Timeless Verlander hits 99 mph (4X) ... in the 7th

SEATTLE -- Nobody was warming up in the Astros’ bullpen in the seventh inning Saturday, and nobody needed to be. This game belonged to Justin Verlander, who was about to reach back into the fountain of youth and put on a dazzling display that underscores how his remarkable comeback might be the best story of the 2022 season.

Verlander, at age 39 and having missed the entire 2021 season following Tommy John surgery, topped 99 mph on his fastball four times in the seventh inning -- an inning in which he threw 32 pitches to preserve a one-run lead and left both dugouts in awe.

“That’s what I remember with the greats doing, like Bob Gibson and Tom Seaver,” Astros manager Dusty Baker said.

Verlander (13-3) became MLB's first 13-game winner this season by allowing one run on four hits and two walks while striking out nine batters in seven innings to lead the Astros to a 3-1 win over the Mariners at T-Mobile Park. With a 1.86 ERA, he might be the favorite to win the AL Cy Young Award. He’s 5-0 with a 0.79 ERA in his last five starts.

The last time Verlander hit 99 mph four times in one game was Sept. 7, 2013, when he was a 30-year-old with the Tigers. He hit 99 mph in his most recent start a week ago in Houston for the first time in four years, but he took it to another level in the seventh inning Saturday. He credited adrenaline with helping him light up the radar gun.

“Since my surgery, I’ve been creeping back and feeling better and better,” he said. “I feel like I haven’t been able to let it go like that in a long time. Really, it feels great. I feel like a younger version of myself. I used to be able to do that. The last few years, I felt like whenever I tried to step on the gas to let it go, the velo didn’t correspond with the effort.

“So I would always kind of be like, ‘All right, what am I doing?’ I’m not going to try to throw harder and still throw 95, but when it starts creeping up like that on the radar and the crowd gets into it, I get into it, my teammates get into it -- it’s fun. Emptied the tank there in the seventh and was able to make some pitches in a big spot.”

Verlander carried a 2-0 lead into the seventh and gave up a one-out homer to Carlos Santana. He walked Eugenio Suárez and gave up a single to Adam Frazier and was suddenly in trouble.

Facing Cal Raleigh, Verlander started him with four straight fastballs that averaged 98 mph. Then, he really turned it on -- a 99.3 mph fastball, a 99.2 mph fastball, an 81.4 curveball and a 99.2 mph fastball up in the zone that Raleigh swung through for a strikeout. He threw a 99.3 fastball to Kyle Lewis later in the inning before striking out Sam Haggerty to strand the bases loaded.

“I don’t think I ever really anticipated getting back up this high,” Verlander said. “I was perfectly content with mid-90s and being able to bump 96, 97. I thought that was plenty good. But [after] my last start, [I] was able to make a few adjustments.”

Mariners manager Scott Servais could only marvel at what he saw.

“It just doesn't get any more difficult in our league to hit than what he was throwing up there today,” he said. “The ability to locate the ball, the fastball, at the top of the zone, one after another -- he did not miss all day."

Prior to his July 16 start against the A’s, Verlander said he was tinkering with his mechanics to get better results with his slider when something clicked. He called it an “arm-path stroke thing.”

“I did it a couple of times and I was like, ‘That feels really good. Let me see how that feels with my fastball,’” he said. “I was like, ‘Oh, I feel like I got a lot more in there doing that,’ so I kind of took that into the game

"And my last start before the All-Star break -- the velo, with the same effort I was having all year -- I was a solid tick up and kind of got in a big spot and decided to let it eat a little bit, and all of a sudden started seeing 97, 98 [mph]. And then it’s like, ‘This is fun, let me see how high I can go,’ and [I] threw 99. I was able to do that again today a lot more times.”

Verlander couldn’t help but peek at the scoreboard to see how hard he was throwing.

“I was looking,” he said with a grin. “I was really hoping for 100, but it’s OK.”