HOUSTON -- It felt like the House of Horrors all over again.
One strike away in consecutive at-bats from securing a gut-check win at Daikin Park on Friday night, the Mariners instead took a gut-punch, 10-7 loss to the Astros in the bottom of the 10th inning -- and in stunning fashion.
Andrés Muñoz worked into a two-strike count to both Jose Altuve and Daulton Varsho, each with two outs, but surrendered back-to-back singles on well-executed pitches outside the strike zone, which tied the game at 7.
Those came after a one-out, RBI single from Isaac Paredes -- also in a two-strike count -- but one that still positioned the Mariners with a 7-6 lead.
The closer then gave up a back-breaking, 405-foot, three-run homer to Christian Walker that nearly reached the train tracks beyond the Crawford Boxes -- spoiling a game that Seattle had clawed its way back into.
The Mariners (57-66) fell to a season-high six games back of first place in the AL West to these Astros (63-60) with 39 games to play. They’re now 3 1/2 games back of the final AL Wild Card spot, with five teams in between on the outside looking in.
They’ve lost eight of their past 10, 16 of 22 and 21 of 31.
“Not a lot of justice in this game,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson said. “I think the story tonight really is the way our guys fought back.”
Wilson has absorbed increasing criticism in this season that feels like it’s slipping away, but there was credence to his postgame commentary. An argument could be made that Muñoz made only one true mistake in this one, yet it was one that he paid mightily for.
The pitches to Altuve and Varsho were well off the plate and away, yet found holes to keep Houston alive.
Altuve chipped an 0-2 slider off the end of his bat into No Man’s Land in shallow right field, while Varsho chopped a 1-2 slider the other way and past a diving Brock Rodden, who was playing shortstop in his MLB debut and shaded in a shift narrowly to the left of second base.
“I thought Muñoz looked sharp still,” Brendan Donovan said. “Just a couple of those, like, kind of stick-it-out-there, good pieces of hitting.
“That loss, like I said, it stinks. But I'm actually really proud of this club. I mean, down early, fought back, scratched one, scratched another. ... I thought it was cool to see some really good fight out of this bunch.”
Seattle had rallied from a 5-2 deficit in the sixth inning and eventually tied the game in the eighth -- on Rodden’s first career hit, a ground-rule double that capped a momentum shift.
Rodden also had a sacrifice fly in the 10th that pushed their lead to 7-5, after Victor Robles ripped a triple into the left-center-field gap that scored Donovan, who was the automatic runner. It pushed the Mariners ahead for the first time since the second inning, when George Kirby was tagged for four runs, all with two outs.
Yet after Kirby departed, the Mariners’ bullpen didn’t allow a single baserunner to reach -- covering 4 1/3 innings leading into the 10th. Wilson even held Muñoz an inning later than anticipated, instead relying on two gritty innings from Eduard Bazardo, who threw just six pitches in the eighth, then 14 in the ninth.
The five earned runs for Muñoz tied a career high, with an April 15 loss in San Diego.
“We can feel sorry for ourselves if we want,” Wilson said. “We've still got to come back out tomorrow. We've got to play hard, and we've got to win the series, and that's still in front of us.”
This building had been horrible to the Mariners for a multiyear stretch, even after they emerged from their rebuild. But Seattle had so masterfully exorcized its Daikin Park demons over an extended stretch since.
After going 7-32 here from 2019-22 (including the ‘22 playoffs), the Mariners had since gone 17-7 before Friday, including a three-game sweep here last September that essentially secured the AL West title.
Overall, the Mariners had won 10 of their past 11 against the Astros and seven of eight this season -- having already clinched what could be a critical tiebreaker.
But for that to be in play, they’ll need to start stacking wins, and time is dwindling.
“Keep trying to find a positive every night,” Donovan said. “I know a lot of guys do that. Just try to find one thing positive every night, and then the emphasis is just try to find a way to win every night.”