The world’s prettiest “Y”

By Jessica Roberts on October 1, 2022

It’s finally happened, the Seattle Mariners have clinched their first playoff spot since the 116-win 2001 squad. With a 2 – 1 win, Seattle brought an end to what had been the longest playoff drought in professional North American sports — a title that we now transfer to the Sacramento Kings.

Please take a moment to enjoy an image that Mariners fans have waited 20 years to see.

Cal Raleigh’s 3-2, 2 out, home run closed out the race for the post season and reminded us all of the beauty of the letter Y.

Obviously, what the “Y” symbolizes is the most important part. It symbolizes more Mariners baseball with a shot at the World Series. It symbolizes the difference that’s occurred in this world over the last 20 years. It symbolizes a reward for those who have stuck with this (at times) shitshow of an organization.

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It also symbolizes growth. And in my case, what it really symbolizes it’s particularly personal.

At eight years old, I had finally “phased out” of wearing a dress and pretending to be pregnant — or the damsel in distress. Or so I thought…in 2019 I finally accepted the fact that I was transgender and I liked wearing dresses because they made me feel feminine.

In 2021, I attended my first Mariners game as Jessica. Which was warmly received by the franchise’s social media team.

Welcome! Hope you have a great time tonight! 💙
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) July 4, 2021

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For the team I’ve loved since I was a literal baby to welcome me to the ballpark as my true self was extremely validating. We hadn’t resumed creating regular content, and I was still trying to get my physical health all sorted out. But for that moment…none of that mattered. I was a just girl, attending her first Mariners game.

Big Dumper’s home run, despite the fact that I’m on the other side of the state, was one of the best things to ever happen to me in my sports fandom. With everything I’ve been through since the last time this team made the playoffs, I can’t help but cry every time I remember the sheer joy I felt when that ball stayed fair as it ricocheted off of the glass facade of the Hit it Here Café.

My ladylike shriek and sprint into the kitchen was a moment that will live with me forever. For the first time in my adult life, let alone the first time since I accepted who I am, the Seattle Mariners are guaranteed to play in the playoffs and that’s pretty fucking special.

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To put this even more in perspective, the drought was about to enter it’s 10th year when this blog was started on September 11th, 2011. For the first time in the history of our podcast/blog we’re going to get to talk about the Seattle fucking Mariners in the playoffs. I can’t even begin to attempt to describe how monumentally pumped I am for this moment. There is very little in my sports fandom that compares to this moment, there is only one other event in our blogs history that earned this type of feeling and it didn’t get anywhere near the coverage this has.

For the drought to end on a 3-2 pitch with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning at home is the kind of nonsense Hollywood makes sports movies out of…the kind of moment that lives in the mind of anyone who’s played whiffle ball in their back yard. And on Friday night, we got to witness the Cal Raleigh take full advantage of that on pitch that was below his knees.

In the end, he was able to square it up with one of the top three most iconic moments in the history of the franchise.

My early Mariners fandom had been dominated by teams that had gone to the playoff with some regular consistency and that was usually accompanied by deep runs in the post season that always seemed to end in the sixth, fucking, game of the ALCS. Little did I know the two decades of pain that were headed my way.

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It’s not that they haven’t come close, sometimes aided by luck and sometimes hindered by it, throughout this drought — and if MLB had modernized it’s playoffs sooner the drought wouldn’t have been all that long anyway. But it had lingered, there had been seasons where this team found new ways to string us along before they broke our collective heart.

But it matters not now, this squad is genuinely good and it still has a good shot at the No. 4 seed (first wild card) which comes with a home series in the Wild Card round. We actually get to talk about preferred seeding and who we want to see in the playoffs and it actually means something now. It can’t be taken away from us now, the playoff spot is secured and we’ll actually get to see this team in October baseball. And we’ll get to see them roll out a starting rotation of Robbie Ray, George Kirby, Luis Castillo, and Logan Gilbert (with Chris Flexen and Marco Gonzales as capable starters out of the bullpen).

The playoffs have finally come back to Seattle and it feels fucking amazing.