Marlins finally bringing back Max Meyer from Triple-A

Ely Sussman · July 26, 2024

Explaining why Meyer is making his return to the Marlins active roster now after more than three months in Jacksonville.

"Max is back," as Craig Mish of SportsGrid first reported. Instead of making his scheduled start on Friday for Triple-A Jacksonville, right-hander Max Meyer is being recalled by the Miami Marlins. He's expected to face the Milwaukee Brewers this weekend in what will be his first major league action since April 13.

Meyer has been building up to this moment for several weeks. For the majority of his Jumbo Shrimp stint, he started on a once-per-week schedule and never exceeded four innings in any appearance. The objective was to pace Fish On First's third-ranked prospect so he could continue pitching competitively throughout a full-length season while being responsible with his overall workload coming off Tommy John surgery. Throughout the past month, Meyer has been gradually lasting deeper into his starts and getting re-acclimated to shorter rest. Most notably, he worked on "normal" (by MLB standards) four days' rest between his July 9 and July 14 outings.

In 15 starts since being optioned, Meyer has posted a 4.34 ERA, 4.43 FIP and 1.48 WHIP in 58 innings pitched. His best results came recently, surrendering only two total runs in his final 19 frames.

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The decision to option Meyer in the first place was highly controversial after he began 2024 with back-to-back-to-back effective performances. The Marlins were 3-12 through 15 games, with two of those wins coming in Meyer starts.

Beyond taking post-Tommy John precautions, the team wanted to see Meyer develop into a more complete pitcher instead of relying so heavily on his signature slider.

Meyer's MLB pitch mix: 49% sliders, 34% four-seam fastballs, 15% changeups, 2% sinkers
Meyer's Triple-A pitch mix: 41% sliders, 38% four-seam fastballs, 19% changeups, 2% sinkers

Frankly, I'm still skeptical of the changeup. It has flashes of being a quality pitch, but lacks consistency—Meyer recorded only five of his 69 Triple-A strikeouts using it.

The Marlins starting rotation has been in complete disarray since Jesús Luzardo (back) and Braxton Garrett (elbow) got hurt last month.

Why did the club wait so long to call upon the former top draft pick, cycling through other arms who don't have major league-caliber stuff? Because the front office wanted to exploit Meyer's situation for their long-term gain.

Meyer entered 2024 with one year and 82 days of MLB service time (written as 1.082). He accrued 18 more days (pushing his total to 1.100) at the time of his demotion. Upon reaching 172 days of service, a player is credited with a full year, which made July 21 a magic date in Meyer's case. If the Marlins held him down until then, he could only max out at 1.171 by the end of this season, leaving him five years short of qualifying for free agency instead of four.

Mission accomplished: Meyer will now have to wait until after the 2029 season to test the open market. Meanwhile, Miami starters outside of Trevor Rogers have been predictably bad during that span, keeping them near the bottom of the standings and optimizing their chances of winning the 2025 MLB Draft lottery. It's been embarrassing to watch.

MLB and MiLB combined, Meyer is at 75 innings so far this season. He has the opportunity to make up to 12 more starts through year's end if he sticks in Miami's rotation. That would push him past his previous single-season high of 111 innings pitched from 2021 and position him to make every scheduled start in 2025 with minimal restrictions.

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