Audio: New Mariners reliever Evan Marshall shares how his dog saved him from a near-death experience

The Mariners added a new bullpen option earlier this week, claiming reliever Evan Marshall off waivers from the Arizona Diamondbacks. And while picking up everything and joining a new team isn’t the easiest thing in the world, it’s much easier than what Marshall went through in 2015, as he told “Danny, Dave and Moore.”

That’s when the right-hander from northern California took a batted ball to the face in a Triple-A game, a blow that fractured his skull and put him in critical condition. At that point, it was more than just playing career that was in jeopardy, and when it became necessary to remove a breathing tube after surgery, Marshall wouldn’t wake up.

That’s where Butterscotch Maxwell Marshall, or Butters for short, comes in.

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Butters is Marshall’s dig with his wife, Allie, and the Cavalier Spaniel-Bichon Frise mix actually brought Marshall back from nearly slipping in to a coma.

It’s been over a year and a half since that injury, and Marshall completed his comeback last year by working his way into MLB action with Arizona. Sooner or later, he could be on an MLB mound again with Seattle.

You can hear Marshall’s incredible story, including his full retelling of how Butters brought him to in the hospital, in the interview embedded above.

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