Is Ichiro getting short-shrift for record?

It's like the sun going up in the morning and breathing in oxygen.

Ichiro Suzuki is going to get hits for the Seattle Mariners. And maybe we're not paying enough attention to how incredible Ichiro has played for the past nine seasons.

Ichiro has put together his ninth consecutive 200-hit season, a major-league record. More than 100 years ago, Wee Willie Keeler had 200 hits or more for eight seasons in a row from 1894-1901.

Put in perspective, only seven players active today have had more than one 200-hit season. Pete Rose has the record with 10. Ichiro, who has only played in the majors since 2001, is just one behind. He's had 200 hits in every single season he's been in the majors, from 242 as a rookie MVP to an incredible 262 in 2004.

Ichiro also has 2,000 hits already in less than nine seasons. At his current pace, he'd have 3,000 hits in 2014, when he turns 40, in his 13th season. He's roughly 700 hits behind Derek Jeter all-time, and Jeter had a six-year head start. Jeter has had six 200-hit seasons, and is on pace for a seventh.

A Seattle Times story wondered why we're not noticing Ichiro's record (while we're all wrapped up in Jeter's career hits record with the Yankees). Some suggest it's a form of racism against a foreign-born player. I don't buy that, but I do buy that it's because Ichiro has had a ton of hits when much of the country is sleeping, and because the Mariners haven't been relevant in pennant races in the past few years. And ESPN's Rob Neyer correctly points out that Keeler's record was even a little obscure to hard-core baseball fans.

Ichiro will be a first-ballot Hall of Famer when he retires. He's admired here, and revered in Japan. He's a pioneer, likely the greatest Japanese hitter ever, and he did it in the major leagues. Perhaps we need to recognize it more.