Imagine this: The last time something this historic happened in MLB, the Philadelphia Phillies weren’t even the Phillies (they were still the Philadelphia Quakers). Back in 1887, they faced the Indianapolis Hoosiers and demolished them 24-0. Since then, it’s now 139 years later that MLB has witnessed another moment like this, but this time, it was a bittersweet night with history for one side, a humiliating mistake for a player, and a crushing loss for the other.
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On Tuesday, the Milwaukee Brewers thrashed the Seattle Mariners 22-0. This stands as the most lopsided shutout victory in MLB’s modern era (1900). Meanwhile, this also tied to be the largest shutout win in the MLB since the 1887 Philadelphia game.
Interestingly, that’s not everything that surrounded this game…
Julio Rodriguez’s Blunder On the Worst Possible Day
A 22-0 scoreline should leave little room for one player’s mistake to dominate the conversation. But Julio Rodríguez, a Mariners player, found a way to turn one historically shameful night into something more bizarre.
The Brewers were 1-0 entering the 5th. They went 6-0 by the end of the same. The Mariners failed to spark a comeback attempt. And the runs kept piling up. By the end of the 7th, they were 13-0.
In the 8th, Rodriguez secured the second out on Christian Yelich’s fly ball and casually threw the ball to the stands, giving away 2 runs. The $209.3 million Seattle star thought it was the third out and walked casually until the realisation of what he had done hit him.
Andrew Vaughn and Jonathan Ornelas reached home, adding to Seattle’s misery. It took the score from 19-0 to 21-0. And baseball fans were quick to criticize his gaffe. Some even urged strict actions for Rodríguez, while a few of them bashed the entire team for the result. But Pat Murphy had a completely different perspective.
“Guys lose their focus for a second, especially a guy that’s played as long as he has and understands the game and has done so much for the game. Those things happen, especially when the score is like that,” the Milwaukee Brewers manager told the reporters during the postgame, per Fox Sports 920.
Murphy understood what the impact could be on a player when he’s going through such a huge defeat. Hence, instead of bashing the blunder, he took it as just another mistake. Pat Murphy said:
“At that point, I was playing catch in the hallway here with Jackson (his son). So I could be guilty of that, too, because Jackson and I were playing catch. I didn’t see the play, but yeah, that can happen.”
However, there was still much more to the game.
Mariner’s Worst Loss in Franchise History
This thrashing loss was the worst the Seattle Mariners have faced in their franchise histroy. Their last worst defeat was 7 years ago, when they faced a 21-1 loss to Houston on Sept. 8, 2019.
The Manager of the team then broke his silence about the same. “Obviously, not how we wanted to start this game,” Dan Wilson said. “It just got out of hand. They put up a lot of runs tonight, and we were quiet offensively. It’s a tough one to even think about.”
One of the Mariners player accepted how bad a loss this was. “This was an embarrassing loss,” Miller said. “At the end of the day. We’ve got to go to the hotel, sleep, wake up, and we’ve got another game tomorrow.”
Clearly, the Brewers will remember the triumph for a long time, but Julio and the Seattle Mariners will try to move on as fast as possible.