Yes, the hottest team in baseball of late is the team you've never heard of: the Florida Marlins! They just completed a sweep of the Blue Jays, have won 8 in a row, and 18 of 24. The roster is filled with rookies who are starting to perform under the watchful eye of cutie Joe Gerardi. It's a fun team to watch.
Even when they were losing early in the season, they were in every game. Dontrelle has started to settle down after a rough start to the season, and Cabrera is having a typical year for him (.346), and youngsters Uggla, Ramirez, and Willingham have all had big hits lately.
The city of Hialeah is still working on funding for a ballpark NW of Miami that would keep the team here, now that San Antonio is out of the picture...we'll see how successful they are...

9 in a row now!!!

3rd Place now, and just a hair behind Philadelphia for 2nd!! Who would've thunk it? That Joe Gerardi is a great manager in addition to being a little hunk-a-muffin!

Imagine what this team could have done last year if he had been the manager....

I live in Fort Lauderdale, and was fortunate to have attended all three home games during our 2003 World Championship season, so it was very sad to see most of the players who were an integral part of that championship season sent packing during the recent off-season. I think the team should be re-named the "Phoenix", because they always seem to rise from the ashes of their fire sales to win championships.

If history repeats itself, we will be planning another championship parade next year for the Pheonix...uh, I meant Marlins:-)

Can you imagine how good the team might have been last year with Gerardi as the manager??

I've been pleasantly surprised with this ballclub. It takes some of the sting away from the offseason dismantling. But I'm still keeping them at arm's length. I just don't want to get attached to a team and then have to watch as they move to another city. They get that stadium issue resolved, I'll come back. Until then, I'll just catch games on TV and read about them in the newspaper.

That said, and political issues aside, the most surprising thing about this team has been its offense. Other than Miguel Cabrera, they had nobody in the lineup who was a legitimate threat. But players like Olivo and Jacobs and Willingham have really put together pretty good years so far. The pitching was not as bad as many made it out to be. Several of the starters actually started games last year. They're mostly unknown, but they were further along than the bats. As for the defense, well that's been suspect at times...but it's getting better. And the kid Alfredo Amezaga has actually contributed quite a bit.

At this point Joe Girardi must be mentioned as a Manager of the Year candidate. And you're right...he's hot!

Uggla is my latest heartthrob. What a cute boy! And so many other cute boys on the team! I watch them often simply due to the hotness factor.

eek! eek! eek!

And just when people start to notice...boom, they lose 5 out of 6. Such is the life of a rebuilding team. Before the year started, I thought if they come out and win between 75-80 games, the year would be a success. I'll stand by that. They're 35-45 after today's loss. Still not bad after a 11-31 start.

I guess Sanchez no hitter justifies reviving this thread...

I don't know if the Marlins will make it to the play off but just the fact that at this point it is even a posibility it's quite impressive

The lowest payroll, the most rookies, 13 wins out of the last 17 games, the only team in history to go from 20 games under 500 to over 500 and now the first no hitter in 2 yrs.

what an accomplishment, what a team, what a manager Joe Girardi turned out to be; getting ordinary players to do extraordinary things..

Sanchez owned the DBacks last night. Amazing pitching performance. I didn't realize that since 93 the Marlins have the same number of no-hitters as the Yankees. An amazing year! But it looks like a foregone conclusion that Gerardi will be gone after this year, which sucks on a couple of levels: One, that he's not managing this team, and two, that he will probably be managing the scrubs.

So South Florida will be treated to a few years of good baseball, maybe another WS trophy. Then we can truly "break up the marlins" *rim shot*

Amazing that the Marlins have had four no-hitters in their history. It's too bad that only approximately 6000 people were in attendance last night--in highlights it looked like there were more people on the field than in the stands! But let's not put too much on the rookie Anibal Sanchez. Let's keep Bud Smith in mind. wink

~Adam

Four no hitters in their fourteen seasons....while the Mets and Padres(combined 83 seasons) are still waiting for one.

Speaking of the Mets, the Fish POUNDED them last night 16-5, as Cody Ross went deep three times and collected 7 RBIs. Uggla picked up 5 hits, and Cabrera now leads the NL in batting average. The Marlins are just 2 behind the Padres for the Wild Card, and have gone up on the Phillies....


Who woulda thunk it?

Imagine what they could so each year if they could keep the consessions money and advertising money from the stadium. That is why they are constanting breaking the team up and bringing in rookies (cheap rookies)... I do not know if they will ever get a stadium... Miami did not build the stadium for the Dolphins either, their former owner Joe Robbie built it.

I think Uggla is a cute ballplayer. What's your fav on the Marlins? Also, the Marlins might mess up and wind up being the wild card if they win about 10 more games.

Uggla's cute, so is Josh Willingham. I think they may have given the WC up at this point. Two dissapointing losses they chould have won....

Break up the Marlins? Maybe they're breaking themselves up by firing manager Joe Girardi. The new manager is Fredi Gonzalez.

From what I've seen and the more I hear about Girardi, I think the Marlins were foolish to fire him. Taking the team where he did in the first year is quite a major success. Hopefully the Marlins loss will be the Nationals gain, though I've heard that he'll most likely win up with the Cubs.

Anthony

Obviously, Jeff Loria thinks he can do better than Girardi. I mean, he only was able to produce five 10-game winners, and have his rookies hit 112 HR's; a Major League record. And how dare Joe actually berate Jeff after Mr. Loria harrassed the umpires? What chutzpah ! This just proves that Jeff Loria is one of the biggest douchebag owners in professional sports. I think he ranks with one of your buddies, Anthony....does the name Dan Snyder ring a bell?

The response down here has been loud -- and people are outraged. Is it a coincidence that they hired a Cuban guy who grew up in Miami to replace him in an attempt to quell the PR nightmare they've created? Somehow I doubt it.

So maybe MLB owning the Expos/Senators was a better fate than Loria just keeping them.

On a good note, Hanley Ramirez won the Rookie of the Year in the NL. Dan Uggla finished third, and the Marlins had 3 of the top 4, plus 6 of 12 named in the voting. That's never happened before....

I agree that Ramirez's Rookie of the Year selection was great, though I thought it would go to one of the other candidates. If Loria continues to doom the team, I hope the Cardinals can land Dontrelle Willis, even if he's starting to develop a Saberhagen-style every other year pattern of winning and losing.