All in all, you can't call the 2025 Miami Marlins anything less than a roaring success. The 2024 model of the Marlins went 62-100, and then proceeded to deal away their most productive offensive player in the offseason. To finish seventeen games better at 79-83 just a year later, and to do so without a ton of splashy free agent signings or promotions of generational prospects, is remarkable.
Jordan Hicks is a pitcher who needs an offseason of work under his belt to be unlocked. James Tibbs got shipped off for Dustin May, which never really made sense to me because Dustin May also felt like a pitcher who needs an offseason of work to be unlocked, but he was on an expiring deal so I guess the Red Sox thought otherwise.
Last week? I was incensed to an unhealthy degree by everything they did wrong, waiting with teeth bared for them to shoot themselves in the foot again. But Wednesday night? Yes, David Peterson gave up a grand slam to turn a 2-2 tie into a 6-2 Padres lead that would prove insurmountable, and no, Peterson shouldn't do things like that. But he gave it up to Manny Machado, who's an awfully good player and an even better one with the bases loaded.
It's really understanding the rules of him coming in as a reliever and knowing that because of the rule and the way it's set up right now as a starter, he can come out of the game and still maintain as a DH. But he comes in as a reliever, you got to find that line of where the game is because you can't have him come in in the sixth and then take him out as a pitcher in the seventh and then keep him as a DH.
