Two quality starts against the world champions later, perhaps the Miami Marlins are beginning to trust their starters a little more. 

Then again, one of those was a Sandy start, and that's never been the problem. It's the rest of the staff that has been causing headaches. Sometimes it's been on account of being legitimately unable to make it through six or more frames. More often than not though, Marlins starting pitches have just flat out not been allowed the chance to face that dreaded third turn through the batting order. If there's been one consistent source of frustration for Marlins fans so far in 2026 (Austin Slater is now the Mets problem), that would be it. 

Granted, the numbers do suggest the batter has the edge the third and fourth time through. As is the case with just about every starting pitcher, everywhere. When looked at on the singular game level, this approach makes sense. It especially would in say, a playoff series, or even in a world where baseball's regular season resembled the NBA or NFL format where the off days outnumber the gamedays in any given week. 

However, as you might have heard, the MLB season is a marathon, not a sprint. Which makes it more than fair to wonder just how long the Marlins bullpen can stay effective if they are forced to fire this many bullets this early in the season. If Miami's relievers are routinely asked to pitch innings the starter normally would, it would seem to only be a matter of time before they run out of gas. And if that happens when it's clear that the starting pitchers that keep getting pulled had gas of their own left in the tank most nights? That's the kind of thing that could haunt Miami all summer long. 

So why not split the baby on this one and just bump one of the Marlins many starters into the bullpen? 

Obviously, you wouldn't want to do this with a rookie starter. Josh Johnson did start his Marlins career doing this but only as a September call-up after a full minor-league season of brushing up on those starting pitcher skills. So this would need to be one of the veterans- Janson Junk, Max Meyer, Chris Paddack moving over. Which isn't a new idea, of course. Marlins fans have been clamoring for that since the first weekend of the season. 

Basically, this is a pitch for piggybacking. Junk was extremely effective in this role last year, and would be the natural choice if it wasn't for the fact he has multiple quality starts himself. Still, his early work in 2025 serves as proof of concept. Ideally, the outings wouldn't be of the 4 to 5 IP sort Junk logged during that stretch, which would effectively burn them for nearly as long as that day's starting pitcher. But if the Marlins could have someone who could throw 2 to 3 IP depending on pitch count two to three times a week without compromising any of their high leverage bullpen arms? 

That sounds well worth considering, and possibly vital to making sure the Marlins best relievers have something left for the playoff push.