Room For Improvement – The Seattle Mariners After 15 Games

Fifteen games down, 147 to go. I wrote something similar last season when the Seattle Mariners got off to a slow start in April. Had the Mariners gone 6-9 in any stretch during, say, mid June, no one would even notice. But the freshness of the season and the high expectations surrounding this ball club this year magnifies the early issues scoring runs and the surprisingly poor pitching.

The Hitting

Currently, the Mariners rank 20^th in the majors in runs scored, 14^th in batting average, 10^th in slugging percentage, mostly on the back of Nelson Cruz’s monster three weeks, and 20^th in on base percentage.

Upon closer inspection, Nelson Cruz, Robinson Cano, and Kyle Seager, are all doing their thing, with respective slash lines of .328/.369/.738 – .290/.323/.447 and .286/.365/.446. There’s been decent early production from Austin Jackson and Seth Smith. But, underperformance from Dustin Ackley, Logan Morrison, and Mike Zunino, with the platoon play of Rickie Weeks and Justin Ruggiano contributing little. Morrison, Weeks, Ruggiano, and Zunino are all below the Mendoza line.

But, you kind of expect that throughout the season. Some guys will be hot. (And guess what? Nelson Cruz is not going to continue putting up a 1.107 OPS, nor will he continue on a pace to hit 80 HR). Some guys will be steady. And, some guys will struggle.

The overall hitting should improve some, but then again, this team isn’t the Boston Red Sox. Middle of the pack should be fine.

The Pitching

The more disturbing trend has been the performance coming from the pitching staff. The Mariners currently rank 27^th in batting average against at .268, 27^th in ERA at 4.83, and 28^th in WHIP at 1.42.

This year’s projected phenom, Taijuan Walker, has only managed 12.2 innings in his three starts, and has a 2.29 WHIP and a 10.66 ERA. Last year’s phenom, James Paxton, isn’t fairing much better with 15 innings in three starts, a 1.53 WHIP, and an 8.63 ERA. And the always steady Hisashi Iwakuma is off to a rocky start with a 1.41 WHIP and 6.61 ERA.

And that’s not even mentioning the archer in residence, Fernando Rodney, with one non save situation meltdown, in which he ironically got the win, and another blown save. In 6.1 innings, Rodney has a 2.05 WHIP and an 8.53 ERA.

These numbers are so incredibly bad that they have to get better, with these pitchers or with even replacement level pitching. On the bright side, Felix Hernandez has been, well, Felix Hernandez, and J.A. Happ has been a pleasant surprise.

Going Forward

It’s early and I expect both the offense and the pitching to improve, especially the pitching. But, to the extent that pitching varies much more from season to season than hitting, it’s worth keeping an eye on as the Mariners wind up a home stand this weekend against the Minnesota Twins before taking the show on the road for ten games against the Texas Rangers, Houston Astros, and the Los Angeles Angels.