3 up, 3 down: Tracking key early trends for the surging Mariners

First, Mitch Haniger delivered with the bases loaded Friday night, hammering a grand slam out to left-center to power a 6-1 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Then, he delivered some important perspective on the state of the Seattle Mariners.

“Unfortunately, the start of the year wasn’t what we wanted,” the veteran right fielder said. “And there’s a lot to be said on what could be different and all these things, and a lot of times you just have to keep coming to work and working hard and not giving in to all the BS and just keep trying to get better. Because you’re going to have stretches where you suck and you’re going have stretches where you’re great.

“And that’s baseball.”

And that, indeed, serves as an apt summation of the first month of the season for the Mariners, who have rebounded from a panic-inducing opening stretch to emerge at the end of April as the hottest team in the American League.

What about this Mariners’ start is sustainable? What’s not? Who’s on the verge of a breakout and who’s bound to regress? We address all that and more with a look of some of the Mariners’ early-season trends.

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1. Pitching

It all starts with the pitching for the Mariners. That’s been true in each of the past four seasons, first when the organization made its ahead-of-schedule surge out of its rebuilding phase in 2021, through its playoff-drought busting in 2022, and then in its September collapse last season.

Now? Now the Mariners are better than ever. Like, literally. It’s almost to the point that the consistent performances and the historical data are difficult to fathom. Just how good has the pitching been?

Consider: The Mariners entered the weekend having allowed just 21 earned runs over their previous 14 games, posting a 1.50 ERA since April 10, the best stretch in club history and the best stretch by any pitching staff in MLB since 2017.

The starting pitching, led by the steadiness of Logan Gilbert and Bryce Miller, has been electric. And the bullpen has been dominant again while withstanding key injuries, thanks largely to Andres Munoz, Gabe Speier, Trent Thornton and Tayler Saucedo.

Is it all sustainable? Yes and no. Fourteen games is a small sample size, and the Mariners obviously won’t post a 1.50 ERA over the next five months.

But they led the AL with 15 quality starts through Friday, and they’re 13-2 when their starter pitches at least six innings. This is what the Mariners do. This is who they are. And it’s entirely reasonable to expect this staff to continue to be one of the best in baseball and continue to carry this club deep into the summer.

2. Julio

From March 23 to April 14, Julio Rodriguez ranked as one of the worst hitters in baseball. That’s not an exaggeration. The Mariners’ star center fielder had a .186 batting average through his first 63 plate appearances, and his 35 wRC+ ranked in the bottom 10 of all MLB hitters.

Since then, well, Julio has been Julio. Over his last 10 games, he’s hitting .419 with a .979 OPS and multiple hits in seven of those 10 games. He hit his first homer of the season Tuesday in Texas, and he seems to be hitting at least one 105-mph line drive up the middle every game. He’s back, folks, and it’s a beautiful thing to watch.

3. Defense

There was some understandable skepticism in spring training about the Mariners’ defensive plans, particularly with an unproven partnership of Josh Rojas and Luis Urias at third base.

After a shaky start defensively, the platoon has played out as well as anyone could have reasonably expected. Rojas leads the team with a 168 wRC+ and a .900 OPS, and Urias has come through with a couple big home runs, including one in the series-clinching win in Texas on Thursday. Just as important, both have showed steady improvement with their glove work during their daily pregame routine with infield coach Perry Hill.

The Mariners overall rank as a top-10 team as rated by the Defensive Runs Saved metric, with 10 DRS through their first 26 games. Most of that owes to Cal Raleigh, whose six DRS rank him No. 1 among all catchers and tied for No. 2 among all MLB players.

Rodriguez, meanwhile, ranks No. 1 among all center fielders in Statcast’s Outs Above Average metric.

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1. Strikeouts

Two ways to look at this: The Mariners’ strikeout rate of 27.3% is the highest in the majors, and that’s an alarming spike for an organization that revamped its lineup over the offseason largely because it wanted to cut down on strikeouts (after finishing second in the majors with a 25.9% K rate last year).

There are promising signs, though. Since April 13, the Mariners’ strikeout rate has dropped from 29.5%, and manager Scott Servais has been encouraged by a more consistent “team approach” up and down the lineup. The Mariners are chasing fewer pitches out of the strike zone, and in turn they’re chasing opposing starters out of the game earlier.

And the strikeouts have also come with positive trade-offs. The Mariners hit 15 home runs in their previous 12 games through Friday; their 11.1% walk rate over the past two weeks ranks No. 3 in MLB; their 122 wRC+ ranks No. 4; and their .331 wOBA ranks No. 6.

If they can make their strikeout rate a little more manageable — something closer to the league average of 22.5% — and still offer the slugging upside, then this would be a formidable lineup.

2. The newcomers

Three of the Mariners’ most significant offseason additions — Jorge Polanco, Mitch Garver and Luke Raley — have each graded out so far as negative WAR players according to FanGraphs. Not what the Mariners had hoped for with those veteran acquisitions, certainly.

Polanco is striking out at a career-high rate (28.3%), though he does rank second in MLB with a 17.9% walk rate.

Garver, batting cleanup to open the season, has been dropped to the No. 7 spot lately, and his wRC+ of 67 ranks last among Seattle’s regular hitters.

Garver did hit his second home run Friday, perhaps an indication he’s on the verge of a breakthrough. And he does have an unusually low .174 BABIP (batting average on ball in play), which might suggest he’s been unlucky. But other underlying data (an “expected” slugging percentage of .273, for instance) show he just hasn’t been hitting the ball with the same authority he’s accustomed to.

Raley had seen sporadic playing time through the first few weeks, but Servais has started Raley in left field the past two games (favoring him over rookie Jonathan Clase), and the Mariners do value the versatility he brings. Figure Raley will get more runway to prove he can hit out of his early slump.

3. The injuries

Injuries can derail any team, of course, but there was a heightened awareness of that with this club coming into the season given some of the roster’s injury history.

Saturday’s news that reliever Matt Brash (elbow) will be shut down was a discouraging development, and it comes just two days after the Mariners placed shortstop J.P. Crawford (oblique) on the injured list.

It’s becoming increasingly unlikely that Brash will throw a pitch for the Mariners this season, and Gregory Santos (lat strain) is nowhere close to joining to the bullpen either.

Crawford realistically will be out for a month, and left fielder Dominic Canzone (shoulder) doesn’t figure to be back until at least mid-May.