Making the Marlins Even Worse
The Miami Marlins are NOT tanking, thank you very much. Derek Jeter and the front office may have traded away all their valuable assets for magic beans, but the current Marlins players are giving their all. It’s not their fault that they are woefully outclassed. Management is most assuredly tanking, but the uniformed personnel is not.
Despite their best efforts, these Marlins make last year’s 47-115 Orioles look like the 1992 Springfield Nuclear Power Plant Softball Team. As of this writing, the team is batting .218/.281/.307. For context, Alcides Escobar hit .231/.279/.313 last year, and he was the second worst qualified hitter in baseball (Chris Davis was the worst.) The entire Marlins team is hitting worse than Alcides Escobar! Tanking!
This begets the question of how bad they could be if they were actually trying to lose.
In the card game Hearts, the objective of the game is to get rid of any hearts-suited cards as well as the queen of spades. However, if you collect all the hearts as well as the queen of spades, this is actually the best possible hand. It’s called “shooting the moon,” but if you go for it and miss, you’re likely to lose. (Editor’s Note: We’re going to take Dan’s word on this.)
If for some reason, baseball wanted to become more like Hearts, the Marlins would be well positioned. Should MLB decide to give out a trophy to a team that fails to win 40 games, what could the Marlins do to bring home the hardware?
Bat Neil Walker in the #8 spot
The Marlins have used 17 position players this year, of which seven are below the Mendoza Line. They have exactly one above average batsman: Neil Walker. Playing first base, he’s slashing .294/.379/.431 with a commendable 127 wRC+. His slugging percentage is only 21st out of 33 first basemen with at least 120 plate appearances, but hey, he’s the best they’ve got!
Another not-so-fun fact about the Marlins is that they have zero intentional walks as a team. In other words, at no point has an opposing manager feared the eighth hitter sufficiently to pitch around him and get to the pitcher’s spot. (Editor’s Note: !)
By batting Walker, the Marlins’ only good hitter, in front of the pitcher, he can start collecting loads of free passes. In this way, the team can ensure they almost never have a dangerous hitter at bat in a key situation.
Make Caleb Smith a LOOGY
The biggest bright spot for the Marlins has been the emergence of Caleb Smith (Editor’s Note: Dr. K!) as an ace. His 2.25 ERA is sixth in the NL, and the his 2.94 FIP is 11th. He leads the league with a 35.2 percent strikeout rate, in part because a number of other proven top line starters have under-preformed so far this year.
While Smith has excelled, the bullpen lefties have been a disaster. Adam Conley, Wei-Yin Chen, and Jarlin García have surrendered 31 runs in 34 1/3 innings.
Clearly, the team needs a stabilizing presence who can face tough left-handed hitters late in a game. Smith is the only qualified candidate. Of course, this creates a massive hole in the rotation, but maybe Conley or Chen can start in his place.
Move Brian Anderson behind the plate
Brian Anderson has not followed up his breakout 2018 season very well. His wRC+ has dropped from 113 last year to 73 in 2019. However, his glove work at third base has been superb. He leads the Marlins with 3 DRS and is second to center fielder Lewis Brinson with 2.1 UZR.
Shouldn’t the best defender play the most important position? It’s only logical to make Anderson a catcher. Other than the pitcher, no player handles the ball more than the backstop. In this way, he’ll be involved in every pitch!
That’s it!
There really isn’t much else to do. Tanking is hard, but the Marlins front office is good at it. Sure, we could use crazy anti-logic defensive shifts, such as a four-man outfield with no first baseman, or load up the wrong side of the infield. Otherwise, the Marlins are pretty pathetic on their own. Too bad there’s no trophy for that.
