The Grand Slam: Mariners miss opportunity to gain ground in wild-card

The setup was perfect for the Seattle Mariners. Earlier in the day, both the Oakland A's and Kansas City Royals lost, opening the door for Seattle to move into a tie for the wild-card lead with a win over Houston. That door slammed shut quickly though . Starting pitcher Chris Young didn't have his best, and the Mariners offense off little help against Dallas Keuchel as the Astros exploded to a 10-1 win. The game was essentially decided in the first inning as Houston's offense hit two of its five home runs. Strangely enough, the first inning output was one home run more than they'd hit as a team in their previous 12 games. Chris Carter smacked his 37th, a two-run shot, to end the drought and start the scoring. Alex Presley quickly followed with a two-run shot of his own making it 4-0. Matt Dominguez, Carlos Corporan and Jake Marisneck would all add home runs later, but by that point they were merely piling on. Though he didn't hit a home run, Jose Altuve made a little more history of his own. With his 218th hit, he tied Rod Carew for the most hits by a second baseman since 1937. On the hill, Keuchel was never threatened for Houston. He allowed one run over eight innings to notch...