THE FRONT ROW WITH JASON ELLIOTT: July 2, 2014

I get that the baseball season is a long one.

But being a Seattle Mariner fan right now is like being on a roller coaster at Silverwood Theme Park.

First they're up, then plummeting down, then starting a slow climb toward the top.

THE MOST amazing thing of the season is that, for the most part, Seattle hasn't had its projected starting rotation of Felix Hernandez, Hisashi Iwakuma, Taijuan Walker, James Paxton and Chris Young together for a full time through yet.

Walker had been out with a shoulder injury until returning Monday night to help pitch the Mariners to a win at Houston. Paxton made two starts before an injury derailed the start of his first full season in the majors.

Even Iwakuma, who was coming off an All-Star season where he led the team in ERA, didn't start the season with the team after a thumb injury slowed his start out of the gate.

Hernandez has been everything that he's paid to be so far. Both Young and newcomer Roenis Elias have pitched well enough to keep them in the hunt for now.

Felix meanwhile, has been tough to hit, with a a one-hitter on Sunday against Cleveland, and has some other dominant performances thrown in along the way.

Which is a good thing since the offense has been challenged to say the least.

Corey Hart was brought in to provide some power, but has been injured, limiting what he's been able to do.

The biggest free-agent splash the team made during the offseason was acquiring Robinson Cano for the next eight years.

It was only recently that he started becoming the power source that he's expected to be, hitting home runs in back-to-back games for the first time this season on Sunday and Monday.

IF THE playoffs began Tuesday, Seattle's 45 wins are enough to claim one of two wild-card spots in the American League.

Entering Tuesday, Seattle was still six games behind first-place Oakland, which has the best record in baseball with a 51-31 mark.

Not bad, but the Mariners will need to do a little more.

It wasn't so long ago, 19 years to be exact, when the Mariners finally arrived on the baseball map by "Refusing to Lose" and bouncing back to finish the 1995 season with a memorable run to the American League Championship Series.

The team is light years away from that now, but you can't help but wonder if that kind of approach that will finally get these guys over that final hurdle to the playoffs.

There's still three months left in the season, so there's no need to sprint to the finish line.

It might help if they don't fall too far off the lead dog either.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d'Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter at JEPressSports.