By Kirby Arnold
Herald Writer
NEW YORK — The end came decisively for the team that was one of the best in baseball history from April through September.
The Seattle Mariners’ October swoon continued, however, with a 12-3 loss to the New York Yankees on Monday that ended their season. The Yankees won the best-of-seven American League Championship Series 4-1 and advanced to the World Series for the fourth straight year.
The Mariners, who tied the 1906 Chicago Cubs’ major league record of 116 victories, could not duplicate their regular-season success in the playoffs. They beat the Indians in the first-round division series in the deciding fifth game, then won only one of five games against the Yankees.
The Yankee Stadium crowd let the Mariners know about it, too, by chanting "One-six-teen! One-six-teen" and "Over-rated! Over-rated!"
Although badly beaten, the Mariners still believed in themselves, including one — Stan Javier — who played his last major league game and another — Jay Buhner — who might have.
"I’m so happy I ended my career in Seattle," said Javier, who played the first game of his career 1984 with the Yankees and ended it in Yankee Stadium. "This is still one of the best teams in baseball, and I believe this team will be playing at this level for a long time to come."
Buhner, who spent most of the season recovering from a foot injury, said he will decide in the offseason if this was his last game.
"I don’t know, but I would say yeah," he said. "Based on the way I feel right now, I think I’ve gotten just about everything out of my body that I can get."
In the end, that’s all anyone could say about the Mariners, who fell into a postseason hitting slump and never recovered against the Yankees.
"I don’t know about feeling unfulfilled," Mariners manager Lou Piniella said. "If we’d have won this and lost in the World Series, you’d still feel unfulfilled. We gave it our best shot."
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