The Biggest Reason The Seattle Mariners Are Winning Again

Mandatory Credit: Bob Stanton-USA TODAY Sports

Closing Pitching

I’m hesitant to add this in, because I don’t love riding the Fernando Rodney Express. You can’t argue with results I guess.

Rodney is currently tied for the AL lead in saves with 11 so far this season. He’s only tallied one blown save on the season, even though he’s given up 15 hits in 15.2 innings of work.

It’s commonplace for Rodney to put one or two runners on before closing out the game. It’s a roller coaster for sure.

I remain hesitantly optimistic about acquiring Fernando Rodney, If you want to live on the edge of your seat, check out Ryan Divish’s twitter feed whenever Rodney comes into the game. There’s a lot of distrust going down there.

One of the reasons I’m skeptical is because at this time last year the Mariners again had a closer with 10 saves. Tom Wilhelmsen had already notched 10 saves by May 12th in the 2013 season, and, well, we all know how that ended.

Even starting pitching has been great for the M’s. Which is surprising because the Mariners started the season with a decimated rotation. The Mariners are currently 4th overall in the AL ERA with 3.61 (as a team), almost a half run below the AL average of 4.05.

Compare that to last year’s total ERA of 4.31. Pitching seems to be improved thus far. To be completely honest, the return of James Paxton and Taijuan Walker, while welcome, may not contribute to as many wins as we expect.

Pitching is already solid with this team (disregarding a few dud starts from Brandon Maurer and Erasmo Ramirez, those are bound to happen time to time).