Seattle Mariners Trivia
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7correct to beat the crowd
50 free Seattle Mariners trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
The Seattle Mariners exist because Seattle sued the American League, spent their first fourteen seasons without a winning record, and then produced one of the great runs in baseball: Griffey, Edgar, the Big Unit, The Double, and a 116-win season that still ties the all-time record. This Mariners trivia quiz covers all of it, from the 'name the team' contest winner who never claimed his prize to the 2022 playoff-drought breaker and the 2025 division title. There are questions on the ballparks (Kingdome, Safeco, T-Mobile Park), the uniforms, the retired numbers, Dave Niehaus, Louie Louie, Buhner Buzz Cut Night, the King's Court, the Vedder Cup and the franchise record book, running from easy questions for casual fans to expert ones about perfect games and ownership changes. Play it before first pitch or use it to settle bar arguments about the 1995 ALDS. Every answer was checked against baseball reference material and encyclopaedic sources before publishing, and each question carries a citation.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which stadium did the Mariners play their first game in 1977?
The Kingdome
The Kingdome drew 57,762 for that first game, a 7–0 loss. In 1994 falling ceiling tiles shut it down, and the Mariners had to play their last 20 games of that season on the road.
Q 02The Seattle Pilots' 1970 move to which city led to the lawsuit that created the Mariners?
Milwaukee
Milwaukee got the Pilots when a bankruptcy referee approved their sale seven days before the 1970 season. Seattle, King County and the state sued the American League, and a new team was the settlement.
Q 03Which future US senator, then state attorney general, led the legal action that created the Mariners?
Slade Gorton
Slade Gorton hired trial lawyer William Dwyer to press the case. It took nearly six years to reach court, and about a month into the trial the league agreed to give Seattle a new team.
Q 04Who suggested the name 'Mariners' for Seattle's new baseball team in 1976?
A Bellevue fan
A Bellevue fan, Roger Szmodis, won the naming contest with 'Mariners' from about 15,000 entries. The club could never find him to hand over his prize of season tickets.
Q 05What is the Mariners' mascot?
The Mariner Moose
The Mariner Moose has been the mascot since 1990. In the 1995 postseason he broke an ankle, crashing into the outfield wall while being towed on skates behind a four-wheeler.
Q 06Which colours did the Mariners wear before switching to navy and Northwest Green in 1993?
Royal blue and gold
Royal blue and gold were the Mariners' colours for their first 16 seasons. Dropped in 1993, they came back in 2015 on a cream throwback uniform worn for Sunday home games.
Q 07The Mariners' original 1977 logo shaped the letter 'M' like which object?
A trident
A trident: the first logo was a trident forming a capital M. The club dropped it in 1987, and it has since returned on a 2017 spring-training cap and on the 2023 City Connect uniform.
Q 08Which 43-year-old pitcher earned his 300th career win in a Mariners uniform in 1982?
Gaylord Perry
Gaylord Perry beat the Yankees 7–3 that May for win number 300. In August umpires ejected him for doctoring the ball, the only such ejection in a career shadowed by spitball suspicions.
Q 09Diego Seguí, who pitched for both the Pilots and the Mariners, earned which nickname?
The Ancient Mariner
The Ancient Mariner was 39 when he threw the first pitch in club history, eight years after pitching for the Pilots. He went 0–7 that season and never appeared in the majors again.
Q 10What did the Mariners first achieve in 1991, their 15th season?
Winning record
A winning record: the Mariners went 83–79 under Jim Lefebvre after 14 straight losing seasons. He was dismissed that autumn anyway.
Q 11Which video-game company's president bankrolled the 1992 purchase that kept the Mariners in Seattle?
Nintendo
Nintendo's Hiroshi Yamauchi put up most of the money as a thank-you to the region that hosts the company's American arm. He never once saw the Mariners play in person.
Q 12Owner Jeff Smulyan planned to move the Mariners to which metropolitan area before selling the team in 1992?
Tampa
Tampa Bay had a new domed stadium and no team to play in it. Smulyan's lease made him offer the club to local buyers first, at an appraiser's price, and a Seattle group met it.
Q 13Which manager led the Mariners for a decade from 1993 and won two AL Manager of the Year awards?
Lou Piniella
Q 21Which Mariner's number did the club retire first, in 2016?
Ken Griffey Jr.
Ken Griffey Jr. and his father became Mariners team-mates in 1990, and that September the two hit back-to-back home runs. His 24 is retired at every level of the organisation, minor leagues included.
Q 22Which Mariner was the 2022 AL Rookie of the Year as the club ended its long playoff drought?
Julio Rodríguez
Julio Rodríguez also reached the final of that summer's Home Run Derby. In August, still a rookie, he signed a contract extension that could be worth as much as $470 million.
Q 23Which slogan became the rallying cry of the Mariners' 1995 run to their first playoff berth?
Refuse to Lose
Lou Piniella had a Seattle past: the Pilots took him in the 1968 expansion draft, then traded him a week before their first game. He was the league's Rookie of the Year for Kansas City that season.
Q 14Whose 11th-inning walk-off double beat the Yankees in Game 5 of the 1995 Division Series?
Edgar Martínez
Edgar Martínez drove in two runs with the hit Seattle still calls 'The Double'. When he retired in 2004, baseball renamed its award for the best designated hitter after him.
Q 15Which team did the Mariners beat in a one-game playoff to win their first division title in 1995?
California Angels
The California Angels led Seattle by 13 games in August, then collapsed. The two finished level, and the Mariners won the extra game at home to reach the postseason for the first time.
Q 16The 2001 Mariners' 116 wins tied which team's 1906 major-league record?
Chicago Cubs
The Chicago Cubs won 116 in 1906 and still lost the World Series, to the crosstown White Sox. The 2001 Mariners fell short too, losing the ALCS to the Yankees in five games.
Q 17Which Mariner won both the AL MVP and Rookie of the Year awards in 2001?
Ichiro Suzuki
Ichiro Suzuki was a 27-year-old rookie who had already led Japan's Pacific League in batting seven years running. Only Fred Lynn, in 1975, had won both awards in the same season before.
Q 18Which major-league single-season record did a Mariner break with 262 in 2004?
Hits
Hits: the old mark of 257 had stood since George Sisler set it in 1920. Sisler's 81-year-old daughter was in the Seattle crowd, and the new record-holder walked over to greet her after the hit.
Q 19Which future Red Sox legend did the Mariners trade to Minnesota in 1996 as a minor leaguer?
David Ortiz
David Ortiz was the player to be named later in a deal for third baseman Dave Hollins. Known until then as David Arias, he went on to hit 541 home runs, none of them for Seattle.
Q 20Which number have the Mariners retired twice, for two different Hall of Famers?
51
51 belonged first to one Hall of Famer and then to another, who vowed not to embarrass it. The second wearer was honoured first, in 2025; the original owner's turn came in 2026.
Refuse to Lose caught on as Seattle piled up late comeback wins that September. The run is credited with winning support for a new ballpark, which kept the club in the city.
Q 24Which song replaced 'Louie Louie' at Mariners games in 2022?
'Can't Hold Us' by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
'Can't Hold Us' by Macklemore & Ryan Lewis lasted three seasons in the seventh-inning stretch. The club dropped it in 2024 after remarks the rapper made at a benefit concert, and 'Louie Louie' returned in 2025.
Q 25Which Mariners pitcher threw the franchise's first perfect game on August 15, 2012?
Félix Hernández
Félix Hernández struck out 12 in a 1–0 win. That April the Mariners had been on the wrong end of Philip Humber's perfect game, so they won one and lost one in the same season.
Q 26What was the yellow-shirted, K-card-waving cheering section at Mariners home games from 2011 to 2019 called?
The King's Court
The King's Court gathered for every home start by the club's ace, known as the King. After his finest game, in 2012, the Mariners stretched it to the whole ballpark for a night and called it the Supreme Court.
Q 27The 'Maple Grove' fan section, with a potted tree named 'Stick Rizzs', celebrated which Canadian pitcher?
James Paxton
James Paxton's Grove was the fans' own idea, and they waved 'Eh' cards whenever he reached two strikes. In 2018 he rewarded them with a no-hitter thrown in his native Canada.
Q 28Which Mariners promotion, begun in 1994, gave a free ticket to any fan who had their head shaved?
Buhner Buzz Cut Night
Buhner Buzz Cut Night was built around bald outfielder Jay Buhner, who often worked the clippers himself. The club revived it in 2024, 30 years on, and he shaved one of the current Mariners before the game.
Q 29Which food tradition did Mariners broadcaster Mike Blowers start in 2007?
Rally Fries
Rally Fries began when a fan chasing a foul ball spilled his fries and Blowers sent him a fresh tray. Fans started bringing signs to ask for their own, and the team seemed to rally whenever the fries arrived.
Q 30Who was the Mariners' play-by-play announcer from 1977 until his death in November 2010?
Dave Niehaus
Dave Niehaus greeted grand slams by telling Grandma to get out the rye bread and mustard, because it was 'grand salami time'. The club put a bronze statue of him, seated at his microphone, inside the ballpark.