There’s no getting around it - Felix Hernandez had about as nightmarish a 2017 as he could have had. Plagued by injuries throughout the year, Felix posted his fewest innings pitched since his half-season rookie year in 2005. Even when he did pitch, he was bad. He posted an fWAR of 0.4, which barely would have touched the still-not-good 1.0 figure he posted in 2016 had he had a full gauntlet of innings.
Barring another major pitching acquisition (and there are still some good starters on the free agent market), the Mariners seem content to go into 2017 with Felix Hernandez as their third starter, behind James Paxton and Mike Leake (yeah).