When faced with a seemingly insurmountable lead, there’s long been a saying that there’s no clock in baseball. The advent of the pitch timer has made those words technically inaccurate, though the point remains: If your team is behind, the fight to mount a comeback is not against time but, rather, simply the opponent.
And in the cases of the Marlins and Nationals on Sunday, they proved those words right with a pair of historic ninth-inning rallies.
Miami entered the bottom of the ninth against the Yankees trailing by four runs, while Washington came into the final frame down by five. Each team turned in a miraculous finish to score improbable wins, marking the first time in the modern era that two teams came back from at least four runs down in the ninth inning to win without requiring extra innings.
Both teams had about a 1% chance of winning coming into the bottom of the ninth inning, per FanGraphs. The Marlins had three of their first four hitters reach to load the bases with one out, then scored two runs on an error by Clay Holmes and tied the game on a two-run triple by Luis Arraez. Jake Burger delivered the walk-off hit with a single to center field to seal the 8–7 win.
YOU GOT TO TRUST US! pic.twitter.com/N0D6zncwrb
— Miami Marlins (@Marlins) August 13, 2023
The Nationals, meanwhile, trailed by five runs in the final inning. A sacrifice fly by Ildemaro Vargas made the score 7–4 with two outs. A bases-loaded walk trimmed the lead to two, then the game was tied after two runs scored on an error by shortstop Nick Allen. Jeter Downs drove in the winning run on a game-ending single with what was his first hit as a National.
JETER COMPLETES THE 6-RUN COMEBACK. 🗣️WALK 'EM OFFFFFFFFFFFF pic.twitter.com/u3XM4oufqm
— Washington Nationals (@Nationals) August 13, 2023
