MLB Daily: Felix Hernandez is Human; Andrew Cashner's Weird Night

Welcome to a Tuesday edition of everybody’s favorite post on the Internet …

Human element: For three innings, Felix Hernandez appeared in cruise control vs. the Yankees at Safeco last night  … and then fell apart, allowing seven runs, including a grand slam to Mark Teixeira. Meanwhile former Mariner Michael Pineda struck out nine over six innings to improve to 7-2.

Afterward the prevailing thought in the Seattle papers is that Hernandez was bothered by a light rain that caused a muddy mound because the roof at Safeco was open. Hernandez and manager Lloyd McClendon disagreed, per the Post-Intelligencer:

"“The mound was fine. He just didn’t have his stuff today,” Lloyd McClendon said after the game, saying that Hernandez simply lost command of his fastball and change-up. “He’s human, I guess.”"

Aren’t we all?

Seattle — a team many including myself thought could make the World Series — has lost three straight and is 24-27 and  7.5 games behind first-place Houston. Injuries to Hisashi Iwakuma and James Paxton, along with up-and-down performances from Taijuan Walker after a great spring haven’t helped the Mariners. The offense is the main culprit, however, with the Mariners sitting 28th in runs scored.

Nelson Cruz lived up to his price tag, with 18 homers. Kyle Seager has been okay, doing about what was expected of him. The rest of the Seattle offense is borderline inept. Robinson Cano is off to his worse season in the Majors with a .246/.290/.337 line. Regulars Dustin Ackley and Austin Jackson have sub-.600 OPSs, which is hard to do. A contending team shouldn’t see Willie Bloomquist (.396 OPS) getting close to 50 at-bats into early June.

There’s still time for Seattle to turn it around, but losing games on night’s King Felix starts doesn’t bode well.

Baseball is weird Vol. Infinity: Jacob deGrom shut down the Padres last night in San Diego — the ninth time they’ve been shut out in 2015. How about the performance by Andrew Cashner?

Said Cashner, via the Union-Tribune:

"“It was a weird one,” Cashner said. “I thought I had some of the best stuff I’ve had this season. Some balls just fell in. I think the main mistake was the home run on a hanging slider. … I just couldn’t stop it after that.”"

Weird indeed.

Balloting: I’m not much for conspiracy theories, but how to explain the Royals leading the American League with five would-be All Stars right now? Salvador Perez, Lorenzo Cain and Mike Moustakas are the top-three vote getters per MLB.com — all three are beating Mike Trout which is impressive in-and-of itself. Alcides Escobar and Alex Gordon would also start the game if it were played tomorrow.

I can’t argue too much about this, although Josh Donaldson is clearly a better choice at third than Moustakas. Royals home attendance is up big numbers after the World Series despite the moldy Aramark hot dog buns, but voting is online only this year. What gives? My quick theories:

• Ned Yost tried to log on to AOL to check his email and accidentally hacked the ballot system.
• Lisk enlisted his kids voting all-day now that school is out for the summer. (That’s a joke.)
• The Royals are a really good team and deserve all the All-Star love.

Vote early, vote often.

Of Salesmen!: MLB is teaming up with Rush for some sort of promotion. Randy Johnson, who has taken up photography post-baseball, is involved. Geddy Lee is a big baseball fan — remember that old ESPN fantasy promo? Obviously the way to get kids interested in baseball is through prog rock, right?

Next time baseball should incorporate The Trailer Park Boys, but that’s me.

(Sorry for the gratuitous clip.)

This & That: Texas called up top prospect Joey Gallo to fill-in for Adrian Beltre. Gallo had 49 strikeouts in 43 games at Triple A, but an OPS north of 1.000, which fits in line with modern-day baseball. … Jose Fernandez threw three innings at the Marlins spring training facility. He could be back from Tommy John surgery before the All-Star break. … Clayton Kershaw picked up three hits at the plate and limited the Rockies to a Nolan Arenado home run.

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