It's starting to look like anything is possible for these Mariners

After the Mariners were swept in Boston in May, I wrote that their season was over. And if I was wrong then, I couldn’t be wrong again after they lost four of five at home to the Angels in June to fall to 29-39 and I suggested we all come clean about the team's flaws.

But here they are at 61-52, going 32-13 in their last 45 games, taking two of three from the Yankees in consecutive weeks, looking like a playoff team and one that could even be a lively darkhorse in the postseason.

Because of a spotty lineup, I'm like other cynics and skeptics in having doubts about the Mariners ending their 21-year playoff drought. And wouldn’t it be on brand if the Mariners fell short with the best pitching staff in franchise history?

I’m sure that’s debatable. There might have been another staff with Felix Hernandez as the ace along with four others who might have matched up with this year’s rotation. And other bullpens that say “what about us?” But I can’t remember a Mariners’ team this stacked with arms.

For most of the season, we’ve watched Robbie Ray, Logan Gilbert, Marco Gonzales, Chris Flexen and George Kirby flummox opponents or at least give the Mariners a chance to win every game. And if they have a lead in the sixth or seventh inning, good luck to anyone trying to come from behind with the flame-chuckers in the bullpen.

And now they’ve added Luis Castillo to their rotation, giving them a legitimate ace, causing the Mariners to turn Flexen into a long reliever. Flexen has done nothing to warrant a move to the ‘pen, posting another commendable season after a breakthrough year in 2021.

But I’m thinking he looked at the big picture and bought in because it further strengthens an already premier pitching staff.

By acquiring Castillo, the Mariners have gone from “hey, we’re just happy to make the playoffs” to “hey, we just might make a run in the playoffs once we get there.”

Seattle Times columnist Larry Stone acknowledged as much in a tweet this week, saying the Mariners are in a great position as a playoff team because they have terrific starters and a bullpen filled with guys who can throw high 90s and in the case of Andres Munoz, the low 100s.

As the Yankees discovered in that epic 1-0, 13-inning Mariners’ win Tuesday night at T-Mobile Park, Seattle’s relievers are the best in the league. Munoz, Paul Seward, Matt Festa and Matt Brash combined to hold the Yankees hitless over the last five innings.

Yet as good as they are at run prevention, are the Mariners playoff worthy enough at run production? I’ll cop out and say it remains to be seen, with a lean toward "maybe" over "maybe not."

I say maybe so because the Mariners continue to the most logic defying team for the second year in a row. Last year they somehow won 90 games with a negative run differential that suggested they should have been a .500 team at best. This year it’s easier to understand how they’ve won 27 games by one run — nearly half of their 61 victories — because of their standout pitching. But can that continue with guys in the lineup who hit .200 or worse?

Think about this for a second — the Mariners won Tuesday night with Jake Lamb hitting cleanup. This is a player the Mariners acquired at the trade deadline from the Dodgers for cash considerations. You could justifiably argue that he shouldn’t even be in the lineup of a team trying to make the playoffs, much less bat fourth in the order.

But none of that stuff seems to matter with this team. Examples that don’t make sense appear all over the place:

— Backup catcher Luis Torrens has been terrible all season but delivered the game-winning hit Tuesday night. His reward? A likely demotion to Tacoma as soon as new acquisition Curt Casali is activated.

— They’re winning with a starting left fielder in Jesse Winker, a brutal defensive player who has not come close to being the hitter he was with the Reds.

— Carlos Santana has been generally bad at the plate, but he’s delivered one clutch home run after another, including his latest blast, a game-winning two-run shot against the Yankees Wednesday afternoon.

— They could have sputtered when they lost three players — Winker, J.P. Crawford and Julio Rodriguez — to suspensions from the brawl in Anaheim, but that didn’t happen. In fact, at one point they won 14 games in a row.

— And in the last 20 games since the All-Star break, featuring 13 games against the Astros and Yankees, they went 10-10 without Julio for 15 of those games and Ty France for four.

Among the more encouraging developments for the Mariners:

— Julio is expected back from both of his wrist injuries on Friday when the Mariners open a nine-game road trip in Texas.

— In their remaining 49 games, they play 34 against losing teams, including the last 20 of the season.

— Yes, they went 7-12 against the Astros this year but by going 4-2 against the Yankees, the Mariners showed that if they’re equipped enough to handle the Bronx Bombers, they can go toe to toe with anyone in the league.

Yet as amazing as the Mariners have been, they’re nowhere near a playoff lock. Although they’re the second of three wild-card teams now, they’re only 1 1/2 games ahead of Tampa Bay and Baltimore, who as of Thursday were tied with the Mariners in the loss column with 52.

And Cleveland and Minnesota are right there too — one will win the Central Division and the other will be fighting for a playoff berth the rest of the way.

I’ve already been wrong — as in really wrong — when it comes to forecasting where the Mariners are headed. But it sure looks like they’ve gone from nothing’s possible to everything is, even a run at the World Series.

Jim Moore is a longtime Pacific Northwest sportswriter and sports radio host on 950 KJR at 10 a.m. weekdays with Jason Puckett, and writes a regular column for the Kitsap Sun. Contact Jim at jimmoorethego2guy@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter @cougsgo.  

This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: Jim Moore: Seattle Mariners making the 2022 playoffs look realistic