Marlins Take Series From Mets with 7-3 Victory, Ichiro Hits 3-Run HR

[Namaste]

20K of those were me

[HUGG]

Defensive Runs Saved, Team
1. Kansas City 28 (LOL)
2. Miami 11
2. Arizona 11
4. St. Louis 9
4. Toronto 9

[Nick]

Holy Shit KC, that doesn't even seem possible.

[Jay]

Even though they're winning games, I still feel this isn't a good enough team to compete. The pitching ranks in the lower half of the league (and the majors) in basically every metric except babip (lowest in the NL) so it's likely going to get worse before better. The hitting isn't that much better performing pretty much middle of the pack except for power and it's also likely to get worse (highest babip in the NL).

[Madman81]

Even though their winning games, I still feel this isn't a good enough team to compete. The pitching ranks in the lower half of the league (and the majors) in basically every metric except babip (lowest in the NL) so it's likely going to get worse before better. The hitting isn't that much better performing pretty much middle of the pack except for power and it's also likely to get worse (highest babip in the NL).

i would suggest that you take an intro level english class

[Jay]

i would suggest that you take an intro level english class

Sorry I don't proofread posts or worry about my writing on message boards. My comment was a suggestion as he'd learn some valuable information. This comment poorly informed of higher education if you think intro english courses actually teach students much of anything.

[Valid]

Even though they're winning games, I still feel this isn't a good enough team to compete. The pitching ranks in the lower half of the league (and the majors) in basically every metric except babip (lowest in the NL) so it's likely going to get worse before better. The hitting isn't that much better performing pretty much middle of the pack except for power and it's also likely to get worse (highest babip in the NL).

It's also April 30. Don't you think we should wait a little while and see how Fernandez and Alvarez are before determining whether or not this team is good enough to compete? The sample sizes aren't nearly large enough yet to come to such a conclusion.

I mean, we had people calling this team a "disaster" one week into the season.

[Madman81]

Sorry I don't proofread posts or worry about my writing on message boards. My comment was a suggestion as he'd learn some valuable information. This comment poorly informed of higher education if you think intro english courses actually teach students much of anything.

a simple grammatical mistake is almost always an indication of a lack of intelligence and/or education

[Jay]

a simple grammatical mistake is almost always an indication of a lack of intelligence and/or education

Actually it's not. Understanding grammar is not a prerequisite of intelligence or education. Not to mention intelligence is an extremely complex construct with many factors so grammar maybe part of one of those factors but there are many others and just because a person is lacking in one factor does not make them unintelligent. Education also comes in many varieties and ranges subjects. The only thing a simple grammatical mistake shows is that a person did not care or had bad instruction at elementary levels of education. Higher education doesn't and isn't supposed to focus on teaching students simple grammatical issues; it's supposed to teach them how to think.

[Jay]

It's also April 30. Don't you think we should wait a little while and see how Fernandez and Alvarez are before determining whether or not this team is good enough to compete? The sample sizes aren't nearly large enough yet to come to such a conclusion.

I mean, we had people calling this team a "disaster" one week into the season.

I haven't heard a timeline on Alvarez which just doesn't sound good. Fernandez is still 2 months away. This means the current roster is going to play a substantial number of games before either of those two can actually make an impact on results.

This isn't a small sample size issue like looking at an individual player is at this point in the season. It's 193 innings pitched and 814 plate appearances. You could argue that all players are playing poorly at the same time but it's not the case. Some are playing bad whereas some are playing good and since we're looking at averages of their results it balances out. We could look at this really closely and examine the difference between the expected performance and current performance but i doubt that going with this micro approach would show different results than the macro view.

[Nick]

We have the 3rd most runs scored in the National League and our 2nd best hitter was ineffective for the first half of the month due to injury and then in the 2nd half didn't play due to injury. Dee Gordon and Hech are playing way over their heads, but Mike Morse and Ozuna are playing beneath their ability. This team is going to hit, and it's going to keep us near .500, the rotation needs to hold the fort down. Can they, we'll see. I think the outlook for most people here has been stay in the race until Jose comes back, see what he gives us, maybe he pushes us into being a playoff team, and I'd say from what I've seen we're still on track for that.

[BigGameFish]

Good point there about staying in the race until Jose is back. A month in, I don't think anyone would say that isn't possible. Of course the hitters will fluctuate up and down, as you say, but it's clear that our lineup is stacked with quality hitters from top to bottom, and that's not even including arguably our second-best all around batter in Yelich.

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But I'm very concerned about the ability and health of our rotation and rotational depth. That looks to be the potential Achilles heel of this team as it is currently constituted.

[Jay]

We have the 3rd most runs scored in the National League and our 2nd best hitter was ineffective for the first half of the month due to injury and then in the 2nd half didn't play due to injury. Dee Gordon and Hech are playing way over their heads, but Mike Morse and Ozuna are playing beneath their ability. This team is going to hit, and it's going to keep us near .500, the rotation needs to hold the fort down. Can they, we'll see. I think the outlook for most people here has been stay in the race until Jose comes back, see what he gives us, maybe he pushes us into being a playoff team, and I'd say from what I've seen we're still on track for that.

Yeah doing well in runs scored is great and it's obviously why they're winning games but all the other stats will predict runs scored. The difference between Morse/Ozuna and Hech/Gordon is power and the Marlinsare currently 27th in the majors in iso so it's still middle of the league team.

The other thing is besides guys returning from injuries, the club doesn't have the ability to add an impact player.

[Bobbob1313]

Whether you think the offense will be fine comes down to whether you believe in Morse and Ozuna's abilities to fix their issues before Hech and Gordon regress.

I think I believe in that. They'll be fine.

[Erick]

To be fair, you don't necessarily have to have a good team to make the playoffs these days. The second wild card sort of further rewards mediocrity. I just hope the team can stay within striking distance until Alvarez and Jose comeback. With those two healthy, I think this is a pretty good team.

Another thing not being taken into account when considering April production is that it wasn't just Morse/Ozuna who struggled. Yelich is hurt and provided very little when healthy. He's better than he's performed. We also have a better catcher now than we did to start the year.