Commentary: Mariners stood with JP Crawford. He’s making them look pretty smart.

SEATTLE – In the vast wasteland of erratic at-bats that have marked this Mariners’ season, where “Controlling the Zone” has been largely an empty slogan, one player in particular has stood out as a fountain of plate consistency.

JP Crawford rarely strikes out, and walks with frequency – the only player in the majors, in fact, to rank in the 95th-plus percentile in walk rate, and 85th-plus percentile in whiff rate.

When Crawford does make contact, he is driving the ball with the sort of authority that eluded him in previous years. Case in point: On Sunday, in the Mariners’ desperately needed 2-0 win over Detroit at T-Mobile Park, Crawford had two doubles and a single, raising his slugging percentage to .402 – just five points behind Julio Rodriguez (with an on-base percentage of .368 that’s 46 points higher than Rodriguez). Crawford had just 33 extra-base hits last year. He’s already at 28 this year, with 70 games still to play.

Perhaps even more impressive was Crawford’s final at-bat, when he worked the count full, fouled off a pitch and took ball four on a close pitch that he refused to chase. That sort of plate discipline has been maddeningly rare on the Mariners this year; for an offensively challenged team that needs every base runner it can get, it’s a godsend.

Crawford has been perhaps the Mariners’ most clutch player, and he has solidified the leadoff spot after Rodriguez faltered atop the lineup. Throw in Crawford’s leadership – he was the driving force behind the team meeting that helped propel the Mariners to a strong finish before the All-Star break – and it’s no wonder manager Scott Servais said Sunday:

“I guess if I had to have a team MVP, at this point in the season, he would be the guy. Certainly defensively, he’s as solid as they come. But what he’s done offensively, the improvements he’s made, he finds a way to get on base. He’s got a knack for having big at-bats in big moments. He’s always done that since he’s been here, but the consistency, he’s gotten better.

“We talking about the ball jumping off his bat. He’s driving the ball more consistently, and we’re seeing more extra-base hits. And he does all that by playing every day. He wants to be out there. He wants to be the guy.”

Frustrated by his lack of extra-base production and a second-half decline in which he went from .363/.454/.582 in his first 108 plate appearances to .218/.314/.283 over his final 119 games, Crawford spent the offseason at Driveline, honing the mechanics of his swing.

“I was putting myself in a bad spot to fire, so I was trying to clean up my loading and really use the force from your legs,” he said in spring training. “Using that kinetic energy to work all the way up through your body and just get more oomph on the ball.”

So far, so good on the oomph factor. There was much consternation the past two years among Mariners’ fans when the team bypassed a wealth of free-agent shortstops to stand with Crawford. When I asked Crawford in spring training if he would have moved to second base had the Mariners signed a shortstop, he replied, “Hell, yeah. Absolutely. I’ll play catcher. I don’t care where I’m playing. I’ll play anywhere. Long as I’m in that lineup every day helping my team win, it don’t matter.”

But the truth is, Crawford has outplayed many of those free-agent shortstops this year.

His .368 on-base percentage ranks first among all MLB shortstops, and his .770 on-base plus slugging ranks fourth. Crawford’s Baseball Reference WAR of 2.7 is higher than Xander Boegarts (1.7 WAR, 7-year, $177-million contract with Padres), Carlos Corrrea (1.2 WAR, 6 years, $200 million with Twins), Trea Turner (1.1 WAR, 11 years, $300 million with Padres) and Javier Baez (0.4 WAR, 6 years, $140 million with Tigers.).

It should be noted that the numbers are slightly different with the other compiler of WAR, FanGraphs, which has Crawford at 1.6, below both Turner and Boegarts. And moving Crawford to second base would have upgraded what has been a trouble spot all year for the Mariners (their .574 OPS from second basemen ranks 29th among 30 teams).

But it’s also easy to see why the Mariners covet the presence of Crawford, whom they signed to a five-year, $50 million contract extension on opening day of 2022 in Minneapolis. After Kyle Seager retired, Crawford realized that it was, in his words, “my team.” And that has manifested itself this year as the Mariners try to navigate their way through a frustrating season.

“Ten days ago, things weren’t looking so good,’’ Servais said during the All-Star break. “And our guys got together, with JP really leading the pack. … He shows up every day, he competes his tail off. He’s loud when he needs to be in the clubhouse, he’s locked in during the game. He’s just focused on what we need to do to win the game. He doesn’t get caught up in some things that are going against us, a bad call, what the other team’s doing. He’s just doing the right things day in, day out and it pays off over the long haul.”

In the midst of a season in which far too many Mariners’ at-bats cause one to shake their head in dismay, Crawford has stood out as a shining exception.