It was the 14th inning of the winner-takes-all Game 5 of the American League Division series, and Steven Blackburn, a diehard Seattle Mariners fan, couldn’t contain his emotions any longer. The stress of the tie game between his Mariners and the Detroit Tigers was starting to take its toll.
Blackburn and the rest of the 47,000 fans at sold-out T-Mobile Park had been standing, yelling and nervously watching for 4 1/2 hours as the game grinded into an extra-inning standstill. So the 26-year-old Blackburn got out his phone and started sending messages to the woman most credited with the Mariners’ September surge and nearly unprecedented playoff run: a witch named Luna who sells custom spells on Etsy.
Luna please, I’m desperate, Blackburn typed. Work your magic.
The Mariners won the game and the series in their next at-bat when Jorge Polanco punched a single to right field, propelling them to their first American League Championship Series berth since 2001. Was Polanco’s clutch knock a result of Luna summoning her powers again? Or was it due to a lucky bag of Cheetos, or fans sporting mustaches — real and fake — in support of Seattle players? Or maybe it was the comeback shoes sitting atop fans’ heads, or Humpy, the racing mascot who never wins, finally finishing first in the salmon race?
No matter what Mariners fans believe, it’s working.
“People believe in the power of weird,” said Tyler Thompson, the Mariners director of game entertainment. “It’s only weird if it doesn’t work, and in a lot of these cases, like Humpy and the (rally) shoe, it definitely works.”
On Friday night, down 2-1 in the bottom of the eighth and facing a potential third straight loss in the ALCS, Cal Raleigh hit a game-tying homer before Eugenio Suárez — ice cold all postseason — launched what some might say was a supernatural tie-breaking grand slam.
The organization sits one win from its first World Series, and the team continues to provide more magic than longtime Seattle fans — who have experienced plenty of heartbreak — ever could have dreamed of. For a dedicated fan base starved for success after so many years of falling short, this Mariners’ run has taken on a greater meaning.
“Baseball is the most beautiful, romantic and emotion-provoking sport on the planet,” longtime season ticket holder Ana Krafchick said. “And getting to see the Mariners play this deep is the best thing that’s happened to my life.”
Mariners fans are pouring their faith into this year’s team. (Jane Gershovich / MLB Photos via Getty Images)
Blackburn’s initial Etsy witch purchase didn’t come on a whim. He had been mulling over the idea since a friend asked him about it in June. Blackburn isn’t an expert on spells, but he thought waiting for the right moment could help.
So when the Mariners found themselves in an early September slide, losing ground to a Houston Astros team responsible for much of Seattle’s recent suffering, Blackburn made his move. On Sept. 2, following the team’s fourth straight loss and fifth in six games, he found Luna and made a simple request: a powerful, custom spell to uncurse the Mariners (cost: $16).
“My wish is for the Seattle Mariners to get their act together and start winning baseball games again,” Blackburn wrote to Luna, in part, “and hopefully make their way to the World Series and win.”
Blackburn placed the order on the night of Sept. 5. He got confirmation from Luna that the spell had been cast the following afternoon, with instructions to stay positive to help manifest the spell into materializing. Blackburn posted on X, where he has roughly 1,200 followers. The two tweets — the first explaining his request and the second confirming the spell was cast — generated more than 450,000 views.
On the day Blackburn’s spell was cast, the Mariners beat the Atlanta Braves 10-2. The next day, they won 18-2, and the Mariners’ official X account posted: “shoutout to the etsy witch,” above the winning game graphic.
shoutout to the etsy witch pic.twitter.com/XalePUoOkW
— Seattle Mariners (@Mariners) September 7, 2025
In late September, during the second-to-last series of the regular season, Seattle traveled to Houston for a pivotal three-game series. It was the kind of series previous Mariners teams in a division race would have lost. Instead, they swept the Astros, taking a lead in the division they’d never relinquish. It was Seattle’s first AL West title since that magical 2001 season, when the team won 116 games and reached the ALCS.
“For the last decade, we have been haunted by the Astros over and over,” said longtime fan Nathan Bishop, who runs a Mariners newsletter and has had several friends dress up as witches for games this season. “This year it was like, ‘OK, this is not every team that has come before. This group is able to tell its own story.’”
The Mariners fan base is a proudly quirky and fiercely loyal group that has clung to every potential spark like a rain-soaked shirt that’s morphed into a second skin. It is not just witches and mustaches (a nod to the Mariners players’ facial hair) roaming Seattle. Fans have changed their social media handles to variations of “Etsy witch” and visited Salem, Mass., to try to ensure the team’s mystical powers hold up.
Even snack time has taken on special meaning for Mariners fans since early September. Around the time Blackburn ordered the spell and the first mustaches began to sprout, Mariners president Jerry Dipoto and broadcaster Rick Rizzs brought back a classic superstition involving Cheetos. When the team was in Atlanta, Dipoto resumed an old routine, ensuring that Rizzs received a bag of Cheetos from the baseball operations group on game day.
And then there are the shoes.
In Game 2 of the 2022 AL Wild Card Series against the same Blue Jays team they are squaring off with now, the Mariners rallied from an 8-1 deficit. A fan at a team watch party at T-Mobile Park was spotted with a Birkenstock on top of his head. Thompson and his team zoomed in on the fan, and when the Mariners got a hit, they flashed back to him with a “Rally shoe” graphic. Seattle won the game 10-9 and clinched a series win.
The shoe-on-the-head superstition returned with a vengeance during the 15-inning marathon in Game 5 of the ALDS — momentarily confusing the national TV broadcasters as they scanned a crowd suddenly donning footwear on their noggins.
The “Rally shoe” in action during Game 2 of the ALCS. (Steve Russell / Toronto Star via Getty Images)
As the Mariners push towards a World Series, no one wants to break the momentum. Even Dipoto’s wife has been washing and wearing the same pair of socks to the games. In baseball, you don’t mess with superstitions.
“If you think something is pushing you in the right direction, you’re loath to not do it that way,” said Dipoto, who wore the same shirt under his uniform during his playing days until it fell apart.
Season ticket holder Amy Franz, who hasn’t missed a home game since Edgar Martinez’s Hall of Fame induction in 2019, combines all of the superstitions when she attends games. She’s been wearing a witch hat since the Etsy witch spell became known, with a fake mustache and special glittery shoes to put on her head. In the 15th inning of the ALDS Game 5, Franz realized she was missing something: her bag of Cheetos.
“I told my husband the bag was under his seat, and as soon as I opened them we got the hit to win the game,” Franz said.
Born in 1977, the Seattle Mariners have yet to experience life as a World Series team. That’s 48 years of pent-up emotions from a fan base just waiting to explode with joy — if that moment ever comes.
“I’m not afraid to say I’ve done an ‘Angels in the Outfield’ prayer, and I’m pretty agnostic,” said Mariners super-fan Saul Spady, who went viral for tearing up in the stands during Game 2 of the ALDS.
“The Mariners have been a tragic fan base and need all the help they can get, and everyone desperately wants to feel like they have a role in helping this team,” said Spady, who has grown a mustache for the first time in his life. “They are picking their fandom piece. I’m embracing being ‘Mariners Crying Guy’, because how cool is that? This fan base is deep and weird and awesome.”
“I feel like lots of Mariners fans are criers,” said Krafchick, who grew up going to Mariners games. “It’s an emotional group. You saw Saul, he was bawling, it’s just such a release of so many feelings.”
Krafchick wasn’t immune to those emotions as she watched the Mariners clinch a berth to the ALCS on Sept. 10, her late father Steven’s birthday. On one forearm, Krafchick has a tattoo of home plate with her dad’s initials, “SPK”; on the other is “My, oh my,” the famous catchphrase coined by late Mariners broadcaster Dave Niehaus, written in her father’s handwriting. Steve died from ALS in 2020, and of all the things they bonded over, the Mariners were the biggest.
“The Mariners bring the city and whole community together in a really beautiful way,” Krafchick said.
The bond has been strengthened through years of misery.
“I think people outside of Seattle look at Mariners fans and say this team is so mediocre every year, but it’s not that,” said Mariners lifelong fan Joe Veyera. “Year-in, year-out we have been a good team but always fall like one or two games off of the playoffs. There’s a level of heartbreak there that I don’t think people nationally quite grasp.”
Veyera was just 8 the last time the Mariners went to the ALCS.
“It’s hard not to look back and be like ‘Man, I grew up waiting for this team to make a run like this,’” Veyera said. “You think about all the friendships you’ve had, any people you’ve lost, it’s hard to not get emotional about it, thinking about all the changes between these two moments and everything that happened in between.”
One of Bishop’s lasting memories from the last division-winning team isn’t from the action on the field. It is of him jumping off the couch and hugging his dad in a way he hasn’t since. This time around, Bishop is bringing his son to Mariners’ playoff games.
Becky Mulhollen’s first date with her husband came at a Mariners game during that inaugural 1977 season. On Wednesday, she was there with her 11-year-old granddaughter, Olivia, teaching her how to keep score. Mulhollen keeps score at every game and has more than 50 years of Mariners history in a hope chest at her home. She raised her kids here, spreading out a blanket in front of their seats in left field so they could play. This season, Mulhollen says, has been surreal, an emotion echoed by everyone interviewed for this story.
Amy Franz and Becky Mulhollen show off their game day attire. (Brittany Ghiroli / The Athletic)
No matter what happens, Mariners fans will always have this season. A new generation of fans will grow up remembering the 2025 M’s and how they made the whole city fall in love with baseball. Across the state, events are being rescheduled.
“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” said one Seattle-area teacher to parents, “but I jumped on the Mariners bandwagon and can’t have parent conferences during the game.”
Workplaces are turning into viewing parties after hours. At Adobe’s offices in Fremont, it’s not uncommon for dozens of employees to stay late to watch on the large televisions so they don’t miss a pitch while commuting. Everyone has Mariners fever. The Seattle Sounders paid tribute to the M’s earlier this week with their goal celebration. Earlier this month, Julio Rodríguez got a rousing ovation at the Seattle Kraken game while riding on the Zamboni.
The city held a Mariners rally last Wednesday, and mayor Bruce Harrell officially declared Oct. 16 “Humpy Day” in honor of the Mariners’ now viral salmon mascot. Humpy lost 165 consecutive salmon races before winning during the second iteration of the race during Game 5 of the ALDS. Thompson, who helped hatch the idea for the race before the 2024 season, said the team doesn’t script the endings and that it was the regular Humpy running when he got his iconic win.
What fun would scripting any of this be? Humpy’s win was unexpected, unprecedented, a real David versus Goliath tale. If the Mariners are going to get to the organization’s first World Series, they’ll have to do a few more improbable things. So might their fans.
“The meeting of all of this has created a cocktail of Mariners fans that are superstitious, want to be here early and want to have an impact on what happens on the field,” Thompson said. “I believe as much as they do what they do has an impact, whether it’s what jacket they wear, what mustache they grow or what fish wins.”
Thompson, in his eighth season with the Mariners, said this run has shifted the fan base into another gear. And whether they’re ultimately the last team standing or not, the city won’t soon forget what bringing home a division title, and playoff baseball, back to Seattle has meant for a quirky, rabid bunch.
“I’m somebody that looks at life through baseball,” Mulhollen said. “And there’s always hope with the next hit and the next run. You never know what will happen. Is there disappointment? Yes, but with disappointment comes great joy. Do I think we will make the World Series? Yes, absolutely. Will I be disappointed if we don’t? Yes, absolutely.
“But it’s baseball. You have to learn how to deal with adversity. You don’t give up. You keep hoping until you can’t.”