The Seattle Mariners completed a 3-1 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on April 4, with standout performances from pitcher Bryan Woo and infielder Cole Young. The game at Angel Stadium remained scoreless until extra innings, when Young hit a go-ahead triple in the tenth inning to break the tie.
This result is notable as it marked the first time in Mariners history that the team allowed one or no hits in an extra-inning game of ten or more innings. It is also only the fourth such occurrence across Major League Baseball in the last decade.
Cole Young described his approach during his key at-bat: “Just analyzing the situation of the game, and just trying to do a job,” Young said. “Because usually in that situation I mean, obviously, every time in that situation you want to get the runner over. So that was my whole approach in that at-bat, is to just hit the ball to the right side and get the runner over and just do a job and let the top of the order do the rest.”
Pitcher Andrés Muñoz played a crucial role by striking out Mike Trout with three pitches at a tense moment late in regulation play. “I was thinking fastball the whole time, just making sure that it was up,” Muñoz said. “That’s it. Sometimes when you try to do too much, when you try to put extra effort on it, it says middle-middle. And that is not what I wanted. So just try to attack, be aggressive — but smart at the same time.”
Young’s triple set up further runs as Julio Rodríguez drew an intentional walk before both he and Young scored on Josh Naylor’s RBI single. Mariners manager Dan Wilson praised Young’s composure under pressure: “The game doesn’t speed up on him,” Wilson said. “And he’s able to keep that consistent pace to his game, and that plays extremely important in those kinds of situations.”
Bryan Woo led Seattle’s pitching staff by throwing seven shutout innings with six strikeouts while allowing only one hit and one walk. Reflecting on his performance after a difficult previous outing against Cleveland Guardians, Woo said: “That’s what I keep talking about — raising the floor… Just the days that you don’t feel like you have it or have your best stuff, still figuring out how to get through it and make the most out of those days.”
The Mariners will monitor third baseman Brendan Donovan for leg discomfort following an awkward landing during an attempted infield single.
