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The Seattle Mariners have clawed their way into the AL Wild Card race and have a chance to force a ton of scenarios on Sunday in the final day of the regular season. The Mariners face the Los Angeles Angels, looking to take the rubber match to put themselves in position to make the postseason. If the Mariners win, they’ll need a bit of help from around the league to have a shot at the playoffs.
Seattle can win and still not get in, mainly because the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox and Toronto Blue Jays could all get wins today anyway. If that happens, the Mariners have no path to the playoffs. It’s when the Yankees and Red Sox loses is when the fun starts for Seattle.
The Mariners can get into a tie with a win and losses by the three AL East teams. There are 3-way and 4-way tie scenarios up in the air as well. There are also ways the Mariners can force a one-game playoff before the actual one-game playoff to see who gets in. This would have the M’s facing either the Yankees or Red Sox depending on how things shake out.
ESPN’s Jeff Passan takes a deeper look into it all in this useful chart:
There are 16 permutations for Game 162 in the AL wild card race. @WesleyJ_14 put together this handy primer for all of it. Bravo to him. Let this be your guide for Sunday.
— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) October 3, 2021
Every game starts just after 3 p.m. ET. Buckle up. pic.twitter.com/lR18NHd6mJ