SEATTLE -- What, you expected the National League to rally for four runs in the ninth inning off Kazuhiro Sasaki?
|  | | Mike Cameron's hustling double exemplified the Mariners' unlikely first-half success. |
No way. Not this year. Not in Seattle's home ballpark with 47,000 fans clapping and stomping for Kaz to get the final out.
So, when Cliff Floyd grounded weakly to first base, with Mike Sweeney tossing to Sasaki to close out the American League's 4-1 victory Tuesday, it was the perfect ending to the first half of a baseball season that belonged to the Seattle Mariners.
Wonder why the Mariners are 63-24? Just check the box score from the All-Star Game. It was a microcosm of why Seattle has ripped apart the league.
Freddy Garcia pitched a perfect third inning to get the win. With a 10-1 record, that's what he does.
Ichiro led off the bottom of the first with an infield single, ripping a Randy Johnson fastball down the first-base line. Todd Helton made a diving stop, but the blazing Ichiro beat Johnson to the bag. Not since Wee Willie Keeler perfected the Baltimore Chop has a player utilized the infield hit like Ichiro.
In the bottom of the sixth, Mike Cameron lined a soft single into left-center. Except he sprinted out of the batter's box and beat Moises Alou's off-balance throw for a double.
Jeff Nelson pitched a hitless seventh, showing National Leaguers his nasty slider that has held opposing hitters to a .120 average and .153 slugging percentage.
And then Sasaki, the major-league leader with 29 saves, finished it off with an easy ninth inning.
"It has been a great first half for us, kind of a dream season so far," Mariners first baseman John Olerud. "We've had a ton of guys that have really played well and that were deserving to be on this team. So it's kind of a little bit like celebrating the first half."
Cameron's double epitomized the Mariner way -- effort, hustle, desire, taking advantage of everything you can and forcing mistakes from the opposition. He fouled off one 3-2 pitch from Jon Lieber and then lined what appeared to be routine single into left-center. He never hesistated rounding first and a surprised Alou made a bad throw to second.
Mariners second baseman Bret Boone, tied for the AL lead with 84 RBI, said that's what Cameron has done all season.
"Nowadays, a lot of times you see some players that get picked for the All-Star Game (who) don't really want to go and don't want to show up, and Mike is the complete opposite of that. He was just so excited and was going to let everybody know. I thought it was a really neat thing."
Sasaki -- the other Japanese player on the Mariners, in case you've forgotten -- closed it in typical fashion for him: with a big grin on his face that suggested he'd done such a thing before in his life.
"I?m just relieved everything went OK," he said after the game. "When I was warming up in the bullpen, I was really wild, and so I was nervous about if I could throw strikes on the mound."
He did, retiring Brian Giles on a routine grounder to second, striking out Sean Casey on a mean splitter on the outside corner and inducing the groundout from Floyd.
And while Ichiromania has swept through the Pacific Northwest, non-bandwagon Mariner fans know Sasaki and Nelson and fellow reliever Arthur Rhodes have been perhaps the key to the team?s success.
After all, Mariners fans had to endure some awful relief pitching in the '90s, as the team sifted through a variety of failed closers, from the second edition of Norm Charlton to Bobby Ayala to Heathcliff Slocumb to Mike Timlin.
Who would have predicted a Mariner closer would someday record the final out in an All-Star Game?
Then again, who would have predicted anything that has gone on in Seattle this season?
Lieber languishes
Was Jon Lieber's performance the beginning of the end for the Cubs? (Hey, just kidding Cubbies fans.)
Lieber pitched the sixth inning for the National League and gave up consecutive homers to Derek Jeter and Magglio Ordonez. Jeter belted a 3-and-0 thigh-high fastball to straightaway center field for the first homer by a Yankees All-Star since Yogi Berra hit one in 1959. Ordonez then tagged an 0-1 pitch four rows into right-center for the fifth set of back-to-back homers in All-Star history.
Lieber has allowed just 10 homers in 126.1 innings this year and never more than one in any single game. Last year was a different story, however, when he coughed up 36 gopherballs, including two or more on 12 different occasions.
Junior Circuit swagger?
Time for a little American League arrogance?
The National League used to walk with a big swagger throughout the '70s and early '80s, when they were in the midst of winning 19 of 20 All-Star Games (conveniently ignoring the fact that the AL won six World Series title in the '70s).
But the Junior Circuit has now five straight All-Star Games and 11 of the past 14. Oh, the AL champion has also won 12 of the past 17 World Series.
Also of note
The AL and NL teams combined to use 58 players, surpassing the mark of 56 set in 1981, 1999 and 2000. The only players not get in the game were Minnesota's Eric Milton and Arizona's Curt Schilling.
The Mariners not only had eight All-Stars, but four ex-Mariners were also All-Stars. You know about Randy Johnson and Alex Rodriguez and maybe Mike Hampton, who was traded to Houston for Eric Anthony following the 1993 season in one of former GM Woody Woodward's less-astute moves. But how about Joe Mays? The Twins right-hander was originally a sixth-pick of the Mariners and spent three years in the organization before going to Minnesota as the player to be named later for Roberto Kelly in 1997.
Johnson got a nice ovation when introduced in pregame ceremonies. "It was very nice. The fans here are just unbelievable. They have got something real special here and they have had it ever since '95. ... When I first got here as a young player, the Seahawks and Sonics were popular, (and we were) a team that was struggling to get .500 -- but we finally did that and that city has really reached out to the team."
David Schoenfield is the Baseball Editor at ESPN.com.
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