On Sunday, Marlins manager Edwin Rodriguez resigned. The team was in the midst of a nine game losing streak, and has only won one game all June. That losing streak is now at ten games, and the Marlins are turning to a familiar face to help right the ship: former two-time Manager of the Year, and Marlins World Champion, Jack McKeon. Excuse me, the 80 year-old Jack McKeon.
I’m trying to comprehend why they’d go to McKeon here. His current role in the organization was that of a special advisor to owner Jeffrey Loria, who has a friendship with McKeon that goes back a ways, and the old man apparently wanted to go back into the dugout. But is this really the best scenario for McKeon to jump into?
I’ll go ahead and say no. This isn’t the 2003 team that he inherited from Jeff Torborg that was only six games under .500 and nine games out of first place just five weeks into the season. We’re only three weeks away from the All-Star Break and the Fish are 12.5 games out of first and eight games under .500. Their best pitcher, Josh Johnson, is on the 60-day DL and won’t be back until after the All-Star Break at the earliest. His best hitter, Hanley Ramirez, is playing terribly this season with a .405 OPS in June and a .596 OPS overall. Ricky Nolasco, once considered a borderline top ten pitcher in the National League, has a 4.48 ERA thanks to 111 hits allowed in only 94 1/3 innings. The Marlins biggest free agent signing, starting pitcher Javier Vazquez, has been…well, let’s just say that “disaster” is an understatement. In Vazquez’s return to the NL East, he has a 6.85 ERA in 14 starts and is averaging just above five innings a start. That’s um, really not good.
It’s just been an absolute nightmare season for Florida, especially over the past three weeks. There are 65 pitchers in baseball with more wins than the Marlins in June, including six relievers and ten from the NL East. The only silver lining for McKeon: this IS the bottom of the barrel. You can’t play much worse than the Marlins have this month. They’ve still got a couple of more than capable hitters who are producing this year in Gaby Sanchez and Mike Stanton. Anibal Sanchez has been living up to his potential and is a probable All-Star for the team. There are a lot of really good pieces here. If Ramirez can get back to his all-world form, and Johnson comes back slinging fastballs like he’s been able to do for most of his career, this team should be able to dig itself out of it’s hole. But it’s not going to be able to dig itself all the way up to the top of the division. The deficit is just too large right now, and with the Phillies looking unstoppable, the window for winning the division was slammed shut once the team started this horrific slide.
