Yankees are doing Mariners a huge favor with comical slide down AL standings

If it were up to them, probably the last team the Seattle Mariners would want to face in the American League playoffs is the New York Yankees. They've had Seattle's number this year, winning five out of six head-to-head matchups.

Increasingly, however, it's looking like the Mariners may not have to worry about the Yankees.

With the trade deadline having come and gone, the ongoing plight of the Yankees is arguably the story in Major League Baseball right now. They're mired in an 18-29 slide since June 13, and our friends at Yanks Go Yard can tell you all about how ugly it's been. When you combine awful relief pitching with inconsistent offense and shockingly frequent brain flatulence, you get the Yankees of the last two months.

The Yankees are clearing a favorable playoff path for the Mariners

For fans in the Pacific Northwest, there's an inherent complication in indulging a little schadenfreude at the Yankees' dismay: they really did kick the Mariners' butts earlier this year.

The one and only win the M's scored in their six meetings with New York was a narrow 2-1 victory in extras back on May 13. The run differential for the season series is +17 in favor of the Yankees, and even a near-no-hitter by Bryan Woo on July 10 resulted in calamity for Seattle.

What matters now, though, is that the Mariners find themselves 1.0 games ahead of the Yankees for the AL's second wild card spot after Tuesday's action. The M's romped over the Chicago White Sox by an 8-3 final, whereas former Mariner Rowdy Tellez played the hero in the Texas Rangers' 2-0 win over the Yankees in Arlington.

If the season ended today, the Mariners would be the No. 5 seed in the AL playoff field, with the Yankees barely making it in with the No. 6 seed.

The unfortunate thing for both clubs is that each would have to play a three-game series on the road, with the Mariners in Boston against the Red Sox and the Yankees in Houston against the Astros. But the Mariners have at least won a series in Boston this year, whereas their lone trip to Houston (so far, at least) resulted in three losses in four games.

Of course, the season isn't over yet. But that could actually be the good news for the Mariners, as the Yankees falling out of the playoff picture entirely would also work in their favor.

For one, it would nix the possibility of facing the Yankees in October. For two, the next team up in the race is the Rangers. The Mariners thoroughly dominated them (10-3) in a season series that closed last weekend.

Should the Mariners and Rangers end up tied in the standings, the tiebreaker would go to Seattle. It would also portend a favorable matchup for the Mariners if the two clubs met in the playoffs.

Granted, what the Mariners should really want is the AL West title at worst, and both the AL West title and one of the top two seeds at best. Both remain realistic possibilities, as the Mariners are only 3.0 games back of the Astros in the division and not much further away from the Detroit Tigers (4.5) and Toronto Blue Jays (5.5) in the American League race at large.

Certainly the best thing the Mariners can do is keep worrying about their own games. But if the Yankees keep losing at the rate they have been, there probably won't be any weeping in the Seattle clubhouse.