I like this line from David Schoenfield's post, “Hisashi Iwakuma is one of baseball's best”:

Iwakuma needed to shut down the Braves [yesterday] because [Mariners manager Lloyd] McClendon threw out one of the sorriest lineups you'll see with Bloomquist, Chavez and Stefen Romero, who entered the game batting .204/.256/.345, in the cleanup spot.

Yep, that was three of our top four. Willie Bloomquist (.559 OPS going into the game) led off, followed by Endy Chavez (.501 OPS) in the No. 2 spot, followed by the $240 million dollar man, then Romero hitting clean-up (.601 OPS). Well, no wonder he hit clean-up! That .601 OPS is stellar next to everyone else's!

I mentioned this yesterday on Facebook but might as well repeat it here: If there's anything dumber than the Mariners leading off with Bloomquist it's the Braves intentionally walking him in the 3rd with a man on second. But of course that got them Chavez. And that ended the inning.

My friend Jim is quite down on McClendon, and in this regard I tend to agree. His lineups are abysmal. But we still won the game, 2-0, thanks to Prince Hisashi, heir to King Felix. The M's are now three games over .500, and if the season ended today they'd be in the playoffs. When as the last time we could say that on June 5?

Schoenfield concludes this way:

Iwakuma joined the Seattle rotation on July 2, 2012. Here are the AL ERA leaders among starters since then: 

Iwakuma — 2.66 
Max Scherzer -- 2.88 
Felix Hernandez -- 2.94 
Yu Darvish -- 3.04 
Alex Cobb -- 3.05 
Chris Sale -- 3.08 
David Price -- 3.22 
James Shields -- 3.23