Seattle’s LGBTQ community members say they hope that this Friday’s World Cup “Pride Match” between Egypt and Iran, two countries where homosexuality is criminalized, can be an opportunity to change minds.
Seattle, WA
Insiders: Why Seattle Mariners' Bryan Woo is so hard to figure out
The Seattle Mariners have had plenty of stellar pitching performances throughout this season, but Bryan Woo may have had the best yet in Wednesday’s 5-2 win over the San Diego Padres.
Drayer: The gloves are off for Mariners’ Bryan Woo
The second-year right-hander took a perfect game into the seventh inning – no hits, no walks, no baserunners whatsoever. It wasn’t broken up until Fernando Tatis Jr. lasered a home run into the left-field corner, which perhaps not coincidentally came right after Woo had to spend nearly 20 minutes in the dugout while the Mariners added on a pair of runs against two separate Padres pitchers in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Woo was taken out before making it through the seventh, putting a few blemishes on his final line (6 2/3 innings, two earned runs, one walk, five strikeouts) in a game where he was, for the most part, completely dominant.
Wednesday was far from the first time Woo has grabbed attention this season, which has been quite the breakout campaign for the 24-year-old former sixth-round MLB Draft pick. He currently owns a 2.38 ERA, 0.823 WHIP and 8-2 record in 19 starts (105 2/3 innings) with 82 strikeouts to just 10 walks, essentially putting himself among the game’s elite pitchers despite missing time at the beginning of the season with elbow inflammation and having a short stint on the injured list with a hamstring strain along the way.
It’s all pretty incredible considering Woo was a little-known pitcher in Seattle’s farm system just two years ago who had an unimpressive college career (his ERA in his final season with Cal-Poly in 2021 was 6.11). But the Mariners saw something in his makeup and have helped him nurture it, and that’s all a big part of why he was the story around the league on Wednesday night.
“The way Woo was cooking last night, man, that was pretty amazing,” Mariners broadcaster Aaron Goldsmith said Thursday morning to Seattle Sports’ Brock and Salk. “With the exception of, like, one catch by (Randy) Arozarena, it was pretty effortless for Bryan Woo. That was awesome. It was fun to watch.”
‘A much different look’
Goldsmith dove into what he’s learned about why Woo has been so mysterious to opposing hitters.
“It is really fun to try to figure out. I don’t know if any of us have the exact answer, but I can tell you a couple of ingredients I think for Woo,” he said. “One is he just has a really unique delivery. He has among the very lowest release points in baseball, and different is good. I think we all know that. Different is very good, in fact, in baseball, and he’s an outlier in that standpoint of just how low the ball is when it gets released from his arm, from his hand. So it’s a much different look.”
It’s not just Woo’s unique armslot that makes him so hard to figure out. The ease in how he delivers a pitch, his ability to throw strikes at a high rate, and baseball’s pitch clock make for a lethal combination.
“I can’t speak to this myself, but I’ve talked to enough guys who have been in the batter’s box and they all say the same thing, and that is when your mechanics are that smooth and that easy, the ball does jump on you more,” Goldsmith continued. “When it looks like it should be coming out at 91 mph but it comes out of anywhere from 94 to 97, it pops. So you’ve got the release point, plus how smooth it is, plus the fact that – and there’s a number of guys for the Mariners who are like this – he is just kind of the ultimate on-the-prowl pitcher. He just keeps pumping strikes; he’s not a nibbler.
“So when you look at a guy who throws basically more strikes than any other starter – I mean he’s right there in the top five (in MLB), at some points this season has been No. 1 in that category – I think the pitch clock really helps a guy like that because from a hitter standpoint there is no relief. You cannot call time multiple times and step out and try to slow his rhythm down, so when he gets in a groove like that, you feel like you have to start swinging early because if you don’t, you’re behind 0-2. And so you get a lot of quick outs a lot of times for Bryan Woo. He’s really special. It’s very unique.”
Woo did add one extra thing to the combination Wednesday night, however, so maybe that’s why he was all the more unhittable against the Padres.
Must’ve been the cleats 🥷 https://t.co/OwoOidY8CA
— Bryan Woo (@BJW002) September 12, 2024
Hear the full Brock and Salk conversation with Seattle Mariners broadcaster Aaron Goldsmith in the podcast at this link or in the player near the top of this post.
Hyphen’s take on Bryan Woo
Just a few hours later Thursday on Seattle Sports, former Mariners pitcher and current MLB Network analyst Ryan Rowland-Smith talked about Woo when he joined Bump and Stacy.
Rowland-Smith shared what stood out to him from Woo’s performance on Wednesday night.
“It’s September, you’re reaching 20 starts, it’s that point where it’s like OK, the league starts to catch up to you – especially when you’re as good as he is, the numbers he’s putting up,” Rowland-Smith said. “So all of a sudden people start catching on the fact that, alright, this guy’s gonna be in the strike zone a ton. Not to mention the team he’s pitching against is literally the toughest team to strike out and to avoid contact against, especially the second, third time through the lineup.”
Rowland-Smith liked that Woo didn’t stray from his plan even as his strikeouts tapered off the more the Padres saw him.
“The most impressive thing for me was he was getting some swing and miss early on, then he didn’t, but he didn’t start getting away from the plate. You know, he didn’t start getting into these 2-1 counts cause he’s trying to avoid contact. That’s the one thing with Bryan Woo, man, he’s just so settled in the fact that, ‘You know what? I’m gonna have this upshoot fastball on the top of the strike zone and the hitters are just gonna make weak contact.’ And he just leans into that so heavily – he’s 80% fastballs last night, and you know the results just speak from themself. So really, really impressive.”
Listen to the full Bump and Stacy conversation with MLB Network analyst Ryan Rowland-Smith at this link or in the podcast below.
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SEATTLE — Seattle police are investigating a shooting that left a 17-year-old boy injured early Thursday morning in the High Point neighborhood.
At about 12:48 a.m., dispatchers received multiple reports of rapid gunfire near Sylvan Way Southwest and Southwest Morgan Street.
Officers arrived and found a 17-year-old boy suffering from a gunshot wound to the hip area. Medics transported the teen to Harborview Medical Center in serious but stable condition.
Before officers located the victim, they found a car that had crashed and become disabled near Sylvan Way Southwest and Delridge Way Southwest. Police said multiple suspects were seen running from the vehicle through a nearby Home Depot parking lot.
Officers cordoned off the area and searched for the suspects with assistance from the K-9 Unit, but were unable to locate them. Police recovered the vehicle and impounded it for processing.
During the incident, gunfire struck at least three vehicles and two buildings. No other injuries were reported.
Officers processed multiple nearby scenes and recovered evidence before clearing the area. Detectives with the Gun Violence Reduction Unit will lead the investigation.
Seattle, WA
Council eyes street barricades in fight against violence, sex trafficking in north Seattle
SEATTLE — The Seattle City Council is expected to vote next week on a plan that would give the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) the authority to close off street access for public safety reasons.
The proposal comes after months of outcry from residents in north Seattle who say sex traffickers and sex buyers are looping through the streets surrounding Aurora Avenue North.
The street-closure proposal passed the council’s Public Safety Committee on Tuesday and is expected to be voted on by the full council next week.
“I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say the crime has gotten much worse, much more violent, and much more predator,” said District 5 councilmember Debora Juarez. “I think that we do have the authority to shut down a street for bullets flying and endangering the lives of those who live there.”
Frustrated neighbors have installed their own homemade barricades after a spate of gun violence between sex traffickers in May.
RELATED | SDOT removes street barricades near Aurora Ave; neighbors doubtful of temporary measures
Councilmember Bob Kettle says street closures will help tamp down sex buying in certain areas, but he emphasizes it must be accompanied by an increase in outreach and enforcement.
“We have to have a sustained effort,” Kettle told KOMO News. “My concern is for every action, there’s a reaction. We need to take this flex and then really attack it … because if we do just a bit and our attention wanders, we could have this conversation three months from now and we’re talking about the same thing.”
A 15-year-old boy was shot near 95th Street and Aurora Avenue North around 10:45 p.m. last night. The teen initially claimed he had been shot while walking down the street, but investigators now say he was shot by a passenger in his car.
RELATED | Seattle police say ‘drive-by’ on Aurora Ave. was actually passenger shooting teen driver
Kettle credited the city’s Real Time Crime Center cameras with helping investigators quickly piece together the events of the shooting.
“Just as important to finding out what happened, the cameras help police determine what did not happen,” Kettle said.
According to Seattle police data, reports of shootings and shots fired in the north precinct area are at their lowest levels since 2021.
Through the end of May, there were 48 total reports of shootings or shots fired, with one fatal shooting and seven nonfatal injury shootings.
That’s down from 63 total reports of shootings and shots fired – one fatal and seven injuries – in 2025; and 64 shootings or shots fired reports – one fatal and 17 injuries – in 2024.
At Tuesday’s committee meeting, councilmembers pointed out residents are calling for a new police precinct to be built on Aurora Avenue.
Ten years ago, a new North Precinct building was slated to be built at 130th Avenue and Aurora Avenue North to replace the existing precinct building, which was decades old and did not have enough space for the department’s needs.
Led by former councilmember Kshama Sawant, the “Block the Bunker” movement successfully got the North Precinct replacement project killed in city council.
Kettle said the city’s current financial issues make it essentially impossible to bring back a project similar to the one the previous council defeated.
“We have to connect the dots back,” Kettle said. “If we want to know why we are where we are today, we have to look at decisions made over the last two councils.”
Seattle, WA
Iran and Egypt to play in Seattle ‘Pride Match’ despite earlier complaints | The Jerusalem Post
Seattle revels in its reputation as a welcoming place and Pride flags are visible all over the city, all year round. Its June Pride weekend is one of the biggest in the United States.
So, ahead of December’s World Cup draw, it was only natural that local organizers designated the June 26 match to be held in the city as a “Pride Match.”
Then the draw happened — and the two teams scheduled to play the game were Egypt and Iran.
Egypt’s Football Association urged global soccer governing body FIFA to prevent any Pride-related activities, arguing such events clashed with the Muslim-majority country’s cultural and religious values. The governing body in Iran, where same-sex relations can carry the death penalty, filed an objection with FIFA.
Some in Seattle have doubts over the teams in the ‘Pride Match’
But in Seattle, there is no question that the Pride Match will go ahead as planned.
“The World Cup is going to come and go in three weeks,” Hedda McLendon, from Seattle’s local World Cup organizing committee, told Reuters. “The Pride celebration … has happened on this weekend for 50-plus years.
“It is going to happen this weekend, it is going to happen long after the World Cup.”
Some in the city’s LGBTQ community had mixed feelings given the participants, said Jon Cairns, 49, manager of local LGBTQ+ club Kremwerk.
Cairns, however, said his own view was that it provided a platform to promote acceptance that only the world’s biggest sporting event could offer.
“My reaction is let’s have them,” he told Reuters. “International sports is one of the biggest brokers historically of social change and individual rights and freedoms worldwide, including in the U.S.”
He cited black U.S. sprinter Jesse Owens’ four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games in Nazi Germany and Tommie Smith and John Carlos’ raised-fist protest in 1968 as moments where “only international sports could reach that big of an audience.”
“They’re not going to turn off the World Cup on state television in Iran or Egypt to block out a Pride flag in the audience,” Cairns said.
The Pride Match is “a host city initiative” and separate of FIFA, a spokesperson for soccer’s governing body told Reuters.
Seattle’s LGBTQ community sees an opportunity
Egypt and Iran’s involvement in the Pride Match is not the first time the World Cup has grappled with stark differences in attitudes between hosts and visitors.
In 2022 World Cup host Qatar, the emir said visitors should “respect our culture” when asked about gay people attending the tournament.
FIFA threatened yellow cards for captains wearing the “OneLove” armband, citing its rules against political slogans. Teams including England and the Netherlands that had been planning to wear the armbands to protest Qatar’s laws against same-sex relationships abandoned the plan.
For Ryan Webster, a 40-year-old lifestyle manager who was at Kremwerk the weekend before Pride, Seattle’s “Pride Match” was an opportunity to show solidarity with people in countries where their sexuality was outlawed.
“I’m choosing to believe that this is our moment to allow the members of the LGBTQ community that come from those countries to have the opportunity to celebrate themselves in totality that they might not have otherwise,” he said outside the club, which will host a watch party for Friday’s game.
Inside, ‘Venus Fengz’ lip-synced to Cher’s “Believe” before introducing fellow drag performers to the stage, clapped and cheered by a raucous crowd.
Fengz, who only wanted to provide their stage name, said Pride coinciding with the World Cup would bring increased visibility, anticipating perhaps some new audience members.
“I think it’s always great for us to be able to share space and share places with people who don’t have the same experiences as us,” they told Reuters.
“Sometimes you just have to be the bigger person and show grace where you can and know that everyone is a human learning (from) different experiences, but also it can get hard — because you’re on the shorter end of the stick, always trying to have to explain yourself around people who don’t grow up with the same worldview.”
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