Mariners fans revolt as team's pitching staff denied No. 1 ranking

Rational or not, there has long been a perception in Seattle of an East Coast/anti-Pacific Northwest bias when it comes to the main North American sports media outlets. Well, now that crowd has been supplied with more ammunition, courtesy of MLB.com's top 10 pitching staffs for 2025.

In his infinite wisdom, Anthony Castrovince has seen fit to only rank the Mariners' pitching staff as the fourth-best in the Majors. As much as fourth is still pretty darn good, it doesn't seem quite right when taking everything into account.

To be clear, these rankings are based on each team's pitching staff as a whole, as opposed to just the starters. In that case, it would have really been a travesty of justice, considering the Mariners rotation ranked first in the Majors last year in ERA, WHIP, opposing team batting average and fewest walks, and with a fifth starter who was arguably their best pitcher by season's end.

However, even when taking into account we're talking about the Mariners pitching staff in its entirety, the bullpen still did just fine in 2024, even if key relievers were running on fumes by the end of the season. Despite this, they finished ninth in the Majors in ERA and fourth in WHIP, as well as second in opposing team batting average and fewest strikeouts.

Mariners pitching staff as good as it gets in 2024

As a whole in 2024, Mariners pitchers co-led the league in ERA and were all alone in first for WHIP, opposing team batting average, and fewest walks. We do appreciate that a significant part of Castrovince's rankings take into account each current pitching staff's makeup, combined with projecting into the future, but even here the M's still look extremely strong.

This is a Mariners team with three starters in Logan Gilbert, Luis Castillo, and George Kirby, who each have All-Star selections on their resumes and could all be the team ace, whether in Seattle or elsewhere. Meanwhile, fourth starter Bryce Miller led the team in WAR last season and is only getting better. Bryan Woo led all team starters in win-loss percentage and ERA, as well as having a 0.898 WHIP. That was barely behind Gilbert's Major League-leading 0.887.

As for the bullpen, consider all that they managed to achieve last season despite Matt Brash missing the entire year and Gregory Santos getting limited to 7.1 innings due to ongoing injury issues. Assuming both are healthy in 2025, they will provide an immense boost to the Mariners. Particularly Brash, whose slider is regarded as the best pitch on the staff.

This all leads to the question of where the Mariners pitching staff should be ranked in the Majors, and which teams Castrovince ranked ahead of them? Well, the Los Angeles Dodgers have been placed first, the Philadelphia Phillies are second, and the Atlanta Braves are third.

Mariners admittedly second-best to the World Series champions

Beginning with the Dodgers, they clearly had a pitching staff strong enough lead them to their eighth World Series title in 2024. However, their starters and relievers combined to finish 11th in the Majors in ERA, eighth in WHIP, seventh in opposing team batting average, 18th in fewest walks and 12th in most strikeouts.

Why the Dodgers really get their deserved ranking of No. 1 is because of new additions to both the rotation and bullpen. Now in the former are Seattle native and two-time Cy Young winner Blake Snell and Japanese phenom Roki Sasaki, with Shohei Ohtani also set to return to pitching at some point. The Dodgers also signed two of the best relievers in the game, Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates.

Turning to the Phillies, we are once more looking at a pitching staff which was statistically inferior to the Mariners last season, finishing 11th in ERA, fourth in fewest walks, eighth in strikeouts, 10th in WHIP and just 17th in opposing team batting average. So why place Philadelphia above Seattle in the rankings?

Well, Castrovince cites a Phillies rotation which, while not as deep as the Dodgers, is good enough to outpitch them when healthy. He has Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola as staff co-aces, while noting that Ranger Suárez and Cristopher Sánchez were both All-Stars last season.

As for the bullpen, the Phillies did add Jordan Romano, who has a resume as a two-time All-Star closer, alongside fellow All-Star Matt Strahm. However, whether it be the rotation and relievers separately or the pitching staff as a whole, the Mariners arguably have the edge, whether it be based on last season's success (zero debate) or projecting for the year ahead (which we will at least debate, but still have confidence in the M's being better moving forward).

At least move the Mariners up ONE spot

Finally we come to the Braves, who in fairness did match up well statistically with the Mariners when looking at last season's productivity. They co-led with the Mariners in ERA and strikeouts, also ranking third in WHIP, sixth in fewest walks and eighth in opposing team batting average.

The Braves rotation is led by the excellent (but aging) Chris Sale, an eight-time All-Star and three-time strikeout leader who finally won a Cy Young last season. Sale will be rejoined by Spencer Strider, who finished fourth in NL Cy Young voting in 2023 and is finally back pitching after having an internal brace procedure on his elbow last April.

However, whereas you can go against the Braves when comparing them to the Mariners is that they look set to be weaker in 2025, when considering some of their offseason departures. More specifically, we're talking about the likes of Max Fried, Charlie Morton, A.J. Minter and Jesse Chavez, who all contributed towards the team winning the World Series in 2021.

Ultimately, whether looking at last season's success, the current respective pitching staffs and projections for this year, or both, it's clear the Mariners should be ranked at least third, and possibly even as high as second. However, no matter where pundits rank them, it's really a case of just going out there and proving themselves again as one of the truly elite pitching staffs in the Majors.

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