The real career ERA leader for the Seattle Mariners

From time to time, I’ll find myself looking around at the all-time stats for the Mariners. Whether it’s just because I love looking at Edgar’s stats, or being curious about where JP Crawford’s 2021 2B total ranked all-time for the Mariners, I’ll end up there every once in a while. Earlier this offseason, I noticed something that I swore was a mistake on the Mariners pitching records.

Have you taken a look at the Mariners career leaders in ERA? You would think that, with such a volatile stat like ERA, that there would be one person at the top of the list. Seriously, it should be pretty tough for there to be a tie there, right? I wouldn’t have thought that there would be two people tied at the top of the list.

Well, I was right. There isn’t a tie with two people at the top of the list. There is actually a four-way tie at the top of the list! What’s also funny to me is that all of them have thrown a no-hitter, with one of them throwing a perfect game.

The Mariners have a four-way tie for best career ERA on the team for qualified pitchers

James Paxton, Felix Hernandez, Randy Johnson, and Hisashi Iwakuma all have a 3.42 ERA. It’s mind-boggling every time I think about it. The fact that four people, all over 500 career innings, could come to the same number in ERA.  It’s about to get crazier too when you see just how close it is and was to the tie being broken.

What I wanted to do was break it down further. Push those decimal points out, and see who the true ERA leader was in Mariners team history. Let’s get started and check out how the tie was almost broken in 2021, and instead, was further cemented.