Miami Marlins
Unfair Wildness
By: Steve Norris
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
I’m still not over it.
It was October 12th, 1997. The Atlanta Braves were in Miami, Florida for Game 5 of the National League Championship Series and looking to take a 3-2 series lead back to Atlanta with Greg Maddux on the mound.
Maddux had already lost Game 1 at home to Kevin Brown, so Atlanta needed their ace to get revenge on Brown.
However, just before the game, Brown was scratched due to illness and replaced with Livan Hernandez.
What followed is arguably the most controversial game in Braves history. The late Eric Gregg umpired that game and decided for some reason to widen his already wide strike zone, especially to left-handed batters.
This hurt the Braves far more as they had six left-handed batters to the Marlins three. Hernandez was the benefactor and outdueled Maddux 2-1, ending the game on a strikeout of Fred McGriff, where the third strike was at least a foot outside.
If you don’t believe me, do a search for it on YouTube. You’ll be shocked how awful that strike zone was that day.
The Braves would surrender the series to Brown at home two days later 7-4, in yet another first inning implosion by Glavine, while the Marlins would go on to upset the favored Cleveland Indians for the World Series title.
It was a devastating loss for Braves fans, especially after their World Series collapse to the Yankees the previous year.
The fact is, that loss to the Marlins should have never happened in the first place. The Marlins had no business being in the playoffs. They finished 9 games behind the Braves who had won 101 games during the regular season. But thanks to the silliness of the Wild Card, they not only got a chance to beat the Braves, but they were also able to earn the home field advantage by winning just one of the first two games in Atlanta in the NLCS.
Fast forward to last year’s playoffs and the same thing happened to the Braves against the Phillies, except this time it was worse. The hated Phillies finished 14 games…yes…FOURTEEN GAMES behind the Braves.
Yet, when they faced off in the National League Division Series, they were given the opportunity to win one game in Atlanta and immediately get home field advantage in a five-game series.
The Phillies would tee off on Braves ace Max Fried, who was pitching while suffering from the flu, and would win the game 7-6. The Braves would not recover and would go on to lose three games to one.
All of this after playing 162 games.
How does that make sense? Why would a team, who not only failed to win the division, but finished way out of first place, be given such an easy chance to get home field advantage?
Logic says they shouldn’t. In fact, it’s my opinion that it’s time to make the wild card teams work harder to win a playoff series.
Here’s my proposal for the baseball playoffs: Any time a wild card team is facing a division winner in a playoff series, the division winner should get three more home games than the wild card team.
For example, if a division winner is playing a wild card team in the National or American League Division Series, the division winner should get four home games to the wild card teams’ one.
If it’s the National or American League Championship Series, the division winner should get five home games to the wild card winners’ two. This would force the wild card team to have to win two away games no matter what. If they can do that, then they’ve earned the home field advantage.
As for the World Series, that can stay at four games to three no matter who ends up there as a wild card team would have earned their way there by then.
It’s time for Major League Baseball to make the regular season important again if they’re going to keep letting all these wild card teams in.
Unfortunately, it’s run by Rob Manfred, arguably the most incompetent commissioner in sports history, so I don’t see him getting a clue any time soon.
4-Peat?
By: Kipp Branch
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The NL East is the best overall division in Major League Baseball.
The Braves, Mets, and Nationals could all finish over .500 on the season. In 2019 the last full season before the pandemic four teams finished at .500 or better in this stacked division.
Let take a look at each team:
Miami Marlins: The Marlins made the playoffs in the pandemic shortened season of 2020, and eliminated the Chicago Cubs in the playoffs before the Braves ended their season.
This team has one of the top farm systems in baseball and just continues to produce talent.
Sixto Sanchez is one of the best young pitchers in baseball. Starling Marte is an All-Star and Gold Glove winner in the outfield and will be surrounded by all of that younger talent. This team will continue to improve.
Washington Nationals: The Nationals won the World Series in 201, and finished last in the division in 2020.
They still have Max Scherzer, Stephen Strasburg, and Patrick Corbin in this rotation, so they will be in just about every game.
Juan Soto is a superstar and they have Kyle Schwarber and Josh Bell potentially surrounding him in the line-up. How will this bullpen perform in 2021? That is the question surrounding this team.
Philadelphia Phillies: This team has spent a lot of money on free agents over the past couple of seasons but still floats around the .500 mark in the standings.
Bryce Harper is only 28 years old and will probably have a monster season and you have J.T. Realmuto and Didi Gregorius.
The core is there, but will this pitching staff hold up? Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler have to have great seasons for this team to contend.
NY Mets: The Mets have become the trendy pick by most everyone to win the NL East.
Can this team be consistent enough to win the division? That is a huge question mark in my mind.
Pete Alonzo will probably hit 40+ HR’s, and the Francisco Lindor trade was huge offensively and defensively.
Jacob deGrom, Carlos Carrasco, and Marcus Stroman will lead this pitching staff. This team has good pitching and will hit a lot of HR’s.
Something to watch down the stretch is can Noah Syndergaard return this summer from his Tommy John surgery? If he does and is effective then this could tilt the NL East in the Mets favor.
Atlanta Braves: We all know the Braves are one of the best teams in baseball. Freddie Freeman is the reigning MVP and Ronald Acuna Jr. is a young superstar.
The Braves resigned Marcell Ozuna. The Braves signed Charlie Morton and Drew Smyly to beef up the starting rotation.
How quickly can Mike Soroka regain form in 2021 after recovering from a ruptured Achilles tendon last season?
Can Kyle Wright be the starter the Braves envisioned when they drafted him?
The everyday line-up is the best in the division if the Braves play Cristian Pache in CF.
Who will grab the closer job?
My NL East Predictions:
Atlanta Braves: 93-69
NY Mets: 91-71
Washington Nationals: 88-74
Miami Marlins: 78-84
Philadelphia Phillies: 75-87
I see the Braves winning the NL East in the last weekend of the regular season.
The NL East Beast
By: Mike Anthony
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
Climbing the mountain to attain a division championship in Major League Baseball is tough. Maintaining superiority and defending a division title is even tougher.
But doing so while still trying to figure out a way to get to – and win – a World Series is as challenging as it gets.
That’s the problem facing the Atlanta Braves this winter.
The Braves surprised all of baseball by taking the NL East in 2018. Last season, Atlanta was a known power and excelled despite many more expectations placed on it to defend its division crown.
However, the postseason result remained the same as the Braves were bounced in the divisional series for a second straight year.
Heading into 2020, there is no doubt that the Braves will be a contender once again. The young guys who have emerged over the last couple of seasons are now entering their primes, while others like Freddie Freeman, Mike Foltynewicz and Nick Markakis are grizzled and reliable veterans playing at a high level.
Everything suggests that the Braves will be as good as ever and recent signings of Cole Hamels and Will Smith can only help. However, they might also find themselves in the day-to-day fire of competing in the best division in baseball.
Obviously, the elephant in the room is the Washington Nationals. The Nats couldn’t top the Braves in the regular season, but got the last laugh in winning the World Series.
The Nationals re-signing of Stephen Strasburg meant they would let All-Star third-baseman, Anthony Rendon walk, but Washington is more concerned with how healthy they can be.
The main reason for their second-place finish in the NL East last season was that it took two months for the team to get healthy. Once everyone was in place, the Nationals had the best record in all of baseball.
The New York Mets are in a similar spot. It seems as if the Mets have been terminally bitten by the injury bug as they have been underachieving and often short-handed for most of the last three seasons.
That said, New York still has an imposing starting rotation and could easily get into a division race if its bats can stay in the lineup all season.
Then there are the Philadelphia Phillies. The Phils won the 2018 offseason by signing Bryce Harper and Andrew McCutchen, while trading for J.T. Realmuto and Jean Segura.
However, injuries plagued McCutchen and Segura, while nearly the entire bullpen was lost due to various ailments.
Philadelphia continues to dole out money as it has already signed pitcher Zack Wheeler and shortstop Didi Gregorious.
Aside from the still-rebuilding Marlins, there is no reason for any of the other four teams in the division to expect anything less than a winning record and a serious run at the postseason.
If the division proves to be as competitive on the field as it appears on paper, the Braves figure to have a bit of an advantage in that their roster is stocked with guys who have thrived down the stretch in division races the last two seasons.
Then again, the Braves were also the healthiest of the top four division finishers last season and could face a very different situation if they are forced to battle through constant lineup changes.
With winter approaching, baseball may seem a long way off, but a big part of every championship season occurs in November and December when pieces are shifted around by squads in hopes of solving the World Series puzzle.
It’s been a long time since the Braves’ ridiculous run of 14 consecutive division championships and the ways of baseball have changed to where even truly great teams might only have a window of a few years in which they can compete for a World Series.
This is that moment for Atlanta and the front office is clearly going for it. Now it’s just a matter of seeing how things play out.
Beast Of The East
By: Kipp Branch
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The teams of the NL East have been busy this off season trying to get better quickly.
The National League East hasn’t been decided by fewer than seven games since 2012 and the division race hasn’t come down to the season’s final weekend since 2008.
The Atlanta Braves won the division in 2018 by 8 games and pulled away from the Phillies down the stretch.
How did the NL East teams get better this off-season?
Let’s take a look:
Atlanta Braves: GM Alex Anthopoulos went out and signed Josh Donaldson and Brian McCann. The Braves also brought back Nick Markakis. They have the youngest talent in the division, but need a number 1 starter, and closer help.
They won 90 games in 2018. It may be tough to match that win total in 2019. I think the Braves haven’t done enough to address starting pitching concerns this off-season. Will that hurt them? Probably and will have to be addressed at the trade deadline.
NY Mets: New general manager Brodie Van Wagenen has come in making moves.
Van Wagenen already has traded for perennial All-Star second baseman Robinson Canó and elite closer Edwin Díaz.
He also brought fellow late-inning reliever Jeurys Familia back to New York. Wilson Ramos was signed for $19M to come in and catch. Great move by Mets. The Mets have the best starting pitching in the division. Don’t be shocked if the Mets win this division. I like the moves they are making.
Philadelphia Phillies: The Phillies in their own words want to spend stupid money.
They signed Andrew McCutchen for three years and $50 million during the Winter Meetings and acquired shortstop Jean Segura from Seattle.
They traded for catcher JT Realmuto and think they will sign either Manny Machado or Bryce Harper. That could be scary in that hitter friendly ballpark in Philadelphia. The Phillies have been bold and aggressive during the winter and I think it will pay off this season.
Washington Nationals: The Nats brought in elite starter, Patrick Corbin, catchers Kurt Suzuki and Yan Gomes, and re-signed a big bat in Matt Adams.
The Nats need bullpen help and potentially an outfielder to replace Harper. I don’t think Washington did enough to offset the pending loss of Harper.
Miami Marlins: The Marlins at this point, only develop talent and trade it away. They are no immediate threat in the division. I don’t understand this organization. The Marlins can spot, draft, and develop talent as good as any club in baseball, but will not pay to keep it.
NL East Predictions:
- Phillies
- Braves
- Mets
- Nationals
- Marlins
Don’t be surprised if the NL East produces a Wild Card Team in 2019. This division is on the rise. I love the start of baseball season. Spring, warm weather, sand gnats, shorts, flip flops, and eventually the beach gear gets pulled out of the boxes.
Ronald Acuna Jr. is the best young player in baseball, and will win the NL MVP within the next three years.
The Miami Marlins Curse
By: TJ Hartnett
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The Miami Marlins have a short history of existence and long track record of winning championships and pissing off their fan base.
When former owner and Floridian supervillain Jeffrey Loria sold the team last year, baseball fans from across the globe wondered what kind of change this would bring to a team with 25 years of winning every single postseason series they’ve ever played in, along with never winning a single division title and constantly trading away their most popular players.
This is the team that wholesaled sold off their big guns after both World Series wins and the team that fired Joe Girardi the season he won Manager of the Year.
They have constantly developed superstars and then shipped them elsewhere. In 2012 the team built a new stadium and hired Ozzie Guillen to manage the team, which included freshly signed free agent superstars Jose Reyes, Mark Beuhrle, and Heath Bell.
Guillen was fired after one season and not one of those three players saw a second season in a Marlins uniform.
So, the team being sold was cause for celebration for the handful of Floridians who live and breathe Marlins.
After all, the team was chocked full of talent and maybe a new guiding hand would be able to supplement the likes of Giancarlo Stanton and Marcell Ozuna with players that would help Miami take a huge step forward.
Another wrinkle was that the group buying the team included Yankees legend Derek Jeter among its members. This was a true baseball guy, someone who knows how the game is played and what’s more, knows how to win. All in all, things were hopeful for the Miami faithful.
But the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Jeter and the ownership group moved quickly to do the same thing to the Marlins that the previous two owners did – strip it down for parts. Over the course of one week, just seven days, Miami traded away three of their most valuable assets.
Dee Gordon was the first to go, packing his bags for Seattle. Marcell Ozuna was part three, being traded to St. Louis exactly one week later.
Ozuna was just an extra kick in the ribs, as three days prior, reigning MVP Giancarlo Stanton was traded away. It should be noted that he was traded to the Yankees, because there is no justice in the world.
In the span of just seven days all the promise that the concept of new ownership had brought to the team sank into the familiar sense of utter betrayal that must by now feel like a warm hug to Marlins fans.
Rebuilding isn’t inherently an awful thing and it may not even be the wrong thing to do for Jeter but what a wrong foot to start out on for this new regime.
For a franchise that has repeatedly been torn down to be rebuilt and then torn down again, trading away some of the most talented players the team has ever seen as a first move will not instill trust between owners and fans. Stanton is probably the second greatest Marlin in their team’s short history behind Miguel Cabrera (who was traded), ahead of the likes of Gary Sheffield (who was traded), Josh Beckett (who was traded), and literally any other Marlins player was any good at all (who was traded).
He was incredibly popular and now he’s gone, along with Ozuna and Gordon and Christian Yelich isn’t going to be too far behind.
No one liked Jeffrey Loria. He didn’t have a good relationship with his players and they were usually happy to leave south Florida but Derek Jeter is a likeable guy.
Yet Christian Yelich’s agent claimed that the relationship between Yelich and the team was damaged beyond repair.
The Curse of the Bambino prevented the Red Sox from winning a World Series for 86 years.
The Curse of the Black Sox prevent the White Sox from winning a World Series for 88 years.
The Curse of the Billy Goat prevented the Cubs from even participating in a World Series for 71 years, extending their championship drought to 108 years.
The Marlins have won two World Series in the past 25 years but are they cursed to forever be a front office mess?
