Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. As if losing 22–0 wasn’t embarrassing enough, the Mariners also committed four errors, their most in seven years.
In today’s SI:AM:
🤠 How the Texans built their stout D
📓 Breer’s notes from Jags camp
⚾ Verducci on shortstops’ struggles
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Yikes
Last night’s game between the Brewers and Mariners in Milwaukee was a close one for a little while. And then it very much wasn’t.
The score was 1–0 in favor of the home team after the top of the fifth inning. Then the floodgates opened. The Brewers scored five runs in the fifth, five in the sixth and two in the seventh before really turning the game into a farce with a nine-run eighth. I’ll help you out with the math: That’s 22 runs. The Mariners, meanwhile, scored none.
The 22–0 win is tied for the most lopsided shutout victory in modern MLB history. The Pirates beat the Cubs by the same score on Sept. 16, 1975, and Cleveland beat the Yankees on Aug. 31, 2004. The last team to score more than 22 runs in a shutout was the 1887 Philadelphia Quakers, who beat the Indianapolis Hoosiers, 24–0.
But wait, it gets worse. The Brewers scored their 20th and 21st runs of the game when Mariners center fielder Julio Rodríguez forgot how many outs there were in the eighth inning and threw the ball into the stands after catching a fly ball for the second out.
The Mariners were losing 19-0. Somehow the worst play of the game came after that with Julio Rodriguez simply not paying attention.
— Dusty Baker (@DustyBakerTV) August 19, 2026
Unreal. https://t.co/jVNfJOlGLJ #Mariners #TridentsUp pic.twitter.com/Vjg6QZuUrQ
In fairness to Rodríguez, the Mariners had already waved the white flag by sending in infielder Leo Rivas to pitch. Can you really blame Rodríguez for not paying full attention when his team had essentially declared the game over?
Rivas got rocked. He lobbed 31 pitches between 36 and 43 mph toward the plate as the Brewers teed off for nine runs on nine hits, turning what was already a blowout into a total joke of a game.
Position players pitching used to be a fun oddity. Remember when Ichiro Suzuki took the mound in the regular-season finale as a 41-year-old in 2015? Or when Albert Pujols got to finish off a game in his final season in 2022? Those were goofy little treats. But the use of position players as pitchers has exploded in recent years, and the novelty has worn off.
Between 2005 and ’11, there were only 39 combined instances of a position player pitching. In 2022, that shot up to a record-high 160, after which MLB altered its rules to limit when position players can take the mound. (Baseball Reference’s data lists Shohei Ohtani among the players who are “typically position players,” but I think the point still stands.) This year, with more than a month left in the season, there have already been 131 pitching appearances by position players. And they’re mostly like Rivas’s outing—tossing lollipops so softly that they barely have enough juice to reach the plate. Gone are the days of Ichiro giving it his all or former Rays outfielder Brett Phillips yukking it up on the mound. Position players just stand on the rubber and dutifully take their lumps.
The Mariners had already been thoroughly embarrassed in the first seven innings of last night’s game. Who benefited from them finishing out the game with a position player on the mound? There’s no reason why Seattle shouldn’t be allowed to formally forfeit the game and end it prematurely, rather than unofficially forfeit by sending Rivas in to pitch. I’m not the only one who feels that way, either. Mookie Betts told Sports Illustrated’s Tom Dierberger the same thing last month.
“Once position players come in [to pitch], just call the game,” Betts said. “That’s pretty much it. Once you’re down 10 [runs] and the position player comes in, just call it a day.”
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The top five…
… things I saw last night:
5. The wacky play that led to the first of the Brewers’ 22 runs.
4. Alex Bregman’s walk-off single for the Cubs. That’s their 13th walk-off win this season, the most in the majors.
3. Angels shortstop Zach Neto’s difficult off-balance throw from deep in the hole.
2. A beautiful play by third baseman Bryson Stott for the final out of the Phillies’ win over the Marlins.
1. Fernando Tatis Jr.’s badass grand slam robbery. The way he casually revealed that he had caught the ball was incredible. (Tatis also hit two homers.)
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