M's burning playoff chances

NEW YORK — Their biggest game of the year was going up in flames, and all the Mariners could see was smoke.

It was visible on the mound, where the latest bullpen torch job ruined a pitcher's duel Wednesday night. More smoke poured out of their ears as the runs piled up, along with a slew of umpiring decisions that failed to go their way.

By the time the smoke cleared, an angry, frustrated Mariners bunch sat steaming in their clubhouse after a 10-2 loss to the New York Yankees. They pointed fingers at the umpires but also at themselves as they tried to figure out how their playoff push had become derailed.

"We've got to get out of it," Mariners manager John McLaren said.

He's talking about a slide in which his team has dropped 11 of 12 to fall three games behind the Yankees in the American League wild-card race. McLaren was asked how his team, which gave up eight runs in the seventh inning on Wednesday after surrendering a seven-spot in the same frame the night before, planned to turn things around.

"We'll see what we're made out of, how about that?" McLaren said. "We'll see who steps to the plate."

The list of folks he'd like to see "step up" is apparently all-inclusive.

"We'll start with the manager and work our way through the whole team," he said.

There was plenty of blame to go around as a strong outing by Jarrod Washburn was wasted. Washburn had a 2-1 lead in the seventh when leadoff batter Alex Rodriguez homered to left to tie things up and electrify the Yankee Stadium crowd of 52,538.

But things truly began to unravel moments later when Jose Lopez muffed a ground ball for his second error in two innings. Reliever George Sherrill came on, and Shelley Duncan's sacrifice bunt and a semi-intentional walk to Jason Giambi put two on with only one out.

It was at this point that the umpiring became an issue. The Mariners had already seen two blown calls go against them earlier on, involving Ichiro being called out at second on a steal attempt and at first after a ground ball.

McLaren argued both, the second one more vehemently, and patience was wearing thin in the seventh. Sherrill failed to get some close calls, including a full-count offering to Wilson Betemit that walked the bases loaded.

A peeved Sherrill asked plate umpire Larry Vanover about his call.

"He told me that [catcher Kenji] Johjima moved his mitt too much," Sherrill said. "I think he needs to go read the rules, but what are you going to do?"

He contended that a pitch should be called based on where a ball crosses the plate, not where the catcher's mitt grabs it.

"It's a big pitch, a big situation and you reward the hitter for taking," Sherrill said. "What are you going to do?"

Sean Green entered with the bases loaded and stared long and hard at Vanover after a 3-1 pitch to pinch-hitter Jorge Posada was ruled a ball, forcing in the go-ahead run. The runs kept piling up against a stream of relievers, highlighted by Rodriguez belting his second homer of the inning, this one off Brandon Morrow.

Reliever Rick White was so incensed that, when some tight calls went against him in the eighth, he uttered an expletive and was tossed. He sidearmed the ball along the ground past Vanover in disgust as he left the field.

Washburn had yielded just the first Rodriguez homer and a third-inning solo blast to former Angels battery-mate Jose Molina — his first in 182 at-bats dating back to last year — in the third. But he was still saddled with his seventh loss in eight decisions since the All-Star break.

"It's a tough one for us," he said. "We were right in it. We haven't been playing well the last couple of weeks ... we've been dropping a lot of big games."

And now, with just over three weeks to go, they'll have to hope their playoff chances didn't go up in smoke.

Geoff Baker: 206-464-8286 or gbaker@seattletimes.com.

Read his daily blog at www.seattletimes.com/Mariners