Relief pitchers are often overlooked as key parts of a winning baseball equation. They are seen as hired guns and necessary evils, commonly remembered for the game they cost their team rather than the many times they did their job. In Seattle, where the ballpark clearly favors pitching, few have stood out more than Andres Muñoz since Safeco Field, now T-Mobile Park opened in 1999. Sure, the first pitcher most of us think of is Félix Hernández, and rightfully so. The 2024 Mariners pitching staff features a starting rotation that has a quintuplet of hard-throwing right-handers. They have garnered most of the attention and have produced on par with their lofty potential. Still, the most dominant pitcher on this Mariners team has not been a starter. It has been Andres Muñoz, who is clearly one of the best relief pitchers in MLB and proving to be an invaluable piece in Seattle.
Andres Muñoz Proving Invaluable for Mariners
Pitching is at a Premium
The Seattle Mariners aren’t a team that is going to put up ten runs on a nightly basis. The offense, which has been heavily criticized, at its best is probably a middle-of-the-road group whose strength on paper should be consistency. We haven’t seen much consistency to this point, and they’ve led all MLB teams in strikeouts. However, they have been putting up average offense, with a team 96 WRC+. The thought is if they can just go out and be an average offense on a consistent basis, the pitching will take care of the rest. So far that has worked at times. The Mariners have a 30-26 record which is good enough for first place in the AL West.
The starters put together a run of 21 consecutive games allowing two or fewer runs, tying the second longest such streak in MLB history. So, they’ve done their part and then some. Meanwhile, the Mariners bullpen has been a bit of an adventure other than when it turns to the steady Muñoz.
Senior Smoke
When analyzing any modern-day pitcher, we like to check their velocity first. “How hard does he throw?” has become the measuring stick we all reach for when comparing pitchers in this era. Andres does not disappoint. He recently touched 101mph in a battle with Aaron Judge at Yankee Stadium that ended in a strikeout. That is just what Muñoz, aka “Senior Smoke,” does. When asked about his arm strength in a 2022 interview with Seattle Sports’ Shannon Drayer, he shared “I always was the kind of guy that threw hard. When I was 15, I threw 94.” So we can check that box with Andres Muñoz. He threw harder at 15 than some of his bullpen mates throw now.
In 2022, Muñoz put together a season most relief pitchers can only dream of. He appeared in 64 games, pitching 65 innings with a 2.49 ERA, 96 strikeouts, and only 15 walks. He was a two-pitch guy that year, throwing his four-seam fastball 35 percent of the time and his wipeout slider a whopping 64% of the time. In the 2023 offseason, Andres added a two-seam sinker whose average velocity is roughly 99mph. This season he’s thrown that pitch 25 percent of the time and it’s really given him a way to, dare we say it, pitch to contact at 99.
“Give Me Muñoz!”
?Give me Muñoz? pic.twitter.com/LIGAzMGJsg
— britt (@brittanyanne08_) May 28, 2024
Taylor Saucedo spoke for all Seattle Mariners fans when he made the call “Give me Muñoz!” We all know when a game is on the line, there is only one arm that manager Scott Servais can trust to bring home the win. It is Andres Muñoz, who is clearly one of the best relief pitchers in MLB and an invaluable part of this Mariners roster.
The Mariners have gotten solid contributions from Trent Thornton, Ryne Stanek, and Gabe Speier at times. None of them have been steady enough to truly earn the trust of the team’s manager. There is hope that the recently acquired Mike Baumann can be effective moving forward. For now, with all of these guys the Mariners fanbase is collectively holding their breath when they enter the game. When Muñoz enters the game you can feel the confidence the fans have in him. We all breathe easy when one of the best relief pitchers in baseball is on the mound.
Andres Muñoz Has Been the Mariners’ MVP So Far
Muñoz’s pitching stats are really good this year, with a 1.54 ERA, 0.943 WHIP, 32 strikeouts, and eight walks in 23 1/3 innings pitched. What he’s done for this Mariners team cannot be quantified in numbers. They’ve been without Matt Brash for the season and haven’t seen Gregory Santos pitch yet. The Mariners have really been forced to lean heavily on Muñoz, and he’s handled the pressure amazingly.
The Mariners are going to play in close games. Their closer has come through time and time again in the crucial late moments. Seattle now has 30 wins and he’s pitched in 19 of them. Only two other players on the team have any saves. This is eye-popping on a team that doesn’t typically use a player only in the ninth inning as a traditional closer. They prefer to match up their best arm against a team’s best bats, regardless of what inning it is.
The Mariners are currently 14th in team bullpen ERA at 3.80, but if you remove Muñoz, that number balloons to 4.28. That would drop them down to 22nd in MLB. Seattle is so reliant on pitching, that having the 22nd-best bullpen would be detrimental to their playoff chances. Thankfully, the Mariners have an elite workhorse closer who has raised the bar for his team. As long as Andres Muñoz is available, the Mariners are capable of shutting their opponents down late in games.
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