Felix Hernandez Finally Getting His Due For The Seattle Mariners

Felix Hernandez has been a prime example for several seasons of a pitcher who has been a dominant pitcher without a dominant record. This year, for the first time in a long time, the Cy Young candidate is finally sporting a win total that mirrors his dominance—and that’s nice to see.

King Felix’s numbers this year are ballistic, even more so than they have been in the past. The flame-throwing righty has baffled opponents to the tune of a 2.02 ERA, 0.89 WHIP and a spot starting for the American League in the All-Star Game. And now, he has an excellent 11-2 record to show for it.

Of course, we all should know by now that win-loss totals don’t necessarily reflect how well someone is pitching. Felix’s improved record this year has been the result of improved play from his teammates, who are finally offering him a little support.

The infusion of Robinson Cano into the line-up has predictably elevated the Seattle offense as a whole and Felix’s record has gone with it. The new second base superstar has lived up to his reputation, slashing .334/.392/.851.  Third baseman Kyle Seager has also performed at an All-Star level with an impressive .280/.348/.841 slash of his own. Even with more underwhelming play from Justin Smoak and Dustin Ackley, Seattle’s offense has performed well enough to give the Mariners a respectable 53-46 record in an extremely competitive AL West.

The combination of this improved offensive play, in tandem with Felix pitching absolutely out of his mind, has directly led to the improved record. With Hisashi Iwakuma (8-4, 2.95 ERA, 0.99 WHIP) holding down his end of the bargain so far behind Felix since returning from injury, it’s not a surprise that the Mariners find themselves in (dare I say it) borderline playoff contention as we head into the second half of the season.

Whether Seattle is able to maintain this improved pace will be heavily reliant on if they can keep generating offense, which, as usual, has to be considered a huge question mark. Cano and Seager have played well, but the Mariners are still 19^th in MLB with 393 runs scored and a meager .678 OPS as a team. The record is improved but other guys are going to have to hit for Seattle to hang, particularly with the mighty Oakland A’s having an elite-level year and the LA Angels finally playing up to their potential. Many fans are clamoring for Seattle to make a deal for another bat as the trade deadline approaches and it seems as though that might be the necessary course of action if the team has a real legitimate chance of contending in 2014.

Regardless of whether Seattle ends up making the playoffs this year, it’s nice to see Felix getting his due. Despite being one of the best pitchers in the game for the past four seasons, he has just a 52-45 record to show for it since 2010. While it’s starting to become accepted conventional wisdom that win totals aren’t inherently related to performance (which is an equally nice thing to see) it should warm the hearts of baseball fans everywhere to see Felix throw up his Cy Young-caliber numbers and have a record that actually looks it belongs to the best pitcher in the American League.