In terms of judicial confirmations, you say what he's doing is just a "basic function of a majority leader", but it is a lot more than that. He's ramming judges through at a record pace, and he's able to do that because he had the guts to do three things no prior Majority Leader in either party did:
1) He ended the filibustering of Supreme Court nominees. Without that, we don't get Kavanaugh.
2) He ended the very long-standing practice of "blue-slipping" which gave Senators a veto power over nominations in their state. Blue slipping in the reason the 9th Circuit has been so out of step with the rest of the country. McConnell's decision to overturn that practice has had a hugely positive effect on confirmations, and on the 9th circuit in particular.
3) Shorten the amount of debate permitted for confirmations. That again enables him to ram through picks at the highest rate in recent history.
Senate votes are notoriously difficult to whip, and always have been because of the egos of individual Senators. He had the ObamaCare votes lined up until McCain betrayed the rest of the GOP.
Harry Reid had no issues whipping votes for Obama. Why is that? Although, I suppose it does help when 10 Republicans are voting to confirm dirtbags like Brennan.