Miami Marlins suddenly have a new ace in town

The Miami Marlins can make some changes to the rotation. Before the season started, I talked about this potentially happening and luckily it actually did! Max Meyer is becoming a new ace for The Fish. This has been great news especially as actual ace Sandy Alcantara has been struggling so far. Once he gets back into shape, him and Meyer will be an elite 1-2 punch at the top of the rotation.

Max Meyer has become an ace for the Miami Marlins.

There's little better than having a seemingly done top prospect living up to the hype. I remember when there was a lot of hype behind him and I even went to his debut game in the Majors back in 2022. The 2022 season wasn't great for Meyer, as he pitched to a 7.50 ERA/6.45 FIP with 9.0 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 in 2 games and 6.0 innings pitched.

Max Meyer missed the entire 2023 season, but wasn't exciting in his return last season unfortunately. That season, he pitched to a 5.68 ERA/5.90 FIP, with 7.3 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9 in 11 games and 57.0 innings pitched. At that point it sadly looked like as if he was done. It was clearly premature, but nothing that he did really hinted at a major breakthrough.

So far this season, Meyer pitched to a 2.63 ERA/3.41 FIP, with 10.1 K/9 and 2.6 BB/9 in 4 games and 24.0 innings pitched. The FIP does worry me a bit, but it's still very good. The 14 strikeout game on Monday was one of the greatest pitching performances in Miami Marlins history. I do sadly expect him to decline a bit going forward, but he's genuinely better than he was before.

I can see Meyer being one of the building blocks of the next Marlins playoff contending team. I suspect that next time I go to loanDepot Park for one of his starts, he's going to do much better than he did back in 2022. Having Sandy Alcantara shake off his rust will only make the team that much better, though Meyer may end up directly replacing him as the ace if he's traded.