White Sox 2, Mariners 2: Chaos Magic Wins
The thrill of victory! Agony of defeat! Sheer pointlessness of a tie!
The weather was probably nice in Glendale, and it was time for everyone’s favorite kind of spring training game: Not televised! MLB continues their streak of not giving fans what they want (access to more games on TV) and delivering what nobody asked for (runner on second in extra innings).
NOT VERY EXCITING
Seattle drew first blood with a line-drive single to center that granted Ty France with a RBI when Kyle Lewis scored from second. Luis Robert answered back by “[lining] out sharply to pitcher Chris Flexen” (according to the MLB.com Gameday). Flexen was flexin’ today.
The Sox managed to answer back in the bottom of the second with a single from Andrew Vaughn scoring Eloy Jiménez, and Yoán Moncada coming in on a throwing error by Cal Raliegh.
Raliegh made up for the throwing error by tying the game 2-2 in the third with a line out to Adam Eaton that scored Lewis (who was really getting his workout on the base path).
And then ... a whole lot of nothing more happened until the fifth.
TWITTER CHAOS MAGIC
If the White Sox can’t win with TLR on the bench, then what? Does it go from internet joke to real life? Did Twitter manifest this winless streak, with some sort of chaos magic? Can we get Twitter to use the chaos magic for good?
QUIET BATS
The only real offense today came from Robert, Moncada, Vaughn, and Seby Zavala. All in, the team mustered just five hits in six innings. A team RISP of 1-for-8? Not great.
OLD FRIEND ALERT?
Nope
TRIPLE PLAY? TRIPLE PLAY!
I don’t care who turns it— a triple play is always cool to see. Of course it happens during MLB’s bogus broadcast schedule, so the Mariners kindly tweeted a video for us:
The ol’ 5-2-3-2 triple play. pic.twitter.com/uCz1mumSun
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) March 5, 2021
Yeah, it looked like TA was safe and avoided the third out. But no, I don’t mind the call, at least when in comes in early March.
SOCCER FOR EVERYONE?
“We’ll bring you the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat, and because we’ve got soccer highlights, the sheer pointlessness of a 0-0 tie.” — Dan (Sports Night)
I know this wasn’t a soccer game, and the score was 2-2, and supposedly a soccer tie is a draw, but that quote is funny and I don’t have a lot of material when they don’t air the game on TV.