TORONTO — Zak Rickerson wore his Bryce Miller jersey to the Rogers Centre on Sunday, and it stood out like a sore arm. There were a lot of those on Miller’s team, the Seattle Mariners. Less than 43 hours before the opener of this American League Championship Series, they had used seven pitchers in a season-saving marathon across the continent.
Miller’s arm was fresh. Relatively, anyway. He pitched last Wednesday and had never made two starts so close together. He was not the ideal choice for Game 1 against the Toronto Blue Jays, and the fans here let his best friend know it.
“From what I heard in the crowd today, this was supposed to be Toronto’s game,” said Rickerson, a travel agent from New Braunfels, Texas, who has known Miller since seventh grade. “They were talking about the top three starters being used in Game 5, and (the Mariners) just had to throw Bryce out there.
“But I know Bryce didn’t feel like that. He was getting the ball and he was gonna do what he could do.”
What Miller did — after his first pitch landed in the right field bullpen — was completely baffle a hot lineup in a 3-1 victory that betrayed none of the exhaustion that must have preceded it. The Mariners played their game: crisp, heady, with just enough power and speed to support a pitching staff that will not beat itself.
“I feel a little bit tired,” acknowledged closer Andrés Muñoz, drained but delighted after a save that continued his perfect postseason (6 ⅓ hitless innings). “But we are going to try to get a good rest tonight.”
On Sunday, the pitchers put the Blue Jays to sleep. Miller worked six innings, then Gabe Speier and Matt Brash set up Muñoz with an inning apiece. The Mariners were relentlessly efficient, needing only 100 pitches to subdue the Blue Jays, who managed three walks and a single after George Springer’s leadoff blast.
Twelve other starters in the last 50 years had given up a homer on their first pitch of a postseason game. The only one to win was David Price of the 2018 Boston Red Sox, in the World Series clincher at Dodger Stadium. Price was also the last pitcher, before Miller, to make postseason starts with just three days off in between.
But Price was a superstar. Miller was an enigma. After last season’s breakthrough, with a 2.94 ERA in 180 ⅓ innings, his ERA nearly doubled and his innings fell by half. Sidelined twice with elbow inflammation, he posted a 5.68 ERA in 90 ⅓ innings. He made it back for good in late August.
“That’s just kind of how his career has been, where he’s not a perfect pitcher any time he goes out there, but any time something bad happens, he always finds a way to overcome it,” Rickerson said. “And that first pitch didn’t really let it get to him. I think it actually helped him settle down.”
Miller joked that a first-pitch homer shouldn’t really count. (“We’re going with that,” he said.) But the next batter, Nathan Lukes, could have done more damage by walking on 12 pitches. Miller walked another hitter with one out, bringing catcher Cal Raleigh to the mound.
If there were words of wisdom, Miller said, he didn’t remember. It was just a good time for a break in a 27-pitch inning, a chance to lock him back in. He had done this hours earlier when he stood alone in deep center field, staring at the plate from 400 feet away.
“I knew this was the biggest start of my career so far, and I just wanted to get out there and mentally kind of get in a zone and visualize having success on the mound,” said Miller, who had never pitched in Toronto before.
“That’s something that (Adam Bernero), our mental skills guy, walks us through — just visualizing certain pitches with runners on, in the stretch, and seeing yourself from a third-person view of having success. That way, whenever you’re in the moment, it feels like you’ve already been there.”
Miller had been on a playoff mound once before, in Game 4 of the ALDS against Detroit. He shut out the Tigers for 4 ⅓ innings, then left for a reliever as soon as he gave up a run.
Had it been the regular season, Miller said later, he could have gone six or seven innings. He was diplomatic enough with his postgame comments, but clearly not happy. The bullpen blew the game, forcing the 15-inning finale in Seattle on Friday.
As it turned out, throwing only 55 pitches in Detroit helped Miller stay strong on short rest. Both Game 1 starters allowed a two-out walk in the sixth inning of Game 1, but while Toronto manager John Schneider pulled his rested ace, Kevin Gausman, Miller stayed in and finished the inning.
“The hope was to get through four, and then we could start working in the bullpen and getting those guys in there and holding the lead if we had it,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson said. “But the way it kept coming out of his hand, the way he kept going out there and throwing up zeroes was huge.
“It was evident that he wasn’t wanting to come out of that one, and you didn’t want him to come out of the game because he was just attacking, and it was awesome.”
Credit Wilson for trusting what he saw and deviating from the four-inning script. Too often in October, managers fail to recognize that a starter can sometimes pitch well enough to give more than the blueprint suggests.
What the Mariners saw was the A+ version of Miller, a 27-year-old who finished last season with four starts in a row like this (at least six innings, no more than one earned run) but had not done it since. He reasserted his place as a frontline starter with Logan Gilbert, George Kirby, Bryan Woo and veteran Luis Castillo.
“I think he’s peaking at the right time,” said Gilbert, who will start Game 2 on Monday. “When he’s at his best, he has a feel for five or six pitches. That’s what he was doing in the second half last year — the curveball, the splitter, two fastballs, just a lot of things that not many people can do at the same time.”
Miller was his usual self after warmups, Speier said, with elaborate handshake routines for each of the relievers on their way to the bullpen. Kirby keeps to himself on his start days. Gilbert morphs into “Walter,” an intense alter ego almost possessed with competing. Everyone is different.
Miller keeps it all in perspective, his friend said. He’s not loud and he’s not withdrawn. He’s just the same guy, loose and relaxed, caring but carefree.
“So when he gets out there, the big spotlight, it’s nothing really to him,” Rickerson said. “And it’s not because he’s cocky or anything. He’s just a humble guy.”
A humble guy who humbled the Blue Jays with his finest effort of the season.