by Kirby Arnold
The Mariners saw Hernandez as the key player in their return to prominence, and he lived up to the hype and restored his nickname. He won the AL Cy Young Award in 2010 (and finished second in 2009 and 2014, when he led the league in ERA both years), pitched a perfect game against the Rays on August 15, 2012, recorded at least 200 strikeouts six straight seasons (2009 to 2014), and became the franchise leader in strikeouts, victories, innings, starts, and quality starts.
Hernandez became such a star that the Mariners created the “King’s Court” in 2011 at Safeco Field on the days he pitched. For the price of a ticket in a section set aside for the court, fans got bright gold T-shirts and K cards that they held aloft while chanting “K! K! K! … ” every time Hernandez got two strikes on a hitter.
As well as Hernandez pitched, the team never got him to the postseason. But he pitched on without complaint, remaining loyal to the organization and the fans by shunning free agency to remain in Seattle.
But the years, and especially the mileage on his arm, weren’t easy on him.
The 2018 season ended with the Mariners missing the playoffs for the 17th straight year, and this time with Hernandez showing signs of decline. His fastball had lost the high-90 mph power it once had, and for a while manager Scott Servais pulled him from the starting rotation for the first time in Hernandez’s career. He finished 8–14 with a 5.55 ERA and 125 strikeouts in 155 ⅔ innings, all by far the worst of his career.
He still was King Felix, but it seemed clear that the end of his reign as a top-of-the-rotation power pitcher had begun.
EPILOGUE
FEW THINGS STOP TIME LIKE AN autumn run toward a championship. The victories, the champagne celebrations, and even the heartbreaking losses become bookmarks in the life of a die-hard fan and reference points for stories that are told for years.
That’s what it was like in 1995, 1997, and 2001 when the Mariners won the American League West Division, and also in 2000 when they took a wild-card playoff berth to within two victories of reaching the World Series. Baseball fans in the Pacific Northwest who experienced it will never forget the intensity of fall baseball and the euphoria of winning at that time of the year.
It’s something the Mariners and their fans yearn to experience again.
But, since the last meaningful October baseball game in Seattle, empty postseasons have stacked up to the point that the newest generation of Mariners fans has, at best, a distant knowledge of the team’s best days.
Those too young to have seen it for themselves have no true feel for the Mariners’ greatest moments—the 1995 “Refuse to Lose” season or the magnificent 116-victory season in 2001.
Ken Griffey Jr.’s silky swing remains alive on video, but there was nothing like experiencing it on a daily basis when an at-bat by Junior was an event not to be missed. Edgar Martinez’s greatness lives with those who were fortunate to have witnessed one of the outstanding right-handed hitters of all time, along with his 2019 induction into the Hall of Fame.
Griffey, Martinez, Lou Piniella, Jay Buhner, Dan Wilson, and Ichiro Suzuki remain beloved connections to the best era of Mariners baseball, when expectations of division championships and a push through the playoffs were real.
After 2001, however, the Mariners tailspun their way back to where they were in the 1970s and ’80s—spending more time than not in last place while striving to build a club capable of winning a championship. They entered the 2019 season with the longest current stretch in the major leagues without a playoff appearance.
Since Pat Gillick, who built that 2001 team, three general managers have tried to apply their own philosophies toward what it takes to assemble a contender.
Bill Bavasi worked under increasing pressure to win now, and he traded away young players who would become stars—Adam Jones, Shin-Soo Choo, and Asdrubal Cabrera—while acquiring veterans such as Eduardo Perez, Ben Broussard, and Erik Bedard who had little positive impact.
(Bedard was so difficult that the first time he talked with Seattle writers at spring training, he said he would answer only four questions. “Why only four?” asked John Hickey of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Bedard’s response: “That’s one.”)
Jack Zduriencik followed Bavasi in 2009, bringing a background in scouting and player development that gave hope for strong drafts and a rebuilt minor-league system. Instead, third baseman Kyle Seager and catcher Mike Zunino were the only position players from Zduriencik’s drafts to become regulars in the Mariners lineup. And Seager was almost an accidental pick in 2009.
The Mariners were hot on University of North Carolina outfielder Dustin Ackley, one of college baseball’s best hitters, and while scouting him a plucky little infielder—Seager—caught their eye. The Mariners had the second overall pick in 2009 and selected Ackley, who never developed into the middle-of-the-order hitter Zduriencik had envisioned. Seager, drafted in the third round, went on to become an All-Star and Gold Glove winner in 2014 before signing a seven-year, $100 million contract.
The Mariners fired Zduriencik in 2015 and replaced him with Jerry Dipoto, who leaned on analytics, advanced metrics, and the itch to make trades in order to rebuild the system.
Dipoto made 60 trades his first two years on the job, hitting on some and missing on others. He traded Chris Taylor to the Dodgers for pitcher Zach Lee; Taylor became a postseason hero in 2017 while Lee never threw a big-league pitch for the Mariners. But Dipoto also dealt former first-round pitcher Taijuan Walker to the Diamondbacks for shortstop Jean Segura and outfielder Mitch Haniger, who were two key players in the Mariners’ 89-victory season in 2018. Another trade, with the Marlins, brought veteran Dee Gordon to fill the Mariners’ vacancy in center field, although he spent considerable time playing second base while Robinson Cano was suspended 80 games after testing positive for an illegal substance.
Dipoto hired Scott Servais in 2016 to become the Mariners’ ninth manager since Lou Piniella left in 2002. Servais entered his fourth season in 2019, the longest stretch since Piniella’s 10 seasons.
After Piniella, the door to the manager’s office swung open, and then shut, to Bob Melvin, Mike Hargrove, John McLaren, Jim Riggleman, Don Wakamatsu, Daren Brown, Eric Wedge, and Lloyd McClendon before Servais arrived and stayed longer than any of them.
Few days in the history of the franchise were as strange as July 1, 2007, when Hargrove resigned in the middle of a successful season. The Mariners were 44–33 at that point, on their way to finishing second in the AL West after two last-place finishes. Hargrove, though, said he had lost his desire and couldn’t push on.
There had been talk of friction between Hargrove and Ichiro Suzuki, plus rumors that Hargrove was upset that the Mariners were close to signing Suzuki to a contract extension. Thirteen days after Hargrove left, Suzuki signed for five years and $90 million.
“There are no dark, sinister reasons for this decision,” Hargrove said. “If I can’t ask myself to give 100 percent for [the players], then what does that say about me? I’m not going to allow that to happen.”
That wasn’t the only strange departure.
The 2010 season was full of them—the surprise retirement of Ken Griffey Jr., the firing of manager Don Wakamatsu, and, before both of them, the end of outfielder Eric Byrnes’s career.
Nothing defined the Mariners’ struggle to score in 2010 more than the 11th inning of a scoreless tie against the Rangers on April 30. Ichiro Suzuki stood on third base with Byrnes at bat, and Wakamatsu called for a suicide squeeze bunt. Suzuki sprinted toward home as Rangers reliever Frank Francisco delivered the pitch, and Byrnes squared to bunt. At the last second, Byrnes inexplicably pulled his bat back. Suzuki became an easy out.
If that wasn’t strange enough, Rangers manager Ron Washington was ejected for arguing with plate umpire Jim Wolf even though his team had been blessed with a huge break. Washington was irate the pitch was called a ball, mostly because he couldn’t fathom that a hitter would pull the bat back on a suicide play. Byrnes then struck out loo
king to end the inning, and the Rangers scored twice in the 12th and won 2–0.
After the game, perplexed general manager Jack Zduriencik approached the Mariners clubhouse but had to lean out of the way when the door burst open and Byrnes pedaled out on a bicycle. Byrnes came closer to making contact with Zduriencik than he did the baseball on the suicide squeeze. Two days later, the Mariners released Byrnes, who never played another big-league game.
In June, Griffey retired amid turmoil of a report he had been asleep in the clubhouse during a game. And in August the Mariners, 42–70, fired Wakamatsu.
The years that followed didn’t bring consistent success, although the Mariners had their moments of glory and even some levity.
In 2012, they used six pitchers to record a no-hitter in a 1–0 victory over the Dodgers. Starter Kevin Millwood left in the sixth inning because of a groin injury, but relievers Charlie Furbush, Stephen Pryor, Lucas Luetge, Brandon League, and Tom Wilhelmsen finished. About two months later, on August 15, Felix Hernandez pitched the first perfect game in Mariners history in a 1–0 victory over Tampa Bay.
The Mariners signed slugging first baseman Dae-ho Lee in 2016, hoping the Korean star could put a jolt in the offense. He did to a degree, hitting 14 home runs and driving in 49 runs. Lee also was a tall (6-foot-4), chunky (250 pounds) character in the clubhouse who kept everyone entertained with what he said and how he said it. “I don’t believe he speaks English … or Korean,” his interpreter once said.
In the absence of playoff baseball, the Mariners still produced players who became fan favorites.
Felix Hernandez ascended into status befitting his nickname—King Felix—with six All-Star appearances, the Cy Young Award in 2010, and his perfect game in 2012. Ichiro Suzuki played his own style—a speedy slap hitter with home-run power when he wanted to unleash it—to make 10 All-Star appearances and win two batting titles and 10 Gold Gloves. Robinson Cano signed a 10-year, $240 million contract to bring his All-Star bat, glove, and swagger to the Mariners in 2014, and slugging designated hitter Nelson Cruz arrived a year later to give the team a much-needed offensive power boost.
Hard-throwing closer Edwin Diaz, called up from the minors midway through the 2016 season, immediately became a favorite of the Safeco Field crowd and, in 2018, pitched himself onto the All-Star team.
With a fastball that consistently topped 100 mph and a slider that left hitters guessing, Diaz powered his way to 57 saves in 2018 to rank second on baseball’s all-time single-season saves list behind Francisco Rodriguez (62 in 2008). He became the 17th player in major-league history to record at least 50 saves in a season.
Left-handed starter James Paxton was long viewed as the next staff ace after Felix Hernandez, but injuries always seemed to derail him. Through 2018, Paxton had spent time on the disabled list every year since he reached the majors, but a solid 2017 season (12–5, 2.98 ERA in 24 starts) plus changes to his diet and workout regimen gave the Mariners hope that 2018 would be different. It started that way when Paxton pitched a no-hitter in May at Toronto, but he landed on the disabled list twice later in the season.
The 2018 Mariners produced the team’s most successful season since 2001—they won 89 games—although it wasn’t nearly enough in a league so strong it would have taken 98 victories to win a wild-card playoff berth. They went 19–9 in June and by July 5 had risen to 24 games over .500 and trailed first-place Houston by only 1½ games in the AL West.
Better yet, the Mariners accomplished much of that success despite Hernandez’s struggles and Robinson Cano’s 80-game suspension. With Cano returning in August, it became easy for Mariners fans to look toward the second half of the season as a time when they finally could celebrate a push toward the playoffs. Just like 1995, 1997, 2000, and 2001.
What followed was a second-half plummet that was swift, enduring, and crushing.
With Hernandez ineffective and injuries keeping Paxton and Marco Gonzalez out of the rotation for various stretches, along with an offense that simply stalled, the Mariners went 31–34 after the All-Star break. The Astros cruised to the division title, the A’s won 39 of their last 63 games, and the Mariners simply couldn’t keep pace. Before they returned for their final homestand, a seven-game stretch that many had hoped would bring September excitement back to Seattle baseball, the Mariners already had been eliminated.
To many, they had shown the nucleus of a team that could reach the next level despite their late-season nosedive. But the reality was the Mariners, despite winning 89 games, were far from a playoff team in a difficult AL West. Dipoto and the Mariners front office took a hard look at what they had—a big-league club not ready to contend and a minor league system lacking many top-flight prospects—and chose to rebuild the core, not accent it, for 2019.
They traded Paxton to the Yankees, Cano and Diaz to the Mets, All-Star shortstop Jean Segura to the Phillies, and catcher Mike Zunino to the Rays. Designated hitter Nelson Cruz signed a free-agent deal with the Twins. As spring training began, 20 players off the 2018 roster had left via trade or free agency.
Dipoto restocked the organization with prospects he believed could blossom by 2021, fully realizing that the 2019 and even 2020 seasons could be difficult. The Mariners’ new core consisted of speedy center fielder Mallex Smith and power-hitting left fielder Domingo Santana, shortstop J. P. Crawford, and the returning threesome of outfielder Mitch Haniger, second baseman Dee Gordon, and third baseman Kyle Seager. With Felix Hernandez and Marco Gonzalez returning to the pitching staff, the Mariners signed Japanese pitching star Yusei Kikuchi and obtained highly regarded pitchers Justus Sheffield and Justin Dunn, along with veteran reliever Hunter Strickland. And in the minor leagues, top outfield prospect Jarred Kelenic came from the Mets in the Cano/Diaz trade.
“We have a chance to grow into something special and we’re going to watch that happen,” Dipoto said before the 2019 season began.
That’s one of the beautiful aspects of baseball—hope for better days.
In their early years, hope was about all the Mariners had. The simple task of a .500 record was an accomplishment to celebrate, and it took the Mariners 15 years to do it. The 18 years before the Mariners’ division championship in 1995 comprised a period of frustrating finishes, players who became fan favorites and, of course, characters who made life interesting amid the losses.
Along the way, however, something marvelous happened. The Mariners built their history in Seattle. Yes, there was the futility of the last-place teams and ownership problems that stirred fears the Mariners would move to another city. In time, however, they developed star players and competitive teams that their fans would cherish. Their best seasons gave a taste of what a September stretch drive feels like, along with the excitement of playoff baseball in October.
The newest generation of Mariners fans doesn’t know that feeling. But, in 2019 they took the field with the next collection of players designed to instill hope.
That’s baseball. The next pitch can deliver the chance for a strikeout, the next game the prospect for victory, and the next season an opportunity to dream of a championship.
INDEX
A
Abbott, Glenn 11, 24
Abbott, Paul 157, 163, 165, 177
Ackley, Dustin 205
Adamack, Randy 3, 4, 39, 40-42, 72, 81
Aker, Jack 5
Allanson, Andy 144
Allen, George 166
Amaral, Rich 135, 141
Andersen, Larry 23-26, 30
Anderson, Garret 144
Argyros, George 30, 31, 33, 34, 40, 58, 64, 74-76
Argyros, Judie 30, 40
Arizona Diamondbacks 119, 206
Armstrong, Chuck 47, 52, 54, 55, 67, 69, 70, 93, 119
Atlanta Braves 22, 60, 87, 88, 188
Aust, Dave 69
Autry, Gene 50, 51
Ayala, Bobby 108, 129, 147
B
Baerga, Carlos 149
Baez, Jose 10
Balderson, D
ick 67, 70, 75
Baldwin, James 165
Ball Four 5
Baltimore Orioles 27, 60, 104, 132, 134, 136, 154
Bankhead, Scott 58, 97
Bannister, Floyd 11
Barfield, Jesse 81, 82
Barrios, Francisco 18
Bass, Kevin 134
Bavasi, Bill 196, 205
Beattie, Jim 56
Belcher, Tim 146
Bell, David 166, 188
Belle, Albert 149, 150
Beltran, Saydel 198
Beltre, Adrian 197
Bedard, Erik 205
Benes, Andy 135, 147
Berman, Chris 21
Bernazard, Tony 28
Betancourt, Yuniesky 198-200
Blowers, Mike 82, 102, 109, 111, 112, 133, 135, 136, 141, 143, 145, 146, 149, 150, 152, 153,
Bochte, Bruce 21
Boggs, Wade 173
Bonds, Barry 123, 161
Bonnell, Barry 28, 29
Boone, Bret 105-109, 122, 123, 129, 155, 175, 177-179, 184, 190-193, 196
Boras, Scott 30, 161
Borders, Pat 195
Bosio, Chris 44, 133, 146, 150
Bosse Field 49
Boston Red Sox 11, 13, 58, 67, 125, 136, 137, 157, 170, 196, 197
Bouton, Jim 5
Bradley, Phil 56, 58-60
Bradley, Scott 60
Braun, Steve 10
Brett, George 21, 22
Brosius, Scott 191
Broussard, Ben 205
Brown, Daren 206
Brundage, Dave 60
Bryant, Don “Bear” 9
Buhner, Jay 2, 3, 36, 42-45, 81, 83-86, 91, 95, 97, 109, 110, 114, 124-129, 134-139, 142, 146-150, 155, 157, 159, 172, 186, 196, 204
Buhner Buzz Night 42, 43
Burba, Dave 95, 98, 99
Busby, Jim 9
Byrnes, Eric 206, 207
C
Cabrera, Asdrubal 200, 205
Calderon, Ivan 56, 58, 60
California Angels 2, 7, 10, 13-15, 35, 50, 51, 60, 61, 65, 84, 94, 99, 105, 106, 112, 134, 136, 137, 139, 140-145, 153, 164, 180, 181, 183, 184, 196
