5 MIAMI MARLINS

O/U WINS: 70.5

KEY PLAYER: Brian Anderson. The closest facsimile this young club has to a homegrown grizzled veteran, the 27-year-old third baseman led the team to its first postseason appearance since 2003 last year. PLAYER WHO’LL NEED TO STEP UP: Jorge Alfaro. Acquired from the Phillies in the 2019 J.T. Realmuto trade, Alfaro, 27, hasn’t fully eradicated the high hopes once projected for him. Like the Yankees’ Gary Sanchez, the catcher lost his starting job in the playoffs last year (to Chad Wallach) and is being afforded another opportunity.

NAME YOU’LL GET TO KNOW: Sixto Sanchez. You may very well already know Sanchez, who joined Alfaro in that Realmuto deal. Now you’ll get to know him better, and since he hasn’t lost his rookie status, he’ll be a bona fide contender for NL Rookie of the Year. BIGGEST QUESTION MARK: How real was what they accomplished last year? They went 31-29, which even a bad team can do for 37 percent of a standard baseball season.

HOW IT’LL GO DOWN:

Do you remember the 2005 NL East? The Nationals finished last ... at 81-81. That could be these Marlins, an exciting team with a new, historic GM in Kim Ng competing in baseball’s toughest division (but also with easy targets in the NL’s other two divisions). There’s hope for the future. Maybe not for 2021, though.

PROJECTED LINEUP LF Corey Dickerson CF Starling Marte 1B Jesus Aguilar RF Adam Duvall 3B Brian Anderson 2B Jazz Chisholm C Jorge Alfaro SS Miguel Rojas

ROTATION

RHP Sandy Alcantara RHP Pablo Lopez RHP Elieser Hernandez LHP Trevor Rogers RHP Nick Neidert