SEATTLE — Mitch Garver is a bit player in this raging, Mr. Rager Mariners act.
Garver is the 34-year-old veteran back-up catcher to MVP candidate Cal Raleigh. He is a part-time designated hitter. He’s started just two of Seattle’s seven playoff games so far.
Yet he has a leading role in the Mariners’ clubhouse right now.
Since their return home early Tuesday from winning both games in Toronto to take a stunning, 2-0 lead in the American League Championship Series, and into Wednesday before the Mariners host the Blue Jays in Game 3 at T-Mobile Park, Garver has had the floor.
Unlike any of the 25 other Mariners players, Garver has been here before. Exactly here.
He was a starter on the 2023 Texas Rangers. They took a two-games-to-none lead in the ALCS by doing what his current team just did, winning the first two games of the league championship on the road, at Houston.
They cruised back home to Arlington for Games 3, 4 and 5. Then the Astros beat the Rangers three straight times on Texas’ home field to go from down 0-2 to up 3-2 in the best-of-seven series.
“So the big point of emphasis is going to be, continue to do the little things,” Garver said in the visiting clubhouse at Toronto’s Rogers Centre Monday night after Seattle’s 10-3 blowout win in Game 2. “Try to score every inning. Keep the gas down.
“My plan is to talk to them about it shortly here, yeah. Keep the gas down all the way through … Don’t get complacent.
“And win ballgames, like we have been.”
Those Rangers Garver played for two seasons ago rebounded to win Games 6 and 7 in Houston to reach and win the World Series.
The Mariners enter Wednesday’s game in prime position to not follow Garver’s previous team in this ALCS. Two wins in any of the next three games at the yard in SoDo will send Seattle and the Pacific Northwest’s fans starving for it into the 48-year-old franchise’s first World Series.
“Yeah, obviously it’s a very advantageous position. We’re excited about that,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson told reporters Tuesday back at T-Mobile Park on a series off day.
“But there’s work to do here. …That’s kind of how we’ve done this all along. We go back to work.”
The manager didn’t have to talk to his players Tuesday about not thinking ahead to a possible World Series.
They were already talking that way Monday on their way out of Canada following Game 2.
“Nah, not even thinking about that right now,” Raleigh said. “Just, I’m glad we got the win (Monday). We move on, and we take it into Seattle.
“We know we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”
George Kirby’s rested
The Mariners’ work resumes Wednesday with George Kirby. He gets the ball on regular, four days rest, to begin Game 3 against Toronto’s Shane Bieber.
Kirby started Game 5 of the Mariners’ AL Division Series against Detroit. His five innings allowing one run on three hits with no walks and six strikeouts was barely a footnote. That’s because the Mariners won an epic, 15-inning thriller on one of new Mr. October Jorge Polanco’s clutch hits that got them to this league championship.
Kirby also made that start Friday on normal rest. He started the previous Saturday, Oct. 4 in Game 1 of the ALDS (five innings pitched, six hits, two runs, one walk, eight strikeouts).
He’s the only member of the Mariners’ regular starting rotation who has stayed on normal turns so far this postseason that has had Bryan Woo out injured, Logan Gilbert and Luis Castillo pitch out of the bullpen in Game 5 of the ALDS and Bryce Miller start and win Sunday’s ALCS Game 1 in Toronto on three days’ rest.
Castillo will start Game 4 Thursday against the Blue Jays. If Toronto wins one of the next two games, Woo is in line to start Game 5 on Friday afternoon at T-Mobile Park. Woo hasn’t pitched since Sept. 24 because of pectoral inflammation. He threw a bullpen session in Toronto.
He echoed Raleigh and Wilson in the clubhouse consensus that they remain a long way from winning this series and reaching the World Series.
“I think everybody knows that we still have a job to do. This series is long from over,” Woo said Tuesday back in Seattle. “So we got to come in and be ready to go (Wednesday) and not try to change what we’ve been doing.
“I think, as great as it is to come back home, don’t try to change anything because we’re at home or in front of our own fans or whatever it is. Just kind of keep playing the baseball that we’ve been playing, which has been great, complementary, simple baseball.
“I think that’s where we’re at.”
Kirby is excited to have Woo back, whether that’s in this ALCS — or in that next series no Mariner is talking about.
“Yeah, one, having Bryan back is going to be awesome. He’s been feeling good,” Kirby said.
“Yeah, just to be in front of the home crowd again is honestly huge for us. Everyone gets super excited being back home, the crowd energizes us, and yeah, we’re definitely looking forward to those two games at home, for sure.
“One, it’s a great pitcher’s ballpark. But two, yeah, the crowd is really awesome. Every moment, every big pitch, they’re always behind you. Just as a player, that kind of just gives you a lot of confidence.
“It kind of eases your mind a little bit that everyone is here cheering for you, supporting you.”
Loose, bonded Mariners
The Mariners were noticeably loose before, during and after their two games in Toronto. It was as if they’d been here to the league championship series every year, not for the first time in 24 years.
Before Game 2 utility infielder and outfielder Miles Mastrobuoni again took infield practice on the Rogers Centre field wearing the Mariners basketball jersey with shortstop J.P. Crawford’s number and name on it the team gave away to fans at a home game this summer.
Manager Dan Wilson walked around with a glove, joking with his players, strolling through the infield and outfield catching and throwing an occasional ball.
During the game, the visiting dugout looked like a carnival. Julio Rodriguez, as the game’s third batter, slammed a three-run home run. As the line drive soared over the left-field wall a few feet inside the foul pole, Rodriguez turned to that dugout. His teammates were jumping up and down. Some were spilling themselves over the dugout railing, like kids on a playground jungle gym.
When he got inside after crossing home plate, Rodriguez paraded comically through the dugout with the team’s celebration trident for such a long time it appeared he might bring it into center field with him to play defense with it in the bottom of the inning.
Eduard Bazardo relieved ineffective starter Logan Gilbert in the fourth inning of Game 2, with the score tied at 3 and the game at its highest intensity. Then he pitched two shut-down innings, allowing only a ground-ball single.
When he stranded a Toronto runner at second base to end the fifth, keep Seattle in front 6-3 and keep Rogers Centre hushed, his teammates swarmed Bazardo in the Mariners dugout.
Wilson hugged the right-hander. Rodriguez hugged him, twice.
Then the superstar showed Bazardo an elaborate hand-shake celebration. It ended with Rodriguez pantomiming a cowboy lasso rope toss and a body turn like a dance move. Bazardo and Rodriguez laughed.
This togetherness hasn’t been a byproduct of winning. The Mariners have talked about how uniquely close they are on and off the field, including in July when they were seven games back in the division.
It’s coming in mighty handy now in the most pressurized games of the season, and of most of these Mariners’ lives.
“Yeah, it’s huge,” Kirby said. “You’re able just to just … take away all that selfishness or ego, and you’re just battling for each other. At that point nothing really matters. Being able to be super close with everyone and have good relationships, it’s easier to perform and just kind of enjoy being on the baseball field.”
Garver is in his ninth major-league season, playing for his third team. He won that World Series with the Rangers two autumns ago. He thinks the closeness of these Mariners is why they are two wins from what seemed impossible for so many decades of baseball in Seattle.
“We’re ecstatic,” Garver said, over the blaring music, including Kid Cudi’s “Mr. Rager” that’s become the team’s clubhouse anthem this postseason. “We’re playing really good baseball. And everybody’s pulling for each other.
“It’s nine guys helping each other out.
“You can tell, everybody’s pulling for each other. Everybody’s doing their job. That’s what leads to wins.”
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