Mariners are inexplicably letting the Blue Jays' worst hitter turn the tide in ALCS

This ALCS wasn’t supposed to hinge on the nine-hole. The scouting meetings circled names like Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and George Springer in ink; the bottom of Toronto’s order was more of a footnote than a fear. Yet here the Mariners are, watching their October leverage swing on a bat that produced little all season.

That’s the kind of plot twist that keeps coaches awake at 3 a.m. — not because the damage is loud, but because it’s preventable. You don’t lose a grip on a series at T-Mobile Park by getting beat on your strengths. You lose it by feeding a weakness into someone else’s strength, twice.

What’s maddening is how tidy the pattern is. In back-to-back games in a pitchers’ park, Seattle let the Blue Jays’ No. 9 shortstop, Andrés Giménez — light-hitting, minimal slug all year — sit on pitches in the same lane and flip the game script in the same inning.

How the Blue Jays’ No. 9 hitter is tilting the ALCS against Seattle

Game 3: top of the third, Mariners up two, Giménez yanked a low pitch to right for a two-run shot that changed the entire emotional math.

Game 4: same frame, Seattle up one, same low-and-in window, same pull-side damage from Giménez, and suddenly the Jays are playing downhill again. That’s not random variance; that’s a pattern the Mariners allowed to repeat.

And the profile makes it sting worse. We’re talking about a hitter who hit seven home runs all season and slashed .210/.285/.313. A classic “turn the lineup over” assignment, not a series-tilting bat. Yet Seattle has offered him the only swing he owns with interest: something he can get the head out on, down in the zone, where even a contact-first approach plays like Kyle Seager in a rivalry week. Twice the pitch lived where his barrel wants to live. Twice he didn’t miss.

This is where plan beats panic. The fix isn’t radical; it’s discipline. Stop letting the nine-hole dictate the lane. Elevate four-seamers above the belt to change the eye level before you venture anywhere east-and-in. If you’re going soft, it can’t be soft to the front hip, back-foot breaking ball off the plate or nothing. Start him with something he can’t fire on. If he reaches with two outs? Fine. You’ve got the top coming, and that’s where your best bullets should go. But gifting pull-side loft to the nine-spot is how leverage turns into regret.

Seattle also needs to reframe the bottom of the order like a trap, not a timeout. No get-me-overs in plus counts, no convictionless sinkers that start at the thigh and end up on a souvenir track. Call the game with the top of the lineup in mind — attack nine to set up one and two, not to shortcut your way there. The Jays have made it clear they’re hunting comfort zones early; the answer is to win the first pitch, not survive the third.

If the Mariners make those adjustments, this becomes a footnote instead of a postmortem. Seattle built this season on run prevention and plan execution. Reclaim that identity now, and those two third-inning swings shrink back to what they should’ve been: loud reminders, not turning points.