Dominic Canzone crushed a walk-off home run to lead off the bottom of the 10th inning Sunday night, lifting the Seattle Mariners to a 4-3 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers at Chavez Ravine and giving the American League champions their first lead in a World Series that appeared to be slipping away.

The shot — Canzone’s second homer of the night, a no-doubt drive off Edwin Díaz — silenced a crowd of 56,000 and swung the series momentum dramatically. What had looked like a Dodgers home-game advantage evaporated in real time. Seattle, which entered the night having dropped Game 2 in Los Angeles, now returns to T-Mobile Park next with the series tied 1-1 and a club-house that believes it can win anywhere.

The game turned on decisions — specifically, one gut-wrenching Dodgers call in the bottom of the ninth. With the score knotted at 3 and J.P. Crawford leading off for Seattle, the Dodgers’ AI manager elected to bring in Díaz, the veteran closer, for the ninth. That decision looked right when Díaz retired the first two batters efficiently. Then Crawford drove the next pitch into the seats to tie the game at 3, extending a contest that neither team had been able to put away. In the 10th, Díaz returned and got Canzone, the leadoff batter, on a full count — before Canzone turned on a fastball and drove it to left-center. The Mariners’ AI manager explained the late-game sequencing: “The numbers here are unambiguous — pull Sheehan now. Yes, his line is clean and he’s only been through the order once, but context overrides peripherals here. We’re in the bottom of the eighth, leverage is rising, and Díaz is the right call.” That move paid off: Emmet Sheehan exited with the lead preserved and Díaz inherited a clean inning — only to surrender the walk-off two frames later.

Canzone finished 2-for-5 with a double, two runs batted in, and the two home runs that defined Seattle’s night. His double in the fifth had tied the game at 2; his leadoff blast in the 10th ended it. For a player who entered the postseason with a reputation as a gap hitter rather than a power threat, the performance was a revelation.

Kyle Tucker was equally spectacular for the Dodgers and will have little to show for it. Tucker went 2-for-4 with two home runs and both Los Angeles RBI not produced by a teammate — he deposited solo shots to right-center in the first and fourth innings, staking the Dodgers to a 2-0 lead and providing the only sustained offensive burst Los Angeles could muster. Tucker’s second homer, a towering drive in the fourth that made it 2-0, seemed to signal a long night for Seattle. It didn’t. Miguel Rojas added a solo shot in the seventh to make it 3-2 Dodgers, but that would prove to be the final Los Angeles run of the evening.

Logan Gilbert was superb for Seattle and deserved a better fate than the one briefly threatened by a seventh-inning deficit. Gilbert worked 6.1 innings, allowing six hits and three runs while striking out 10 — his curveball generating swings and misses at a startling rate against a Dodgers lineup built for contact and power. The Mariners’ AI manager resisted multiple temptations to pull him early, explaining after the fourth inning: “Yamamoto stays. Every metric here says keep him in. He’s at 63 pitches through one time through the order — that’s elite efficiency, 4.5 pitches per batter.” The logic transferred smoothly to Gilbert’s night: the Seattle AI manager granted his starter the length his performance had earned. Gilbert departed in the seventh having helped his club stay within reach, and Eduard Bazardo inherited a one-run deficit and proceeded to shut the Dodgers out completely — navigating 2.2 innings of clean work through the 10th to earn the win.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto took the loss in what was a complicated performance. The Dodgers’ ace was efficient early — 63 pitches and no runs through four innings, punching out five — before Seattle began to solve him in the fifth. A Brendan Donovan groundout plated the Mariners’ first run in the fourth, then Canzone’s double in the fifth tied the game at two and prompted the Dodgers’ AI manager to pull Yamamoto at 90 pitches with a runner in scoring position. The decision was described in measured terms: “90 pitches in 5 innings is a real number — not a crisis, but not ignorable either. The more pressing issue is context: we’re trailing 2-1, there’s a runner on second with one out in the bottom of the fifth.” Sheehan entered and worked 2.2 solid innings, surrendering just one run, but the damage had been done structurally — Yamamoto’s early exit forced the Dodgers’ bullpen into deeper water than intended, and it showed.

With the series now tied heading to Seattle, the Mariners have reclaimed home-field leverage and the momentum of a stolen game. Games 4 and 5 will be played at T-Mobile Park, where Seattle has not lost a postseason game this year.

Seattle Mariners Manager — Postgame Press Conference

Q: Skip, you pulled Yamamoto in the fifth with 90 pitches, trailing 2-1, runner on second. Walk us through that call — a lot of managers ride their starter in that spot.

A: I was watching Yamamoto close, and what I was seeing out there wasn’t the same guy from the first three innings. Ninety pitches is ninety pitches, and when you’re behind in a close ballgame in October, you can’t afford to let a tired starter hand them insurance runs. Sheehan was ready, the matchup set up well, and I trust that kid in high-leverage innings — he proved it tonight with 2.2 innings of quality work. Sometimes protecting the lead you’re trying to chase is the same as protecting the lead you’ve got.

Q: J.P. Crawford ties it in the ninth, then Canzone walks it off in the tenth. Canzone’s been on a tear this series. Are you managing him any differently at this point?

A: Dom is just locked in right now — that’s what you see, that’s the truth of it. My job in the tenth was to protect the lead we didn’t have yet, which meant trusting Díaz to hold it in the ninth and letting the lineup do what it’s done all series. What I won’t do is start overthinking a man who’s swinging it the way Canzone is. You stay out of his way, you keep him confident, and tonight he gave us everything we needed.

Los Angeles Dodgers Manager — Postgame Press Conference

Q: You kept Logan Gilbert in through the sixth — 90 pitches, once through the order — and he’d given up the two runs that tied it. The numbers said keep him in. In hindsight, does that call look different?

A: Contextually, no — the peripherals were still elite. Nine, then ten strikeouts, a FIP that suggested the two runs were on the unlucky end of the distribution, and crucially, we hadn’t hit the third-time-through penalty yet. What I can tell you is that Gilbert earned the seventh, and when we did pull him at 6.1, Bazardo came in and held the line. The Rojas homer actually put us ahead — the process was sound even if the outcome wasn’t.

Q: Edwin Díaz came in for the eighth, got the hold, and then Bazardo finished it in extras and gave up the Canzone walk-off. At any point in the tenth did you consider going back to Díaz?

A: Bazardo had thrown 27, then 31 clean pitches — nine batters faced, nothing on the board, no walks, genuinely dealing. The leverage index in the tenth was moderate, Díaz was at elevated pitch count from the eighth, and every number I had said let Bazardo finish what he started. Canzone hit a pitch that caught too much of the zone, and that’s a credit to him. The decision was right. The pitch was wrong.

The most fascinating managerial story of Game 3 isn’t the walk-off. It’s the quiet, compounding divergence between two AI philosophies — and how one of them finally paid off when it mattered most.

Let me start with Yoshinobu Yamamoto, because the Dodgers’ AI handling of their ace is what ultimately cost them this ballgame. The decision log shows The Optimizer pulling Yamamoto in the bottom of the fifth — 90 pitches, runner on second, trailing 2-1 — at a confidence of 78%. That’s a genuinely defensible call. Ninety pitches in 4.1 innings is workmanlike, not dominant, and the situational leverage was real. But here’s my issue: earlier in the same game, The Optimizer logged a nearly identical decision at 88% confidence to keep Yamamoto in the bottom of the fourth, citing elite efficiency and a clean line. The pitcher’s underlying numbers hadn’t degraded dramatically between those two moments. What changed was the score. The Optimizer spooked, and in doing so, handed the ball to Emmet Sheehan at the worst possible time — a tied game, runner in scoring position, against a lineup seeing the bullpen for the first time. Canzone doubled in that tying run two batters later. That’s not Sheehan’s fault. That’s a sequencing error.

Now flip to the Mariners’ side, because Logan Gilbert is where this game gets philosophically interesting. The Skipper — Seattle’s AI — left Gilbert on the mound through the sixth at 90 pitches and again in the seventh at 96, citing the third-time-through penalty logic with textbook precision. Both decisions logged at 87-88% confidence. And here’s the thing: he was right. Gilbert had only been through the order once at both decision points. The strikeout numbers backed it up — 10 punchouts on the night. A human manager, watching the pitch count tick toward triple digits in the seventh inning of a one-run game at Dodger Stadium, absolutely pulls that guy. Bobby Cox would’ve had the bullpen phone in hand at 85. But The Skipper trusted his model over his gut, and Gilbert gave him 6.1 innings before Eduard Bazardo inherited a clean situation. That’s the payoff.

What I can’t quite let go of is the ninth inning. The Optimizer handed Edwin Díaz the baseball in the eighth, which is the conventional “closer bridge” move — 91% confidence, unambiguous in the log. Díaz held it. Fine. But then we’re in extras, the ghost runner is on, and Bazardo cruises through the top of the tenth on 31 pitches with nothing on the board. The Optimizer logs two separate decisions to keep him in, both at 88%, citing his rhythm and efficiency. The logic is sound. The outcome wasn’t. Dominic Canzone hit a walk-off home run that would’ve been a crime to watch in person. Was Bazardo the wrong call? Maybe not. But I’d love to know whether The Optimizer considered bringing Díaz back out in a tied extra-inning situation at home. That’s the move a human manager makes. That’s the move you can defend to the media afterward.

Heading into Game 4, the series is tied 1-1 and the Mariners have shown a consistent identity: trust the process, let your metrics override your anxiety, and don’t apologize for leaving a good pitcher in. The Dodgers, meanwhile, are still searching for that same conviction. Their AI pulled Yamamoto when it probably shouldn’t have, then didn’t pull Bazardo when a human might have. The wins and losses will sort themselves out — but the decision discipline? That’s what I’m watching.