At some point it’s going to end. The feeling of imminent failure among some Seattle fans is going to manifest on the field and this unexpected season is going to start crumbling until it’s just like each of the previous seasons since the Mariners last made the playoffs in 2001. It has to Adam Henrique Jersey , right?

That feeling is what nearly two decades without postseason baseball has created in the Pacific Northwest. While there is genuine excitement for what Seattle accomplished in the first 3 months of the season there’s also a sense of dread among the most fatalistic fans who have seen promising seasons go south before, and it won’t go away until the Mariners officially end the longest current postseason drought in any of the four major pro sports.

Lucky for the doubters, this team is showing the type of resilience needed to do just that.

”I think the thing I’m most proud of, I guess, with this group is the ability for them to be as tight as they are,” Seattle manager Scott Servais said. ”I think there’s a special bond within our team and it plays out on the field.”

The Mariners are sitting at 58-39 and hold a three-game lead for the second wild-card spot heading into the second half of the season. What makes that remarkable is the Mariners have overcome enough obstacles thus far to derail most teams.

Five different starting position players have spent time on the disabled list and catcher Mike Zunino is currently on his second stint on the DL. Their bullpen has seen another four key arms go down at various times all the way back to spring training,

And that doesn’t take into consideration the 80-game suspension of second baseman Robinson Cano. Rather than disrupt what Seattle had going, Cano’s suspension seemed to galvanize the team. Seattle is 36-22 since Cano’s suspension started.

”I think just team chemistry carries a team further than a lot of people think and just when guys are all on the same page and fighting for one another … that’s the big picture and it keeps everyone focused on that instead of their own individual performances and stuff like that,” outfielder Mitch Haniger said.

Seattle’s success in the first half was based around beating the bad teams in the American League. The Mariners were 51-22 against the rest of the AL not named the Red Sox, Astros or Yankees.

They are third in the AL in batting average, and fifth in both slugging and OPS. Their staff ERA is fifth and they’ve been one of the better defensive teams in the AL.

Their flaw is what has made them so good so far. They’ve been heavily reliant on being terrific in close games. Blowouts are foreign to Seattle and that lack of consistent offense could be a problem in the second half.

Edwin Diaz is on pace to challenge the single-season saves record with 36 at the break, but can’t be relied upon to be nearly perfect the rest of the way. Seattle’s 54 save opportunities are four more than anyone else in baseball. Of the three teams ahead of Seattle in the AL by record, Boston has faced 41 save opportunities, New York 37 and Houston 36.

In other words, not every late-game situation is filled with pressure for those teams, while Seattle has somehow thrived playing narrowly decided baseball. The Mariners have yet to lose when leading after eight innings. Going back 80 years, the 1978 Giants hold the mark for the most one-run wins in a season with 42. Seattle already has 26.

But there remains the lingering worry of a Seattle collapse, which was amplified when the Mariners went 2-7 over their final nine games prior to the All-Star break. What was a seven- or eight-game lead in the wild card over Oakland is down to three and Seattle now trails Houston in the division by five games.

But that hasn’t ended the belief this is the year the drought ends.

”I think we have a group of guys that genuinely likes playing for each other,” Marco Gonzales said. ”I think we have a lot of guys with a common goal in mind and that’s to win ball games and so I think that a lot of guys put the team before themselves.”

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ENGLEWOOD, Colo. (AP) — Chad Kelly outshined Paxton Lynch in the Denver Broncos‘ scrimmage Sunday, and that might have earned him work with the No. 2 offense in his quest to win the backup job behind Case Keenum.

“Yeah, he looked good,” coach Vance Joseph said after watching Kelly throw two touchdown passes in a five-play span following Lynch’s erratic performance that included a sack and a near interception.

Asked if Kelly will get a “promotion” to working with the 2s, Joseph said Seahawks Authentic Jerseys , “It hasn’t happened yet. It could happen in the future.”

Joseph declared in the offseason the backup job was up for grabs, but throughout the first eight days of training camp Lynch worked with the No. 2 offense and Kelly took scraps with the 3s .

Still, Kelly, a seventh-round pick out of Ole Miss in 2017 who sat out his rookie season with knee and wrist injuries, has looked significantly sharper than the error-prone Lynch, the 2016 first-round draft pick from Memphis who failed to beat out another seventh-rounder, Trevor Siemian, in 2016 and ’17.

“He’s a playmaker,” Joseph said of Kelly. “He’s always been a playmaker. You watch his college tape two years ago, he just makes plays. He doesn’t always look pretty, but he just makes plays.”

After Keenum’s signing this spring, Joseph said Lynch should benefit by sitting back and learning from Keenum rather than fighting for the starting job as he had the last two summers.

“It’s definitely helped him, just watching every day how Case prepares for practice,” Joseph said Sunday. “He’s gotten better from that. And half of his job is between the ears. So the better he gets there, the better he’s going to play quarterback for us.”

Asked what he felt Lynch had learned from him, Keenum said, “That’s probably a better question for him,” but added, “I think he’s doing a great job getting the ball out, a big, tall guy, he’s got a strong arm and he knows where to go with the football a lot of times and he’s learning from his mistakes, just like we all are.”

Lynch was the only QB who didn’t stop to talk with the media after the scrimmage, and the team said he’d address reporters for the first time at camp on Tuesday following the players’ day off.

Kelly declined to lobby for snaps with the No. 2 offense.

“No Womens Mattias Ekholm Jersey , I’ve just got to keep on performing to the best of my ability, execute whatever play is called and find the open guy and bring my team down the field, whether it’s with the 1s, 2s or 3s,” Kelly said. “I’m focused on trying to get better in the classroom and out here on the football field.”

Keenum didn’t get into the end zone in his dozen snaps at the scrimmage, but he did move the chains against Denver’s No. 1 defense.

“He was good. You know we have a really good defense and when you turn on the lights and have a real pass rush, that’s a top-5 defense. So, I’m not surprised,” Joseph said. “And it’s been more competitive this year than it was last year offensively. They’ve won more days than they won last year at training camp.

“So, I am not down on the offense at all.”

Neither is star cornerback Chris Harris Jr., who said, “Our offense is way better than they were last year, with Case under center. He’s throwing great balls. He’s had great accuracy all camp. He’s improved from the OTAs. When I watch film, the (first) offense is doing something totally different than the (second) offense.

“It’s like they’re a level 10 and everybody else is a level way lower. So, Case and them are clicking right now and I expect them to put up points. I don’t see anybody really just shutting them down with the receivers that we got, and our O-line is way better. So, I see them putting up points, at least 30 a game.”

Keenum said he figures to get a better sense of the Broncos’ offense once the preseason gets here and it’s not just situational drills he’s running.

The Broncos open their exhibition schedule Saturday night against Keenum’s old team, the Minnesota Vikings, where Siemian is now backing up Kirk Cousins.

NOTES: In addition to C Matt Paradis (illness) and TE Jeff Heuerman (knee), LT Ronald Leary (knee) and DT Matt Gotsis (ankle) were held out of the scrimmage as a precaution.