Play Ball! In March, Indoors

SEATTLE —  For the first time in the 127-year history of professional baseball, the season starts in March when the Seattle Mariners and Chicago White Sox play tonight in the Kingdome.

In order to avoid having the World Series stretch to Nov. 3 for a possible seventh game, baseball officials moved up the start of the season a week.

Randy Johnson, who won last year’s AL Cy Young Award after going 18-2, starts for the Mariners against Alex Fernandez, who was 12-8 for the White Sox.

Baseball’s previous earliest opening date was April 2, 1984, when three games were played. Openers were scheduled on April 2 in 1990 and 1995, but they were scrapped because of a lockout and a strike.

Seattle is coming off its most successful season ever. The Mariners finished over .500 for only the second time, beat the Angels in a one-game playoff to win the AL West and defeated the New York Yankees in a five-game series before losing to Cleveland in six games in the AL championship series.

“Who’s going to catch Cleveland this year?” said Seattle center fielder Ken Griffey Jr., rewarded with a $34-million, four-year contract extension. “They beat some teams to death last year. I’d like to be in that position.”

The Mariners’ 1995 success earned them a $320-million outdoor stadium that is expected to be ready for the 1999 season.

In contrast, the White Sox had one of their worst seasons in ’95. Chicago was expected to contend last year, but a slow start led to the firing of Manager Gene Lamont on June 2. Terry Bevington took over, and the White Sox finished 32 games behind Cleveland.