The Marlins have been playing very well as of late, as they are winners of seven of their last ten ballgames. If the Marlins can win tonight, they will be back at .500 for the first time since June 18th, when the Marlins fell to the Tampa Bay Rays to drop their record to 33-33.

In care you were wondering, last year, at this time, the Marlins were sitting at 40-48. This years Marlins team is just a little bit better.

July 6, 2012; St. Louis, MO. USA; Miami Marlins right fielder Giancarlo Stanton (27) poses with his National League All Star Game jersey before a game against the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium. The Marlins won 3-2. (Image: Jeff Curry-US PRESSWIRE)

Busch Stadium

Five-year Run PF*: 0.99
Five-year HR PF*: 0.92
Stadium Dimensions:
Left field line—330 ft.
Left-center field—372 ft.
Center field—402 ft.
Right-center field—375 ft.
Right field line—330 ft.

*Five-year regressed park factors provided by Patriot here

(more…)

The first two games of the series against the St. Louis Cardinals were a microcosm of the Marlins struggles in the month of June. Monday night, the Marlins blew a four-run lead in the ninth inning and ended up losing the game in the tenth inning, blowing an opportunity to win the game in the bottom half of the ninth. On Tuesday, the Carlos Zambrano got beat up in the first inning, allowing five unearned runs, and never got back into the ballgame, losing that game 5-2.

Wednesday night, the Marlins were finally able to fight back against the month of June and pull out a victory.

Heath Bell and catcher John Buck celebrate the Marlins big win over the Cards. (Image: Steve Mitchell-US PRESSWIRE)

Source: FanGraphs

The game did not quite start the way the Marlins would have wanted it to start. Anibal Sanchez, starting for the Marlins, came into the game with an ERA/FIP of 8.09/5.43 for the month of June. In the first inning, it looked like it would be more of these same struggles that Anibal had suffered through this month.

After walking the second batter of the game, John Jay, Matt Holliday doubled to deep right to set-up a second and third situation with Carlos Beltran at the plate. Beltran was able to score Jay on a sacrifice fly, which was followed up by a run-scoring double for David Freese. Matt Carpenter then scorched a single to Giancarlo Stanton, who was able to gather the ball and easily throw out Freese at home plate for the final out of the inning. Stanton bailed out Anibal big time, and Anibal’s night would improve from there, as he was able to retire 9 straight hitters after the out at home.

After coming up with a big hit for the Cardinals in their win on Monday, Joe Kelly was on the mound for the Cardinals. For the most part, Kelly was able to control the Marlins hitters through the first four innings, scattering three base hits.

In the fifth inning, the Marlins offense made a comeback. After Omar Infante and Gaby Sanchez each walked to lead off the inning, John Buck was able to single up the middle and cut the lead in half. After an Anibal Sanchez sacrifice bunt to move the runners to second and third, Jose Reyes grounded out to tie the ballgame at two a piece.

The action was limited until the seventh inning, when Tony Cruz, who was starting for the Marlins killer this series, Yadier Molina, blasted the first pitch he saw from Anibal to start the inning out of the park to put the Cards back on top.

The Marlins would quickly respond with a John Buck one out homer in the bottom half of the seventh. Logan Morrison, who was brought into pinch hit, followed Buck with his own home run. The home run was ruled a home run, then the first base umpire ruled it as a double, after a look at instant replay, the call was overturned and LoMo had given the Marlins a 4-3 lead.

Miami Marlins left fielder Logan Morrison rounds the bases after hitting a solo home run during the seventh inning against the St. Louis Cardinals at Marlins Park. (Image: Steve Mitchell-US PRESSWIRE)

Steve Cishek came on in relief of Anibal Sanchez and gave the Marlins a quick, 1-2-3 inning. The Marlins were able to tack on a run on an Omar Infante double to stretch their lead to 5-3. Heath Bell was brought out to close the game.

After a lead off single by Carpenter, Bell was able to retire the following three hitters to close out the game, but that did not mean that the save did not come without any scares. Yadier Molina, pinch hitting for the pitcher, tabbed a ball back to Bell, who fired the ball to second base. Jose Reyes was late covering second base and the ball got by him, luckily for the Marlins, Infante was there and was able to scoop the ball up and throw Molina out. Bell then got Allen Craig to fly out to end the game.

The Marlins win 5-3, behind a strong start by Anibal Sanchez. Sanchez lasted seven innings, allowing seven hits, striking out four, and walking just two. It was his best start of the month of June and the first time he went seven innings since May 29th against the Washington Nationals.

The Marlins bounced back in a big way tonight and earned a very important win for the ball club.  Hopefully with this win, the Marlins can build some momentum and start a winning streak. The Marlins will next host the last team they beat in a series to start the month of June, the Philadelphia Phillies.

June 25, 2012; Miami, FL, USA; Miami Marlins catcher

Once again, the Marlins found a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.  Ricky Nolasco delivered a strong performance last night, with only four hits and one unearned run over 6 2/3 innings of work. Randy Choate and Edward Mujica came in and delivered a walk each before finishing the seventh inning.  Steve Cishek gave up a run in the eighth, which brought Mike Dunn to the mound for the remainder of the inning.  The fun really started with Heath Bell’s ninth-inning appearance. A leadoff walk to Rafael Furcal, followed by a double and a single brought Yadier Molina to the plate.  A fastball left up in the zone got sent over the left field wall, tying the game.

In the bottom of the ninth, Jose Reyes led off with a strikeout. Hanley Ramirez singled to center field, followed by a Giancarlo Stanton walk.  With one out and the winning run in scoring position, Gaby Sanchez grounded into a double play to end the inning.

In the tenth inning, Tyler Greene singled to left field. With the winning run at first and one out, instead of grounding into a double play, Rafael Furcal hit a hard double the opposite way down the left-field line, allowing Greene to score. Chad Gaudin tallied the second out on a soft grounder from Shane Robinson.  Matt Holliday reached first base after being grazed on the forearm on an inside pitch.  Because of a double-switch screwup by Cardinals manager Mike Matheney, the next batter was Carlos Beltran, followed by pinch-hitter Joe Kelly.  Joe Kelly is a opitcher not scheduled to appear until tonight, and had not yet logged a major-league base hit in his career.  Beltran drew an intentional walk that loaded the bases, and last night was the night young Mr. Kelly tallied that first base hit, driving Furcal across the plate.

The Marlins did a number of things right last night, and certainly looked like they were on track to follow up their 9-0 shutout of the Blue Jays with another strong win against the powerhouse offense of the Cardinals. A blown save by Heath Bell, a 2-error play by Hanley Ramirez, Gaby Sanchez grounding into a double play in a clutch situation, and a bobble and a bad throw by Jose Reyes turned the game into one of the most frustrating games of the season.

Fans, June is not over for the Marlins yet. Tonight, Carlos Zambrano faces Kyle Lohse, and I suspect the demoralizing effect of last night’s game will be harder to shake off, and that the Cardinal bats will give Big Z some trouble.

- After coming off a nice sweep of the Padres and a day off during Comic-con (wish I was there for all the nerdiness), the Marlins finish their western roadie with three against the Los Angeles Dodgers, starting tonight. On the mound the Fish will send ace Josh Johnson while the Dodgers counter with promising young lefty Clayton Kershaw. If there’s one knock right now on Kershaw, it’s that he has a hard time throwing strikes and will walk you. Unfortunately for us, we don’t really know how to take walks, so I wouldn’t be surprised if that turned out a wash. Still, we have JJ, we’ve got hope.

- The Miami Herald has an article on how Hanley Ramirez might get in the way of Albert Pujols’ Triple Crown. The Triple Crown is indeed a rare feat, but it’s measuring two bad statistics. Personally, I’d rather see Pujols lead the league in slash line stats; at least with that, we only get one useless statistic. And well, sure enough, Pujols leads the league in OBP and SLG, and is obviosuly behind Hanley in batting average. Pujols also leads the league in wOBA by a good 30 points. By the way, guess who’s second worst in wOBA among qualified players? Ahead of only Willy Taveras is this handsome, young fellow. At least my girlfriend called him kind of handsome. I prefer my baseball players “effective.”

- Joe Frisaro over at MLB.com has a nice piece on what might have been for Cody Ross in Dodger Blue. It was interesting to see that Ross got along with now-Phillies All-Star outfielders Shane Victorino and Jayson Werth. It feels like a long time ago that we picked up Ross, and now he’s an above average starting center fielder in the league and has his own chant. Good results for a good guy.

- It looks like Scott Olsen is out for the year with an elbow injury. It’s hard to see that happen to a former Marlin prospect and friend of the team. He’s not always been easy to deal with on and off the field, but I still wish him luck recovering.

- I missed this a few days back, but here’s David Pinto of Baseball Musings reviewing the Marlins’ first half. I have to admit, it wasn’t the cleanest David Pinto post I’ve ever seen, but it was a part of a “Thirty teams in three+ dayus” series, so I can’t blame him too much. Also, he didn’t really go over the fact that the rotation has been pretty good peripherally and is due some regression to the mean. Not a bad quickie synopsis though.

- In other news, the Matt Holliday to St. Louis deal is official, and Erik Manning of Beyond the Box Score has got the trade value details. The big prospect name in all of that was Brett Wallace, a.k.a. “The Walrus” due to his (ahem) girth. Despite his size and resulting lack of defensive acumen, he’s considered the best hitter of the 2008 draft and has already made Triple-A this season. Going along with him are two other prospects that, as a Marlins fan and not a prospect follower, I know very little about. Erik fills in the details and gives you the not-so-final verdict.

The Not-So-Final Analysis: Matt Holliday’s value to the Cardinals is worth a total of like $13.5 million when you figure his salary, wins added and increased playoff odds. The A’s get a top 50 hitter, a B grade pitcher and a 22-year old C grade hitter, which totals around $28 million. Oakland comes out way ahead here. For St. Louis, this is one heck of an expensive 2-month rental.

Just when folks think Beane has lost his touch, he goes back to the team he stole Dan Haren from, which resulted in more trades. It’s a vicious cycle for Cardinal fans, who may be watching history repeat itself. The trade only looks good for Cardinal fans if it results in a flag, but as I said earlier, that’s no slam dunk. If they can extend Holliday to an a decent deal, then it looks better, but with Scott Boras, that also is no slam dunk. Lots of wild cards for the Cardinals. Beane looks to have raided St. Louis again.

The dollar values say “steal,” but I don’t know that the Cards won’t have a shot at re-upping Holliday. Now that he’s moving back to the NL and to a nicer hitter’s park than that cavern in Oakland, he should be in his comfort zone, and beating ZiPS projections the rest of the year wouldn’t surprise me. Holliday’s still a damn good player. Let’s hope it pans out for Oakland.

- Finally, blatantly promoting my own stuff (that’s the job of my blog!), yesterday on BtB I put up an interesting WAR chart comparison between professional hitter and longtime Mariners DH Edgar Martinez and a Hall of Famer who put much of his worth from the fielding side of the run equation. Check out the graphs and see if you can guess who it is. As always, Rally’s historical WAR database was used for the data.

- EDIT: Of course (I can’t believe I forgot!), I’d be remiss if I didn’t congratulate Mark Buehrle on his perfect game against the Rays yesterday. A pretty impressive feat, and now he has two no-hitters in his career. Congrats again, and congrats to Dewayne Wise for that ridiculous catch to preserve it in the ninth. Buehrle should get him a nice car.