SEATTLE — As the tailing, 96-mph fastball ran away from the lacquered bat of Corey Seager and into the glove of Austin Nola, reliever Taylor Williams — the Mariners’ de facto closer — let out a scream and pumped his fist in celebration.
His teammates’ yells from the dugout were almost simultaneous, and they spilled out of the dugout at T-Mobile Park to celebrate a 6-4 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Wednesday night.
The players’ reaction to the Mariners’ eighth win of this season was magnified considering they haven’t won much on the whole or recently, and the crushing nature of some of the defeats, particularly the previous two games in Los Angeles, added to the emotion.
The victory ended a pair of streaks: The Mariners’ skid, and the Dodgers’ seven-game win streak.
The Mariners couldn’t keep things going Thursday againt Clayton Kershaw. The Dodgers lefty struck out 11 in leading Los Angeles to a 6-1 victory.
Wins haven’t come easily for the Mariners in this 2020 season, and many have been lost in the game’s final innings by a bullpen that has been anything but lockdown.
“It’s been a struggle at times,” Mariners manager Scott Servais said on a Zoom video call. “Taylor Williams, he didn’t back down, and he kept trying to make pitches and make pitches. When you are playing a really good club like that, they’re gonna make you earn it, and they certainly made us earn it tonight. Three games with the Dodgers, we’ve been right there. We’ve been very competitive. It was nice to get a win tonight.”
After getting the final out of the eighth inning to maintain a two-run lead, Williams came on in the ninth and gave up a leadoff infield single to A.J. Pollock, issued a one-out walk to Chris Taylor and walked Mookie Betts with two outs to load the bases for Seager.
But he got ahead early with two quick strikes, wasted a pitch and went for the kill with an elevated fastball for his fifth save of the season.
“I was able to get him to swing and miss on that first-pitch slider, and I think that dictated the rest of the at-bat,” Williams said. “I was able to kind of get him thinking down and in with that slider, respect the slider. He’s got to be able to cover that down-and-in pitch, and I think it kind of opened up my ability to throw that fastball away.”
On Thursday, Cody Bellinger homered for the second straight game.
Kershaw moved past Don Drysdale and into second place on the Dodgers’ all-time strikeout list. It came on his fifth strikeout of the game when he got Shed Long Jr. swinging leading off the fifth inning. Kershaw now has 2,493 and trails only Don Sutton in franchise history. Sutton has 2,696.
Kershaw (3-1) struck out the side in the fifth and got Sam Haggerty leading off the sixth. He closed out his dominant afternoon by fanning Long and Braden Bishop. It was a second straight dominant performance for the lefty, after he allowed one run and one hit in his last start.
Seattle managed just four hits off Kershaw and the only run came on Kyle Seager’s solo home run.
