This is supposed to be the Fun Differential era. But this is no fun.

I caught a fair bit of heat – and also got a lot of credit (498 likes to date against 80 comments, most of them vitriolically negative) – for this Twitter (X by Musk) post in which I credited Dan Wilson and Edgar Martinez with turning the Mariners around in 2024, almost making the playoffs, and winning 62% of the time (21-13) with what was purported to be a dead roster.

Now I’m wondering if that wasn’t the X (ha) factor after all. I think it might have been the veteran leadership of one Justin Matthew Turner. Just 4 years my junior, Turner joined the club when the M’s were 56-52 (.519) on the year (admittedly, still in first place in a week division, tied for first with eventual AL West winner Houston). During his tenure in Seattle, the Mariners would go 29-25 (.537), a time that overlapped both all of the Wilson/Martinez success and the lead-up to that time that precipitated Scott Servais’s firing (especially the abysmal road-trip in which we saw Servais’s last win). This isn’t as definitive, of course. Statistically, Wilson & Martinez have a lot more success than JT in these small samples.

But that was before the first 9 games of 2025. The Mariners infamously refused to spend loose couch cushion change and a bag of chips on bringing back JT, preferring to sign Pirates cast-away Rowdy Tellez to a minor league deal to earn a starting first base spot with a torrid Spring Training. JT signed with the Cubs for $6 million (I can’t sufficiently stress that this is literally nothing in today’s MLB). JT is 3/11 (.273) in limited action with the Cubs, who are 7-4 and sit atop their division. Tellez is 1/12 (.081) for the Mariners, who are 3-6 and sit at the bottom of their division. His OPS+ is -12.

Obviously the difference between JT and Tellez on the field isn’t worth 4 wins for the Cubs. But you don’t sign Justin Turner at 40 for his on-field contributions. You sign him for what he does on the bench, in the batting cage, in the clubhouse. Veteran leadership. It’s a thing that the Mariners lack. JP Crawford and Cal Raleigh can both lay claim to a pseudo-captain status of this squad and both are south of 31 years old. It’s a young team, which makes it long on potential, but there’s no one with seniority and sage wisdom (outside of Wilson & Martinez themselves) to right the ship when it starts to take on water as it has so far this year.

I would be less certain of my diagnosis for the 2025 Mariners if there weren’t a prior case study to 2024. This one is way more dramatic and obvious: Carlos “Slamtana” Santana. (No, not this guy.) The 2022 Mariners were 34-41 (.453) and in 4th place when Slamtana joined the club in late June. North America’s longest major-sport playoff drought (by an order of magnitude) was in no danger of ending. With Carlos aboard, the M’s rattled off a 56-31 run (.644), including an epic 14-game winning streak going into the All-Star break, to end the drought and finally make the playoffs. Slamtana was instrumental in the clinching game of the Mariners’ first playoff series win in two decades as well.

We let the Pirates jump on getting Santana the next year for cheap and he helped them to a hot start, but they eventually traded him to Milwaukee where he again made the playoffs. He spent the following year in Minnesota and won a Gold Glove! But this year, despite buzz that the Mariners would bring him back for a vacancy at first base (especially if they didn’t re-sign Turner), he returned to Cleveland for $12 million (double JT, but JT hadn’t just won a Gold Glove and Slamtana turns just 39 on Tuesday). Again, this was an affordable price for the Mariners. Carlos has opened 2025 9/31 (.290) with a homer and 6 runs scored for the Guardians, though they are just 3-5 in the early going. Because they have the luxury of playing in the AL Central, they’re just a game out of first with that record.

I’m talking about all this because it’s way more important than the game, which was painful and futile in the way that only a floundering foundering team can produce. The Mariners lead the AL in walks, demonstrating a real tangible improvement in plate discipline and hitting approach that is commendable and truly exciting. But they are next-to-last in runs/game (3.11), somehow well ahead of 3-5 Houston (2.25), who is also In Trouble. And the runs thing indicates that this is, at core, the Same Old Mariners in a fundamental way. A team that struggles to put together timely hits and a sense of momentum. And when they haven’t struggled, it’s usually been with the help of a veteran leader who has won something before.

Hey, JD Martinez is still available. We always did well when we had two Martinezes in Seattle. And this one could go on road trips too!

Mariners Stats:
Comeback Wins: 2
Wire-to-Wire Wins: 1
Comeback Losses: 2
Wire-to-Wire Losses: 4

Multi-Homer Games: 1-2
Single-Homer Games: 2-1
No-Homer Games: 0-3

One-Run Games: 2-1
Extra-Innings Games: 0-1

Record When Scoring >4 Runs: 0-2
Record When Scoring 2-4 Runs: 3-1
Record When Scoring <2 Runs: 0-3

Personal Stats:
Watched on TV: 1-5
Mixed TV/Radio: 2-1