Reviewing the best Mariners of the decade

SEATTLE -- As the decade comes to a conclusion, the Mariners are looking to bigger and better after notching just three winning seasons and finishing above third place in the American League West only once from 2010-19.

But that doesn’t mean there weren’t some fine players donning Seattle’s colors during that span. Here’s our choice for the Top 10 Mariners of the decade:

1. SP Félix Hernández
Seasons: 2010-19

They didn’t call him The King for nothing. Nobody topped Hernández when it came to production, durability and just sheer presence for the past 10 years. He was the only Mariner on the team that entire span, and he racked up an 111-95 record with a 3.40 ERA in 281 games (280 starts) with an ERA+ of 114. While things didn’t end quite the way he hoped, Hernández earned five of his six All-Star berths during the past decade and took home the 2010 AL Cy Young Award. Despite having negative WAR value his final two seasons, Hernández totaled 32.3 bWAR in the 10 years while earning $212 million in salary.

2. DH Nelson Cruz
Seasons: 2015-18

The big man turned into the best free-agent signing in franchise history after inking a four-year, $57 million deal. He wound up averaging just over 40 home runs a season (163 in his 606 games) and earned three AL All-Star berths and two Silver Slugger Awards. Not only did Cruz provide power, but he also proved to be a complete hitter, with a .284/.362/.546 slash line and a .908 OPS. The fact he didn’t play in the field limited his bWAR to 17.0, but there was no limit to his presence in the clubhouse and his strong leadership.

3. 2B Robinson Canó
Seasons: 2014-18

Canó played five seasons in Seattle and earned three All-Star berths while finishing in the top eight in AL MVP Award voting twice. Although the Mariners never reached the postseason after signing him to a blockbuster 10-year, $240 million contract, Canó performed well: a .296/.353/.472 slash line with an .826 OPS, 107 homers and 411 RBIs in 704 games. He totaled 23.8 in bWAR for the five years, including 7.3 in 2016. He served an 80-game PED suspension in '18, and the Mariners traded him to the Mets last offseason.

4. 3B Kyle Seager
Seasons: 2011-19

Seager has been a fixture at the hot corner for nearly the entire decade, and with Félix Hernández departing now in free agency, he is the longest-tenured Mariner. Seager’s durability is a given -- once he was promoted from the Minors midway through the 2011 season, he played at least 154 games every year until a torn tendon in his left hand in Spring Training limited him to 106 this past season. And Seager has been quietly productive throughout, racking up 20-plus homers for eight straight years while posting a .256/.324/.443 line with a .767 OPS. He was an AL All-Star and Gold Glove Award winner in '14, and his 30.4 bWAR is the highest of any Mariners position player in the decade.

5. SP Hisashi Iwakuma
Seasons: 2012-17

The right-hander pitched largely in Félix Hernández’s shadow during his six seasons in Seattle, but he was extremely efficient in his first five years before injuries wiped out his final campaign at age 36. The Bear went 63-39 with a 3.42 ERA in 150 games (136 starts) during his Mariners run, earning an AL All-Star bid and finishing third in the Cy Young Award voting in 2013, when he was 14-6 with a 2.66 ERA in 33 starts. With his deceptive delivery and array of offspeed offerings, Iwakuma threw the fifth no-hitter in franchise history in '15. He totaled 17.3 bWAR before returning to Japan.

6. RF Ichiro Suzuki
Seasons: 2010-12, '18-19

Ichiro’s star truly shone in Seattle the previous decade, but you can’t ignore that the last of his 10 straight All-Star appearances and Gold Glove Awards came in 2010, when he led the AL once again with 214 hits while batting .315. The numbers began to finally fall off a bit at age 37, but Ichiro still played 161 games and hit .272 in '11 before being traded to the Yankees midway through ’12. Of course, that wasn’t it for the franchise icon, as he returned to play 15 games for Seattle in '18 and two more for the Mariners in Japan this past year before finally calling it a career at age 45.

7. SP James Paxton
Seasons: 2013-18

Paxton never could quite put everything together during his six years in Seattle, with injuries and inconsistency seemingly derailing nearly every season at some point. But when he was good, he was very good, and Paxton put together a 41-26 record and 3.42 ERA in 102 starts before being traded to the Yankees prior to last season. The big lefty became just the second Canadian to throw a no-hitter in MLB and the first to do so on Canadian soil, when he blanked the Blue Jays in Toronto in 2018. He totaled 10.7 bWAR during his time in Seattle, a number that surely would have been much higher if he had stayed healthy.

8. RP Edwin Díaz
Seasons: 2016-18

Díaz was a shooting star in Seattle, with a brief career that peaked in 2018, when he tied for the second-most saves in Major League history with 57 in a sensational season. The man called “Sugar” earned his first All-Star bid that year and finished eighth in the AL Cy Young Award voting after putting up a 1.96 ERA with 124 strikeouts and 17 walks in 73 1/3 innings. Díaz burst on the scene in ’16 with his high-90s fastball and nasty slider, and he was installed as the closer not long after his midseason promotion from Double-A. In his 2 1/2 seasons in Seattle, he saved 109 games and had a 2.64 ERA with 301 strikeouts in 191 innings before being traded to the Mets.

9. RF Mitch Haniger
Seasons: 2017-19

Haniger has had only one full season for Seattle, sandwiched between two injury-shortened campaigns. But his value was crystal clear in 2018, when he was named an AL All-Star and finished 11th in MVP Award voting after posting a .285/.366/.493 slash line with 26 homers and 93 RBIs. Even after playing just two months this past season due to a ruptured testicle and ensuing back issue, Haniger has totaled 10.6 in bWAR in just 316 games with Seattle and will look to get back on track next year.

10. SS Jean Segura
Seasons: 2017-18

Segura was another who made a big impact in his brief time. Acquired from the D-backs along with Mitch Haniger in the Taijuan Walker trade, Segura posted back-to-back .300 seasons and won the Final Vote fan balloting to earn a spot in the 2018 All-Star Game. Segura compiled a .302/.345/.421 slash line with a 7.6 bWAR in his two years before being swapped to the Phillies last season.