Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Slide continues as Marlins are swept
This September looks a lot like last season
PHILADELPHIA — Any lost season like the Miami Marlins’ 2017 comes with a long list of what-ifs, and Thursday offered another: What if they had played better against the lowly Phillies?
Miami’s 10-0 loss to Philadelphia concluded the teams’ season series. The Marlins went 8-11, with one win in their final seven games.
The Phillies’ sweep at Citizens Bank Park this week sends the Marlins further down their September spiral, with two wins in their past 17 games. Toward the beginning of that run was a home series in which they lost three out of four to Philly.
“We’ve been reeling ever since,” manager Don Mattingly said Thursday afternoon.
It’s not just the Phillies, who until this week had the worst record in baseball, who have tormented the Marlins. They are also 5-10 — with five walkoff losses — against the Braves, another bad NL East team.
The Marlins are 68-78 and on the cusp of mathematical elimination from playoff contention. If they had beaten the Phillies and Braves at the same rates the rest of the majors have, the Mar-
lins would be 76-70 and still in the thick of the wild-card hunt.
Is the Marlins’ poor play against the Phillies a missed opportunity?
“Not really. I think it characterizes our club,” Mattingly said. “We’re a below-.500 team. We had our chances. We get to 3
1⁄2, 4 [games back] not too long ago in the wild-card [standings] and disappear.”
That might sound familiar. On Sept. 1, 2016, the Marlins were three games back of a wild-card spot. Then they started and ended the month with separate 3-7 stretches.
“We’ve had two years of that,” Mattingly said. “So that’s a little scary, when you have the same group of guys that you feel like one year they have a chance to go through it and grow up and you can say, ‘Hey, we’re a young club, this is our first real pennant race where we had a real shot.’
“[Last year,] we were in the driver’s seat to be in playoff contention last year and we fell apart. This year, we fight our way back into it, and as soon as we get back into it we fall apart.”
For the Marlins and their new owners, who in the coming months have big-picture decisions to make about the franchise’s long-term future, these Septembers will be among the factors considered in figuring out which direction to go.
“I’m not sure if it’s a cold streak at the wrong time,” Mattingly said, “or we’re just not quite good enough.”
On Thursday, they definitely weren’t good enough. Right-hander Vance Worley, starting on short notice as the Marlins tweaked their rotation, allowed eight runs (seven earned) in 1 1⁄3 innings. Rhys Hoskins homered again, his eighth in 10 games against Miami.
Gianarlo Stanton, Marcell Ozuna and Christian Yelich rode the bench. J.T. Realmuto and Dee Gordon exited early. Rookie third baseman Brian Anderson went 3 for 4 with two doubles.