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and yes, Chris Coghlan's name is spelled wrong
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/07/0...-put-past.html
Gaby Sanchez had barely looked up from playing Hanging With Friends on his cellphone Wednesday afternoon when he quickly answered a question he has clearly heard countless times during the past several weeks.
Any explanation whatsoever for how his Marlins team can go from 10 games above .500 to 10 games below in one horrific, wrong-side-of-history month of June?
“No.”
Not even a theory?
“No. No.”
Brief. Defiant. Firm.
From a player’s perspective, there’s little to gain in coming up with theories, anyway. The idea is to get past the failure, not sulk in it, so overanalyzing a season-tarnishing slide to the basement can be counterproductive.
But from the outside looking in — for those who want to know with some level of certainty that this core group can open a new stadium and succeed in it — there’s ample motive to dissect the sudden drop-off.
Without an explanation, it’s impossible to tell which part was the fluke, the Marlins’ 39-29 start to the season that had them two games behind these juggernaut Phillies or the 9-29 stretch that sent the Fish barreling to the bottom of the NL East standings.
LEARNING CURVE
The most reasonable explanation — at least for those who believe the main components on this team are legitimately good players — is also one of the most agonizing to live with because the only solution is patience.
This Marlins lineup is too young and inexperienced in too many key spots to have maintained that early level of play for an entire season. To have done so would have meant defying the odds.
Of course, it has not helped that Josh Johnson has been out with a shoulder injury and Hanley Ramirez only recently has come close to resembling his normal self. But the loss of one starting pitcher and the lack of production from one position player isn’t nearly enough to immediately transform a team from playoff contender to cellar dwellers.
That has more to do with the fact that Logan Morrison, Gaby Sanchez, Mike Stanton and Chris Coughlan, before he was placed on the disabled list, were being asked to carry much of the load for a team that, 50 games in, had the look of legitimacy.
Once the losses started mounting in June, starting with four consecutive one-run defeats, there was a different look about these young stars in the making. There was a combination of frustration and confusion. They were being called on to find answers to a never-before-seen slump, and their mental database didn’t have any similar experiences from which to draw.
So the only answer was to try harder, and the result was a team playing out of character.
The team tried to reply with a new hitting coach, minor personnel changes and desperate lineup changes. But nothing worked until the hot start was just a distant memory.
In retrospect, catcher John Buck said everyone was pressing unnecessarily.
“I think, as a whole, we all tried too hard,” he said, predictably defending his less-experienced teammates. “So I don’t believe it’s so much the young guys.”
But it was those young guys who felt the brunt of the burden. They were the ones hitting at the top or in the heart of the order, and they were the ones who collectively played a huge role in the season’s successful start.
Losing can swallow younger players when the games come this fast and never stop. And avoiding these kinds of collapses require short memories and quick rebounds.
Greg Dobbs, 33, a veteran with a World Series ring from his days in Philadelphia, calls that “a learned behavior.”
But if this Marlins core has not been around long enough, then perhaps it’s a behavior none of them have learned. Hence the horrendous June.
“We know we’re more than capable,” Dobbs said. “It’s not like we were pressing and trying to be 10 games over. We were just playing the game.”
And that’s why there’s still reason for optimism. That’s why it’s fair to call the past five weeks a fluke and the first eight a more truthful sample.
Because the out-of-character performances have come in the collapse.
HISTORY AS A GUIDE
Just like the young core of Derrek Lee, Luis Castillo, Alex Gonzalez and Mike Lowell were promising in the late 1990s, this group is now. It took that unit, save for maybe Lowell who was fairly consistent from the start, a few years to flourish, and they eventually were the brilliant infield that won a 2003 World Series.
Buck knows the difference between young players getting a taste of the big leagues and young players who will be forces in this league for years to come.
While in Kansas City, Buck said the team had multiple minor-league players on the big-league field every night.
Such is not the case with these Marlins.
“Regardless of our age, we have guys that are ready to be here,” he said. “I think we’ve underachieved, I think we all feel that. I believe in this team.”
As for Sanchez, he remained just as defiant, just as firm and nearly as brief when talking about this team’s future as he did when addressing its struggles.
“I still feel like we’re pretty damn good,” he said.
If that’s the case, which judging with the naked eye appears a reasonable assessment, then the Marlins can consider these recent struggles to be more of teacher and less of an indicator of things to come.
“Learn from it,” Buck said. “Take responsibility for what happened.
“I think we’re too good.”
Any explanation whatsoever for how his Marlins team can go from 10 games above .500 to 10 games below in one horrific, wrong-side-of-history month of June?
“No.”
Not even a theory?
“No. No.”
Brief. Defiant. Firm.
From a player’s perspective, there’s little to gain in coming up with theories, anyway. The idea is to get past the failure, not sulk in it, so overanalyzing a season-tarnishing slide to the basement can be counterproductive.
But from the outside looking in — for those who want to know with some level of certainty that this core group can open a new stadium and succeed in it — there’s ample motive to dissect the sudden drop-off.
Without an explanation, it’s impossible to tell which part was the fluke, the Marlins’ 39-29 start to the season that had them two games behind these juggernaut Phillies or the 9-29 stretch that sent the Fish barreling to the bottom of the NL East standings.
LEARNING CURVE
The most reasonable explanation — at least for those who believe the main components on this team are legitimately good players — is also one of the most agonizing to live with because the only solution is patience.
This Marlins lineup is too young and inexperienced in too many key spots to have maintained that early level of play for an entire season. To have done so would have meant defying the odds.
Of course, it has not helped that Josh Johnson has been out with a shoulder injury and Hanley Ramirez only recently has come close to resembling his normal self. But the loss of one starting pitcher and the lack of production from one position player isn’t nearly enough to immediately transform a team from playoff contender to cellar dwellers.
That has more to do with the fact that Logan Morrison, Gaby Sanchez, Mike Stanton and Chris Coughlan, before he was placed on the disabled list, were being asked to carry much of the load for a team that, 50 games in, had the look of legitimacy.
Once the losses started mounting in June, starting with four consecutive one-run defeats, there was a different look about these young stars in the making. There was a combination of frustration and confusion. They were being called on to find answers to a never-before-seen slump, and their mental database didn’t have any similar experiences from which to draw.
So the only answer was to try harder, and the result was a team playing out of character.
The team tried to reply with a new hitting coach, minor personnel changes and desperate lineup changes. But nothing worked until the hot start was just a distant memory.
In retrospect, catcher John Buck said everyone was pressing unnecessarily.
“I think, as a whole, we all tried too hard,” he said, predictably defending his less-experienced teammates. “So I don’t believe it’s so much the young guys.”
But it was those young guys who felt the brunt of the burden. They were the ones hitting at the top or in the heart of the order, and they were the ones who collectively played a huge role in the season’s successful start.
Losing can swallow younger players when the games come this fast and never stop. And avoiding these kinds of collapses require short memories and quick rebounds.
Greg Dobbs, 33, a veteran with a World Series ring from his days in Philadelphia, calls that “a learned behavior.”
But if this Marlins core has not been around long enough, then perhaps it’s a behavior none of them have learned. Hence the horrendous June.
“We know we’re more than capable,” Dobbs said. “It’s not like we were pressing and trying to be 10 games over. We were just playing the game.”
And that’s why there’s still reason for optimism. That’s why it’s fair to call the past five weeks a fluke and the first eight a more truthful sample.
Because the out-of-character performances have come in the collapse.
HISTORY AS A GUIDE
Just like the young core of Derrek Lee, Luis Castillo, Alex Gonzalez and Mike Lowell were promising in the late 1990s, this group is now. It took that unit, save for maybe Lowell who was fairly consistent from the start, a few years to flourish, and they eventually were the brilliant infield that won a 2003 World Series.
Buck knows the difference between young players getting a taste of the big leagues and young players who will be forces in this league for years to come.
While in Kansas City, Buck said the team had multiple minor-league players on the big-league field every night.
Such is not the case with these Marlins.
“Regardless of our age, we have guys that are ready to be here,” he said. “I think we’ve underachieved, I think we all feel that. I believe in this team.”
As for Sanchez, he remained just as defiant, just as firm and nearly as brief when talking about this team’s future as he did when addressing its struggles.
“I still feel like we’re pretty damn good,” he said.
If that’s the case, which judging with the naked eye appears a reasonable assessment, then the Marlins can consider these recent struggles to be more of teacher and less of an indicator of things to come.
“Learn from it,” Buck said. “Take responsibility for what happened.
“I think we’re too good.”
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