John Blanchette: Hernandez’s return provides more than hope

SEATTLE – Bud Selig hasn’t given the Seattle Mariners the go-ahead to print playoff tickets, but surely any day now.

And why not?

Felix is back. The King. He’s back. Kind of.

The M’s, having just dusted off the New York Yankees in two out of three, on Tuesday night boat raced the American League West-leading Los Angeles Angels of Yorba Linda, or wherever, with a spirited display of clutch hitting and opportunistic base-running.

And baseball-mad Seattle jammed Safeco Field on a 73-degree night to the tune of 21,769 to see their faves pull to within a game of first place.

Wait – 21,769? That’s not a tune, that’s a dirge.

Twenty-one-and-change? For the return of the King? Dino Rossi got more votes in the U-district.

OK, so maybe Seattle isn’t quite yet buying what Mike Hargrove and the fellas are selling. Maybe the civic angst over the prized right arm of young Felix Hernandez has been a bit overstated. Maybe Fenway-esque obsessiveness will never be replicated here.

No matter. A sigh of relief would have been as good as a celebration Tuesday night, except that everyone got all frisky at the prospect of drilling the Angels 11-3 and the various delights thereof, not the least of which was Ichiro Suzuki going 5 for 5 with a display of target golf that would have made Tiger envious.

As we are cautioned almost all the way up to the playoffs, it is too early to get excited about one game or one series, but Hargrove did allow for a modest investment of emotion.

“It’s a big series any time you play teams in front of you,” he said.

Well, the M’s certainly have had their share of practice at that the past three years, no?

“I’d hate to lose two of three and get to the end of the year and be just two games behind them,” he allowed. “Obviously, that makes it an important series. We need to play well.”

Or they need the Angels to be awful.

And both would be a bonus, which this was.

Of course, the biggest bonus was Hernandez getting through 78 pitches without clutching his right forearm and scowling, which he did back on April 18 when Minnesota was touching him up in the first inning.

He was only hurt – a strained flexor-pronator muscle.

The rest of the M’s, or at least the small, hard-core fandom, was dying inside. This is what happens when a franchise hangs much of its tenuous hopes on the arm of a 21-year-old starting pitcher, who has more or less been regarded as the ace from the moment he ascended to the big leagues.

So the first few 95 mph fastballs were greeted with appropriate buzz, and the 1-2-3 second inning met with universal approval. When the Angels managed to load the bases in the third without hitting a ball out of the infield, it was seen for what it was – bad luck and a little youthful impatience, Hernandez walking Chone Figgins after having him 0-2 and a strike away from being the third out.

Finally, it blew up on Hernandez a little in the fourth – too many pitches expended, a couple of hard hit balls – and Hargrove came out to rescue him, even though he had a 9-3 lead.

Small though the crowd was, it knew what it had seen. They issued possibly the only standing ovation accorded a starting pitcher pulled with two out in the fourth inning.

If they’d only known what he was feeling, it might have gone on longer.

“I feel good,” Hernandez reported. “No problem. Everything fine. Glad to be back.”

He did confess to some early anxiety.

“The first inning, I was worried (about the arm),” he said. “I was thinking too much. After the first inning, I tried to just throw strikes and do my job, trying not to think of my arm.”

And then the M’s put up those nine runs, and Hernandez started thinking big.

“I said, ‘Let me throw five (innings, which would have qualified him for the victory),” he laughed. “But they say no, I have to be at the pitching count. That’s OK. Maybe next time.”

The best words of all – next time.

Suddenly, the Mariners’ horizons are all that much greater. In retrospect, it was remarkable the way they managed to tread water – if .500 baseball is treading water, given how the M’s have been swamped for three seasons running – without their No. 1 starter.

Some of the things could hardly have been imagined. They beat three left-handed starters in a row after it seemed like they went 0 for 2006 against lefties. Cha Seung Baek, who was more or less Hernandez’s fill-in during those 25 days on the disabled list, started four Mariners victories. The defense was almost airtight.

“And our bullpen did an unbelievable job helping our starters,” said designated hitter Jose Vidro. “It was everything. We have good chemistry, we play good team baseball.

“Now we’ve got him back and it’s our time to turn around. He means a lot. He’s the No. 1 starter, the guy who’s setting us up. We definitely need him. We just move forward froom here. Hopefully, his next start, he can be out there longer and build up from there.

“It’s a treat to have him back. For us to be successful, he has to be out there for us.”

Successful? Given the atmosphere of Tuesday night, that seems like setting the bar low.