turned into an ugly beatdown for the Seattle Mariners.
Although Cal Raleigh and Aaron Judge battled to a draw in today’s edition of their MVP fight, the Yankees were all over the Mariners in the sixth and seventh innings, scoring nine runs between those two frames and earning a thumping 10-3 victory.
Logan Gilbert initially looked like he would throw a gem, but the rain delay turning point really caught up to the Mariners starter, whose final line of 5 1/3 innings, seven hits, five runs, two walks, and five strikeouts did not end up being very impressive. Gilbert moved down to 2-3 on the year and now has a 3.88 ERA.
Although the Mariners looked completely lifeless on offense for much of the game, they managed to put together some garbage time production. But the three runs were far too little, far too late, and the Seattle squad did not look like anything but pretenders on the big stage in the big apple.
M’s, Yanks Hold Pitching Duel Before Rain Delay
Both starters were dealing before weather decided to interrupt the pitching showcase. Will Warren breezed through four innings for the Yankees, giving up just two hits and striking out four – two looking – and walking none on 57 pitches. Gilbert was doing even better for the Mariners, striking out four, walking none, and giving up one hit on 51 pitches through four frames.
Warren’s first inning was strong, drawing weak contact from each of the first three batters – one hit and two fielder’s choices – before striking out Randy Arozarena looking. Gilbert responded with a one-two-three effort on his side. Then it was three up and three down for both sides in the second. Warren worked past a one-out single by Cole Young in the third and Gilbert sat down three in a row in the bottom half. Another quick inning for the M’s followed in the top of the fourth. Cody Bellinger got a two-out hit in the Yankee fourth, but Gilbert struck out Stanton to end the inning.
Then in the top of the fifth, the Mariners began to put together some offense. Luke Raley took advantage of a first pitch fastball down the middle and led off with a line drive just under a diving Judge’s glove in right. Canzone grounded into a fielder’s choice and then Ben Williamson went down 0-2, only to slap a sweeper on the outside corner the other way for a base hit. Young hit a soft grounder up the middle that became another fielder’s choice to set up two outs and runners at the corners for J.P. Crawford.
The Mariners shortstop went up 2-1 in the count, but by this point, the rain was coming down hard and had been for a while. Crew chief and home plate umpire Vic Carapazza called for a rain delay after the balls became too slick to handle.
Gilbert Struggles Post-Delay
After a 35-minute rain delay, play resumed. Both Warren and Gilbert were able to return to the mound, and Warren’s first pitch after the delay – a slider in the lower half of the zone – was harmlessly grounded to first for the third out of the top of the fifth.
In the bottom of the inning, the Yankees finally broke the tie. Gilbert seemed to lose some control on his off-speed pitches after the long delay, missing his spots just enough to allow the Yankees to put together a string of hits.
Paul Goldschmidt hit an 0-1 fastball a couple feet over Williamson’s glove into left field to start off the rally. Then Austin Wells worked a walk on five pitches and Anthony Volpe chopped a slow grounder to short, but the M’s didn’t have enough time to turn two, so now it was the Yankees who had runners at first and third with two outs. Oswald Peraza came to the plate.
The Yankee third baseman swung at the first pitch he saw, a fastball middle-in. He didn’t make great contact, only rolling a slow grounder to the right side in the hole between first and second. Young rushed over and got his glove on the ball, but he needed to flip it to first without a transfer to have a chance at getting Peraza. The ball fell out of his glove instead. Goldschmidt scored to give New York a 1-0 lead.
Gilbert got Jasson Dominguez to fish for a 1-2 slider down out of the zone to get out of the inning. The M’s put together two walks in the top of the sixth – chasing Warren – but couldn’t get anyone across the plate to tie the game.
The bottom of the sixth was much less kind to Gilbert, who by this point was even more errant on his off-speed pitches, hanging them or airmailing them, and didn’t have much command of his fastballs either. To chants of “M.V.P.”, Judge lined a first-pitch fastball down the pipe right back up the middle for a single. Bellinger took an 0-1 hanging slider into right for another single, sending Giancarlo Stanton up to the plate.
Giancarlo Stanton, Déjà Vu
During the infamous playoff drought, the season with the biggest collapse for the Mariners came in 2018. On June 18 of that year, the Mariners were 46-26 and stood in the second wild card spot by eight and a half games over the 38-35 Los Angeles Angels. A further one and a half games separated the Angels and the next team in line, the 36-36 Oakland A’s. The next day, the M’s lost 7-2 to the Yankees.
But it was the following game that Seattle remembers. June 20, 2018. The Mariners went up 5-0 by the top of the fifth. New York scored two in the bottom half, followed by one in the seventh. Then Gary Sánchez walloped a game-tying home run in the eighth. Seattle’s bats were lifeless in the top half of the ninth, so it was up to Ryan Cook to hold the Yankees scoreless and get Seattle to extras. He got the first two out, then gave up a single. Then he went up 0-2 to Stanton.
But Cook threw a hanging slider right down the middle on the ensuing pitch. Stanton obliterated it to left field. Cook memorably screamed downward at the mound as soon as he heard the crack of the bat. That wasn’t the moment the collapse started – the M’s went on an eight game win streak starting later that month and stood eight games over the A’s on July 3 – but it was the moment it became apparent the M’s couldn’t come up big when it mattered.
By the All-Star Break, the Mariners’ lead was down to three games. Seattle fell behind Oakland on August 2 and finished 89-73, eight games back of Oakland.
Back to 2025. Stanton took ball one from Gilbert, a slider high out of the strike zone. Then Gilbert hung a slider right down the middle and Stanton swung and drilled a ball to deep right center. The whole stadium knew the score before it landed as the Yankees increased their lead to 4-0.
And yet, maybe the game of baseball has lost its grandiosity in seven years. Instead of a 453-foot walk off nuke, it was a 403-foot bomb in the sixth inning. Instead of angrily screaming at the mound like Cook did, Gilbert calmly looked back and watched it soar. Instead of being eight games up in the wild card spot and 19 games over .500, the Mariners – after tonight’s loss – are five games over .500 and one game up on the surging Red Sox for the third wild card spot. Perhaps it’s because of the Mariners’ post-COVID Flanderization, but it doesn’t hit as hard as it once did.
After Stanton’s homer, it all fell apart for the Mariners. The mark of a true contender is to be in every game until the final pitch is thrown, and … the Mariners definitely weren’t that on Wednesday night. Imagine a post-2016 Astros team or a post-2012 Dodgers team that would be completely and obviously out of the game down four runs in the sixth.
Gilbert had lost any semblance of control by this point, and he walked Chisholm on five pitches. The M’s caught a break when Cal Raleigh threw an absolute bullet to second to catch Chisholm stealing. But then Goldschmidt cracked a double into right and manager Dan Wilson pulled Gilbert and put in Casey Legumina.
The first pitch Legumina threw was a hanging breaking ball of his own to Austin Wells. The Yankee catcher hit a thunderous blast to right field to make it 6-0. The Seattle reliever put the next two guys away, but it had gone from a close game to a blowout in a matter of minutes.
Judge vs. Raleigh
As summer heats up, so does the fight for American League MVP. In 2025, it’s a two-horse race. The odds-on favorite is Judge, who came into today’s game slashing .360/.468/.734, hitting 33 home runs, knocking in 74 runs, scoring 80, and drawing 65 walks. He led the American League in all of those stats but homers. He has 6.6 bWAR and 7.1 fWAR, best in all of the MLB in both common variants of the WAR stat.
The underdog is Raleigh. Remember how Judge isn’t leading the AL in homers? Raleigh is the reason why. He came into tonight with 35 home runs – the most of any catcher before the All-Star Break by a country mile and tied with Ken Griffey Jr. for the most by any Mariner before the All-Star Break – and was slashing .268/.381/.640 with 74 RBI (tied with Judge), 62 runs scored, and 56 walks. His bWAR is 4.6 and his fWAR is 5.7. While his non-homer stats are worse than Judge’s, he is brought back into the MVP debate by the fact that he is a catcher who spends much of his time managing a pitching staff.
This series is set up to be a big test of both players’ mettle. And in true horse-race fashion, neither candidate pulled markedly ahead.
After Yankee reliever Tim Hill sped through three M’s, Judge struck first with one away. Legumina threw him a sweeper up out over the plate and he hammered it into the right field seats. The Yankees’ lead was now 7-0 and the rout was on.
Not to be outdone, Bellinger and Stanton singled and Chisholm doubled to bring Bellinger home. Juan Burgos came in for Legumina but gave up a two-run single to Goldschmidt before the second Seattle reliever got the last two outs of the inning as the lead swelled to 10.
Geoff Hartlieb, who had previously only pitched once for New York all year, relieved Hill in the top of the eighth and quickly gave up a single to Crawford and a run-scoring double to Rodriguez.
Then Raleigh came up. He took the first pitch for a strike and the second one for a ball, but Hartlieb’s third delivery was a slider out over the plate. Raleigh whipped his bat through the zone and tattooed the ball into the upper deck in right field, his no-doubt shot bringing the score to 10-3, where it would stay for the rest of the game.
Judge supporters would say that he had two hits on the night to Raleigh’s one and that Raleigh’s homer came in garbage time against a terrible pitcher. The Raleigh faithful would respond that Judge’s homer was a porch job and that the Mariner catcher nabbed a runner at second. But for those undecided, today’s game would not have been convincing either way.
Raleigh now stands at 36 home runs, the most by a Mariner before the All-Star Break in team history. He is still on pace for 64 bombs, which would be the highest non-tainted single-season total in history. Judge sits at 34, on pace for 61 himself.
Silver Linings: Burgos Solid, Julio Doubles
There were a couple things that looked good for the Mariners on Wednesday night despite the lopsided result. Obviously, number one was Raleigh, who continued his monster campaign. The other two notable consolation prizes were Juan Burgos’ strong inning and two thirds of work and Julio Rodriguez’ RBI double.
Burgos, who recently made his MLB debut, recorded another strong outing with a final line of 1 2/3 innings, one hit, no runs, no walks, and 2 strikeouts. He now has a 2.45 ERA in 3 2/3 innings of work and has struck out four batters.
No doubt Burgos’ best moment today was his strikeout against Judge to end the eighth inning. Now, he did get the benefit of the doubt on some questionably low strike calls to go up 0-2, but he then did a delayed windup and got Judge to watch a breaking ball pass him by right down the middle.
Meanwhile, a struggling Rodriguez got something positive to write home about. He took advantage of a hanging 2-1 sinker and finally lifted a ball in the air, driving it into the left center field gap for a tailor-made double. It was his second game in a row with an extra-base hit and improved his July slash from .087/.160/.130 to 0.111/.172/.185. Obviously, he still has a lot of work to do to get back to presentable July numbers, but it is a hopeful sign nonetheless.
On Deck
Raleigh and Judge will battle again tomorrow as the second game of the series takes place in the Bronx. Logan Evans will get his second start since his recent call-up and will face Yankee starter Cam Schlittler, who is getting his MLB debut after three seasons in the Yankees minor league system.
Since the Mariners have now lost three of four against the Yankees, the best they can do is split the season series by winning the next two games.
The M’s loss brings them to 48-43 and the team is just a game up on the Red Sox for the third wild card spot. The two teams have already split their season series 3-3, so any tiebreaker would go to divisional records, where Seattle has a slight lead: the M’s are 17-11 against the AL West while the Red Sox are 16-13 against the AL East.
