How The Pitching Staff Is Saving The Seattle Mariners’ Season

As the Seattle Mariners hover just below .500 at 21-22, 6.5 games out of first place in the AL West but only 1.5 games out of the wild card, it comes as little surprise that pitching is keeping them in the conversation.  While the Mariners have had some timely hitting (and no, I don’t believe in “clutch”) to score 178 runs that ranks 15^th in the majors, they’ve managed that while ranked 26^th in BA, 28^th in OBP, and 24^th in slugging.  Pitching, on the other hand, ranks 9^th in BAA, 10^th in ERA, and 11^th in WHIP.  But what stands out is the fact the Mariners’ rank only 21^st in quality starts.  This would tend to suggest that the bullpen is doing a little bit more than its fair share of keeping the Mariners in the playoff race.

A quality start is currently defined as a game when the starting pitcher pitches at least 6 innings and gives up at most 3 earned runs.

Eight of Felix Hernandez’s 10 starts have been quality starts, but the drop off after that is startling.  Chris Young has 4 quality starts out of 7 outings.  Roenis Elias has 3 quality starts out of 9 outings.  Erasmo Ramirez is 3 for 6.  Hisashi Iwakuma, recently back from the DL, is 2 for 3.  James Paxton, who threw a 35 pitch simulated game Sunday and, hopefully, will be back soon, is 1 for 2.  After that, there’s Brandon Maurer, with his 6.00 ERA and 1.67 WHIP, who has 5 starts and zero quality starts.

In many of these games where the starting pitcher has failed to record a quality start, it’s not the case that they’ve been rocked for a ton of runs; it’s that they aren’t getting the 18 outs that is one half of the criteria of the statistic.

Felix has failed to go at least 6 innings only once this year, a game at Houston in early May that, ironically, he pitched well, giving up just 2 earned runs in a 4-5 loss.  Young has gone 6 innings 5 times in 7 starts.  Elias has gone 6 innings only 4 times out of 9 starts.  Ramirez is 3 for 6.  Iwakuma is 3 for 3, but Maurer is a dismal 1 for 5, failing to get into even the 4^th inning twice.  Paxton rounds out the group with a 2 for 2 in his only 2 outings of the season.

That’s 15 times in just 43 games, or roughly 35% of the time, the bullpen is called on for more than 3 innings of work, sometimes extending to 4 or 5 innings.  Given that bullpen workload and the otherwise anemic offense, it’s actually pretty remarkable that the Mariners are a .500 team.

However, there is room for optimism.  Felix should continue to be Felix.  Iwakuma’s return to the rotation bodes well, and Paxton and Taijuan Walker should be in the mix by early June.  Getting Elias and Maurer out of the rotation and replacing them with Paxton and Walker should translate into less stress on the bullpen.  Less stress on the bullpen should translate into more wins on the diamond.