Eugenio Suárez reclaims Mariners hero status with season-saving ALCS Game 5

At least until the team (hopefully) punches its ticket to the World Series, what happened on Friday at T-Mobile Park is the memory of the year for Seattle Mariners fans. It's one of those endlessly replayable ones, with all the right beats and exactly the right main character.

It's the bottom of the eighth inning, and there is beloved Mariner Eugenio Suárez at the plate with the bases loaded and Game 5 of the American League Championship Series tied at 2-2. "Geno! Geno! Geno!" chants the crowd as Toronto Blue Jays righty Seranthony Domínguez delivers a fastball that never crosses home plate.

Instead, it lands 351 feet away in the right field stands for a go-ahead, game-breaking, ALCS-turning grand slam.

There is more than just one hero to the story of how the Mariners eked out a 6-2 win that has them on the doorstep of their first World Series, as they now lead the Championship Series 3-2.

After they had scored 21 runs in back-to-back beatdowns in Games 3 and 4, it is no small thing that Bryce Miller and four relievers — including Bryan Woo, finally back on the mound for the first time since September 19 — kept the Blue Jays to just two runs in Game 5. The defense certainly deserves to share the credit, specifically by way of a pair of huge double plays and a leaping catch at the wall by Randy Arozarena in the top half of the eighth.

And before Suárez knocked 'em down, it was Cal Raleigh who set 'em up. His solo homer leading off the eighth tied the score and gave him 64 total homers for the season, finally giving him permission to say he's tied Aaron Judge for the American League record.

Eugenio Suárez comes to the Mariners' rescue after months of disappointment

This was, nonetheless, Eugenio Suárez's game. They don't make hits any bigger than game-winning grand slams in October. And even before that, he was the one who set the Mariners on a course to victory with a solo homer all the way back in the second inning.

In a vacuum, the 34-year-old is still having a bad postseason. He's batting just .200 with 14 strikeouts against only eight hits. And it's all too easy to imagine him going cold again, given that what he's done in October is perfectly in theme with what he had done in August and September.

It was a big deal and surely a heartwarming story when the Mariners acquired him in a trade from the Arizona Diamondbacks in July. It felt like a righting of a wrong, as the trade of Suárez to Arizona back in 2023 was only quote-unquote necessary because the Mariners needed to cut payroll. They basically gave up a guy who had hit 53 home runs for them across 2022 and 2023, so it was a bit of karmic retribution when he hit 66 home runs in only 264 games as a Diamondback.

The Mariners got Suárez back in hopes of catching a ride on a power train that had already produced 36 home runs, including four in one game in April. What they got instead was a near-automatic out with occasional power, as he finished the year with a .198 average and 13 homers in 53 games.

With Suárez carrying just a .162 average for the playoffs into Game 5, he was dangerously close to downgrading himself to a just plain automatic out. Even if he wasn't Public Enemy No. 1, he stood to become one of the main anchors of the Mariners' fall from grace if they failed to contain the Blue Jays.

Granted, this may yet prove to be the case. The Mariners have the series lead again, but now they have to go defend it in Toronto in Game 6 on Sunday and, if necessary, Game 7 on Monday. The Mariners' wins in Games 1 and 2 in Toronto notwithstanding, that the Rogers Centre is hell on visitors is right there in the Blue Jays' 54-27 home record in the regular season.

Yet even if this series could still be taken away from the Mariners, there's no taking away Friday from Suárez. He didn't merely win the game. He won hearts and minds all over again.