The Seattle Seahawks showed up at T-Mobile Park on Tuesday night carrying the weight of a Super Bowl 60 trophy and all the good vibes that come with it. Sam Darnold stepped to the mound before the Mariners faced the Cincinnati Reds, fired a ceremonial first pitch, and the stadium felt alive for a minute. Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald, GM John Schneider, tight end AJ Barner, and backup quarterbacks Jalen Milroe and Drew Lock stood behind him, a row of championship hardware in street clothes.
It did not fix the Mariners.
Elly De La Cruz led off the game by launching a home run off Luis Castillo. The Reds never really looked back. Former Mariner Eugenio Suarez added a solo shot in the fourth, just to twist the knife a little more. Seattle lost 4-2. That’s a .500 ballclub sitting at 51-51, seven games back in the AL West, and they’ve spent four months cycling between mediocre and frustrating. The fan base’s cardiologists are having a good year.
Darnold’s night before the real work starts
The quarterback heads to training camp Thursday. First practice is Friday at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center. So Tuesday was probably the last night Darnold got to relax before the real business of defending a title begins. But if you’re looking for a guy who understands how fast everything can flip, he’s your guy. Nobody expected Seattle to win the Super Bowl last season. They were the team everyone slept on until they weren’t.
The Mariners could use a little of that magic. They’ve got the pitching. They’ve got Julio Rodríguez. What they don’t have is consistency, and it’s been eating the season alive.
Darnold is 28 and coming off a championship run that rewrote how people talk about him. He showed up to throw a baseball on a Tuesday night in July because that’s what you do when you’re the face of the city’s winningest franchise right now. And for a few seconds, the crowd cheered like maybe something would rub off.
It didn’t. But the Mariners finish the homestand Wednesday afternoon. Maybe that’s their turn.
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